Thesis advisor: V. Paul Poteat / Homelessness is an ever expanding and complex phenomena that adversely affects the well-being of individuals and society. Research suggests the experience of homelessness and its correlates, including discrimination, are especially detrimental to mental health. However, the prevalence of discrimination endured by the Unhoused Community is unclear. There is also a dearth of research concerning factors that may promote resilience in the face of these stressors. Therefore, the purpose of the current study was to determine the extent of discrimination experienced by Persons without Homes and assess the potential of spirituality to buffer the association between discrimination and mental health. A quantitative analysis of responses from 206 participants revealed the correlational and moderational effect of various aspects of spirituality on discrimination and its association with self-esteem, depression, and anxiety. As hypothesized, higher levels of discrimination were significantly correlated with lower levels of self-esteem, greater levels of anxiety, and more depressive symptomatology among Persons without Homes. In addition, all five aspects of spirituality measured (spiritual belief, private spiritual behavior, public spiritual behavior, spiritual social support, and daily spiritual experiences) had a significant moderating effect on the adverse association of discrimination on depression. Two aspects of spirituality (spiritual belief and public spiritual behavior) also significantly moderated the negative association of discrimination on self-esteem. In summary, various aspects of spirituality attenuated the adverse association between discrimination and mental health. These findings have multiple implications for future policy, research, clinical work, social service delivery, and pastoral care. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2021. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Counseling, Developmental and Educational Psychology.

The present study simultaneously examined self-oriented and socially-prescribed perfectionism, self-esteem, depression, and procrastination. Ninety-five undergraduate participants were given the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (MPS), Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), and the Procrastination Assessment Scale for Students (PASS). Multiple regression results indicate that there was a significant multiple relationships between socially-prescribed perfectionism, selforiented perfectionism, self-esteem, and procrastination (R= .56). However, while depression was not a contributing factor predicting procrastination, it was significant when examined with procrastination alone (r= .403, w .000). In addition, there were no gender differences found among the participants with regard to perfectionism, selfesteem, depression, or procrastination. The results have implications for the clinical field in practice and research settings.

The self-esteem of children with Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) has been hypothesized to be low. These children receive frequent negative feedback from the important people in their lives for their hyperactive, impulsive and often intrusive behaviors and for frequent academic failures, which can result in low self-esteem. The research in this area however, reveals conflicting results. The purpose of this research study was to answer the question, "Is there a difference in self-esteem between elementary school children diagnosed with ADD/ADHD and their peers?" A comparative descriptive study design was used to compare the self-esteem scores on the Coopersmith Self-Esteem Inventory (SEI) of81 third- and fourth-grade students with (n = 7) and without (n = 74) a diagnosis of ADD or ADHD. Teacher ratings for each subject's self-esteem using the Behavioral Academic Self-Esteem Rating Scale (BASE) and parent ratings of their child's self-esteem as high, average or low were also compared. Using the demographic information provided by participants parents, there were no significant differences between groups by gender, ethnicity, parents' marital status, parent's level of education, parental employment, or number of children in the home, Jl. > .05. Parent ranking of the self-esteem of the children with ADD/ADHD was significantly lower than their peers, Jl_ = .013. Although no significant differences were found between groups on the SEI or the BASE total scores or subscales,12 > .05, the ADD/ADHD group did consistently rate themselves lower than their average classmate on the SEI. These findings are clinically significant in that studies of adolescents with a childhood diagnosis of ADD or ADHD consistently reveal low self-esteem by that age. These findings are similar to previous research with this age group. It is proposed that these children tend to answer defensively or offer inflated self-evaluations as a selfprotective mechanism. Advanced Practiced Nurses are often part of a collaborative team in the Family Practice, Pediatric, or Psychiatric office setting or in a school health setting which provide opportunities to identify indications of low self-esteem and to offer early appropriate interventions for the child, parents, teachers and significant others in the child's life, which may help to minimize the life long negative consequences associated with low self-esteem. Limitations of the study, and recommendations for future research are discussed.

The purpose of this study was to determine whether relationships exist among self-esteem, emotional intelligence, and exercise frequency, duration, and adherence. To establish such relationships, 64 University of Central Florida students completed experimental packets designed to test their levels of self-esteem, emotional intelligence, and exercise behavior. The responses were analyzed using SPSS and the Pearson correlation coefficient. Significant positive correlations were found between self-esteem and exercise frequency, duration, and adherence. Further significant positive correlations were found between emotional intelligence and exercise duration and adherence, and between emotional intelligence and self-esteem. These are important findings. The research suggests emotional intelligence may be a variable relevant to individual exercise goals as well as self esteem. In addition the study supports past research concerning the relationship between exercise and self-esteem.

Studies indicate that global self-esteem, an individual's overall sense of self-worth, and academic self-esteem, self-worth related to academics, are positively related to academic achievement. This relationship holds for white adolescents. However, while still positive, this relationship is weaker for African Americans, who have high global and academic self-esteem, but very low academic achievement. Patterns for Mexican Americans are less clear, but their global and academic self-esteem appear to fall between the range for white and African American adolescents, while their academic achievement is similar to that of African Americans. To address this, I construct Combinatoric Identity Theory (CIT), a symbolic interactionist theory that incorporates the importance of racial/ethnic and student identities into our current understandings of self-esteem and achievement. I then apply CIT to data collected on Mexican American and white tenth-graders.After a discussion of the relevant literature on education, self-esteem, and identity, I discuss my data collection strategy and techniques. This is followed by empirical analysis. Results indicate that identity processes do affect self-esteem, and that they operate in similar ways for Mexican American and white adolescents. Implications of these results and directions for future research are then presented.

