This case-study was conducted in Babati Town in Tanzania and examines what motivates women to go to secondary school and the goals that they have with their education. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 young women and a content analysis was conducted on the interview narratives. Motivation plays a vital role for being able to accomplish and perform well in education and to improve future life. Maslow’s theory of motivation, the needs hierarchy, is used to examine how the women’s motivations can be viewed. The concept of empowerment is used to examine if the women are motivated by empowerment. The results of this study show that control over their own life is a primary motivation for the women as well as having an income and a job. The results are connected to previous research showing that the goals of having a stable income and attracting a well-educated partner are primary motivations. The women are primarily motivated by the higher levels of Maslow’s needs hierarchy, i.e. the esteem needs and the study shows that women’s motivations can be connected to empowerment. The study also connects Maslow’s needs hierarchy and empowerment to development.

In face-to-face contexts, individuals typically make one social comparison per day and make more self-enhancing downward comparisons (to worse-off others) than potentially threatening upward comparisons (to better-off others). However, online social networks such as Facebook may be radically altering these standards. In two studies, I examined the frequency, direction, and impact of social comparisons on Facebook, and investigated potential moderating factors, including self-esteem. Participants reported making more upward than downward Facebook comparisons (Studies 1 and 2) and made an average of four comparisons in a 20-minute Facebook session (Study 2). Both low self-esteem and being motivated to log onto Facebook to get information with others predict making more comparisons on Facebook (Study 1) and participants with lower self-esteem may feel worse about themselves after making both upward and downward Facebook comparisons compared to their higher self-esteem peers (Study 2).

The purpose of the present study was to examine whether women who have been victimized can have a decrease in their negative affect by being exposed to the suggestion of one of two dimensions of forgiveness. The study also examined the moderating effect of several personality variables on participants reactions to the intervention. Seventy-nine women were given several personality and affect questionnaires before and after they listened to instructions for either granting forgiveness (interpersonal), letting go of their negative affect (intrapsychic), or relaxation (control). Results indicated that focusing on granting forgiveness was associated with more negative affect than the other two interventions. Main effects and moderating effects were found for certain personality characteristics such as self esteem and self efficacy. These findings provide conflicting support for the use of forgiveness therapy with victimized women by suggesting that some benefits may be gained, but personality characteristics should be considered before beginning this type of therapy.

The purpose of this study was to replicate the findings of McDonald and McKinney (1988) who found a significant relationship between low self-esteem and exclusive dating among high school students. Its purpose was also to study components that might lead an adolescent with low self-esteem to seek a steady dating relationship and to discern if any gender differences in this compensation occurred. Measures designed to determine: activity involvement; dating status; the person (parent or peer) an adolescent was most likely to talk to; and self-esteem were administered to 122 high school students. Analysis did not replicate the original findings by McDonald and McKinney. Also the only variable found to have a significiant interaction with self-esteem was activity involvement. Interesting gender differences were found in the relationship between who a person talks to and dating style. Boys, who were involved in an exclusive or steady dating relationship, were significantly more likely to turn to peers for conversation than were boys not involved in this type of dating. No such relationship existed for girls, however. It is hypothesized that population differences lead to the non-replication of the previous study and that for some boys, intimacy may only be found in the dating relationship. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

This study explored the relationship between perceived familial support to self-esteem in gay and bisexual men along a continuum of infection with the AIDS virus. Subjects were primarily obtained from two HIV/AIDS care coordination, education and social support centers. All participants completed the Coopersmith (1967) Self-Esteem Inventory, the Perceived Social Support-Family (PSS-Fa) questionnaire by Procidano and Heller (1983) and a demographic questionnaire. Two hypotheses were proposed: 1) Self-esteem will increase with strength of perceived Perceived Familial Support familial support. 2) Self-esteem will decrease as the stage of HIV infection worsens. Significant support was found for the first hypothesis. The second hypothesis was not supported; however, some reasons are postulated. The continuum of HIV infection and self-esteem as it relates to stages of death and dying are discussed. Implications and suggestions for counseling HIV-infected persons are addressed. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

Bowlby’s (1973) theory of adult attachment was used to provide a theoretical framework for the present study, which examined the relationship between adult attachment and depression. Social support, self-esteem, and optimism were proposed as potential mediating factors. Two competing models were designed and tested to investigate relationships among variables. Models were determined a priori based on theoretical and empirical literature. In the primary model, adult attachment was proposed to influence depression both directly and also indirectly through social support, self esteem and optimism. Alternately, in the second model, additional paths were added from social support and optimism to self esteem. Structural equation modeling was used to assess the fit of the two models to the data for the present study. Hypotheses of the study were that insecure attachment styles would correlate with negative outcomes, including dissatisfaction with social support, low self-esteem, pessimistic life orientation, and depressive symptoms. The hypothesized relationships among variables were supported by the data. Specifically, adult attachment directly influenced social support, self-esteem, and optimism; adult attachment indirectly influenced self-esteem through social support and optimism; finally, attachment, social support, and optimism indirectly influenced depression through self-esteem. In the discussion section, implications for theory and practice, methodological limitations, and directions for future research are provided. Results of the study conclude that attachment style has the potential to significantly influence many different areas of life functioning, including satisfaction with social support, self-esteem, levels of optimism, and depression. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

The author drew on sociometer theory to propose that self-esteem is attuned to traits that garner others??? acceptance, and the traits that garner acceptance depend on one???s social role. Attunement of self-esteem refers to the linkage, or connection, between self-esteem and specific traits, which may be observed most clearly in the association between self-esteem and specific self-evaluations. In most roles, appearance and popularity determine acceptance, so self-esteem is most attuned to those traits. At the same time, interdependent social roles emphasize the value of communal qualities, so occupants of those roles have self-esteem that is more attuned to communal qualities than is the general norm. To avoid the biases of people's personal theories, attunement of self-esteem to particular traits was assessed indirectly via the correlation between self-esteem and self-ratings (Study 2), with cognitive accessibility measures (Study 3), by observing the responsiveness of people???s self-concepts to social cues about the self (Study 4), and with an experiment involving social decision-making (Study 5). As hypothesized, self-esteem was generally more attuned to appearances than communal qualities, but interdependent social roles predicted heightened attunement of self-esteem to qualities like kindness and understanding.

Ortorexia Nervosa (ON) är ett sällsynt förekommande ämne inom dagens forskning. ON behandlar en besatthet av en viss typ av livsmedel som senare leder till social isolering. Studien genomfördes med syfte att undersöka om ON förekommer bland gymnasieelever, om bassjälvkänsla och förvärvad självkänsla, vetskap om sitt eget BMI samt kön är kopplat till fenomenet. Undersökningen genomfördes med enkäter som mätte graden av ON samt självkänsla. Åttiofem gymnasieelever svarade på enkäterna. Resultatet visade att tretton procent av respondenterna fick poäng över tröskelvärdet för ON. Ingen signifikant korrelation uppkom beträffande relationen mellan könen. Undersökningen visade signifikanta samband mellan ON och de två typerna av självkänsla: vid högt behov av förvärvad självkänsla samt låg bassjälvkänsla tenderar individen att ha högre grad av ON.

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