Is self-esteem earned or ascribed?

I think treating self-esteem as an ascribed status benefits no one.  It isn’t something that you are born with and carry throughout your life.  Self-esteem varies from task to task, from interactions with peers and authority figures and is a constantly changing status throughout your life.  If it was something you either had or you didn’t then people with high self-esteem would never face any doubt about their own abilities or self-worth, and low self-esteem people could never meet any challenges laid out before them – and this just isn’t the case.  The danger in assuming self-esteem is an ascribed status is that individuals with low self-esteem are doomed to have it forever and will constantly see this view reinforced when comparing themselves to the perceived ascribed statuses of others even if it doesn’t necessarily reflect reality.  Self-esteem is a result of what we have done and is very much an earned status.  In an article for the Los Angeles Times titled Self-Esteem is Earned, Not Learned Mike Schmoker makes a great point about fostering self-esteem in education:

“Like it or not, self-esteem is very much a function of such unyielding realities as what we can do, what we've done with what we have and what we've made of ourselves. And so the school--with every effort toward sensitivity, compassion and encouragement--should reinforce this, while cultivating ability, talent, decency and the capacity for sustained effort, the belief that you get what you pay for” (Schmoker, 1989).

It is not enough for a school to foster self-esteem by telling a student to feel good about themselves, or to tell them they are successful because this fosters a false sense of self-esteem which can easily dissipate the next time a student faces any struggle or conflict.  This doesn’t mean that it is fully up to the student to take charge in developing self-esteem, rather we should be giving them the tools to develop a sense of self-esteem through success and encouragement.  Focus on the positives and help them improve in areas of less confidence.  According to Carl Rogers in his essay Teacher effects research on student self-concept a student displays fewer disruptions, showed increased levels on tests of self-concept and made great gains on academic achievement if taught by teachers who had greater empathy towards, respect for and valued the opinions of their students (Rogers, n.d.).  The key lies in developing students that feel as if their opinion is valued, and this will help them see their own worth.

Rogers, C. (n.d.). Teacher effects research on student self concept. Handout from EDU 6526, Seattle           Pacific University, Feb. 24, 2017

Schmoker, M. (1989, October 7).  Self-Esteem Is Earned, Not Learned.  Los Angeles Times.  Retrieved        from http://articles.latimes.com/1989-10-07/local/me-394_1_esteem-earn-learned.