The purpose of this study was to determine if academic achievement and academic self-esteem can be linked to the non-traditional organizational pattern of looping in kindergarten and first grade classes. Looping is defined as one teacher remaining with the same students for two or more years. Using a control group-experimental group design where the experimental group participated in the looping program and the control group did not, and applying the statistical procedure of multivariate analysis of variance (MANAVO), it was found that there was no significant difference between the subjects in the two groups on the criterion variable of academic achievement as measured by the Iowa Test of Basic Skills, and the criterion variable of academic self-esteem as measured by the Culture-Free Self-Esteem Inventory, Second Edition. It was concluded that further study would need to be done to determine if there are advantages to an organizational pattern of looping for students in public elementary schools.

The problem of this study was to determine through the use of taped media receptivity to dissonant or consonant information and to appraise those conditions which bring about change in attitude in light of dissonance theory.

Maternal or paternal absence in one- or two-parent families, the presence of stepparents, and reasons for the disruption of the original family were analyzed in relation to the self-esteem of 501 males and females in grades 3-6 as measured by Coopersmith's Self-Esteem Inventory. The study provided a review of the broken-home literature followed by the methodology, results, and conclusions pertinent to the investigation. A step-wise multiple regression analysis and two-way and three-way factorial analyses of variance revealed no significant differences in the self esteem levels of children from intact or disrupted families. Conclusions suggested that children from all family structures may have experienced both debilitating and nurturing environments. Recommendations supported parent training.

Sexual and gender minorities are subjected to discrimination and stigmatization which increase vulnerability to psychological co-morbidities (Mays & Cochran, 2001). The mechanisms through which discrimination contributes to distress in lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (lgbt) communities can be partially elucidated through the minority stress model. The minority stress model argues that minorities are subjected to negative societal attitudes and discrimination that results in excessive psychosocial stress related to their minority position, which is distinct from daily stress. Meyer’s minority stress model is supported by social stress theoriesand data linking discrimination to stress in lgb samples. Researchers suggest that self-esteem buffers the negative effects of adverse experiences but tests of the moderating effect of self-esteem on the discrimination-distress relationship in ethnic and gender minorities yielded mixed results. Szymanski found that self-esteem moderates the relationship between discrimination and psychological distress in a male sexual minority sample, but this has never been tested in a gender-balanced sexual minority sample. We hypothesized that higher levels of self-esteem are associated with lower overall perceived stress in lgbt adults, and that self-esteem acts differentially in lgbt populations to moderate perceived discrimination. We found that discrimination, self-esteem and the interaction effect between discrimination and self-esteem accounted for 53 percent of the total variance in perceived stress scores, ∆R2 = .38; adj. R2 = .53, F(12, 133) = 14.47, p < .001.When we tested whether self-esteem moderated the relationship between discrimination and stress, discrimination was positively related to stress, β = .13, t(144) = 2.14, p < .05, and self-esteem was negatively related to stress, β = -.63, t(144) = -10.26, p < .001. The interaction between self-esteem and discrimination positively correlated with stress, β = .14, t(144) = 2.29, p < .05. Our findings suggest that self-esteem may alleviate the impact of discrimination on perceived stress, which has important implications for interventions designed to reduce stress in lgbt communities.

Although romantic relationships are an important source of self-esteem, individuals vary in the degree to which romantic relationships determine their self-esteem. For individuals with relationship-contingent self-esteem (RCSE), self-esteem is based on the quality of perceived romantic relationship functioning. In contrast, global self-esteem is derived from a variety of domains, not specifically relationship quality. The present study investigated the moderating effects of RCSE and global self-esteem on the effects of relationship specific or relationship-unrelated threats and self-affirmations. Individuals with low global self-esteem react to threats by distancing themselves from their romantic partners. For those low in RCSE, this should occur only when the threats are relationship specific, whereas those low in global self-esteem distance themselves regardless of what type of threat they experience. Exposure to self-affirmations limits this defensive distancing in individuals with low global self-esteem. Prior studies examining the effects of induced self-threats and self-affirmations on perceived relationship functioning have been limited by reliance on college student samples, whose relationships are often shorter in duration than older adults. The current studies examined self-esteem and RCSE within the context of older participants in longer romantic relationships. Specifically, Study 1 examined how self-threats and self-affirmations interacted with dispositional levels of RCSE and self-esteem to predict romantic relationship outcomes. Participants wrote about past experiences to induce self-affirmations or self-threats, which were either relational (i.e., about their current relationship) or non-relational (i.e., about their personal lives), and then completed measures of relationship functioning. Contrary to predictions, there were no significant interactions between either RCSE or self-esteem and the experimental conditions. There was a significant main effect for self-esteem, such that participants with low self-esteem reported less commitment, closeness, and satisfaction as compared to participants with high self-esteem. In Study 2, participants completed one of two writing prompts: a prompt to induce high RCSE, or a control prompt. Participants then wrote about past experiences to induce self-threats that were either relational or non-relational. Contrary to hypotheses, inducing high levels of RCSE and exposing participants to a relational self-threat did not result in decreased relationship commitment, closeness, or satisfaction. The results of both Study 1 and Study 2 are contrary to previous research; potential explanations for this discrepancy and implications are discussed.