Measuring Self-Esteem in Context: The Importance of ...download.xuebalib.com/xuebalib.com.51036.pdfMeasuring Self-Esteem in Context: The Importance of Stability of Self-Esteem in Psychological

Measuring Self-Esteem in Context: The

Importance of Stability of Self-Esteem in

Psychological Functioning

Michael H. Kernis

Department of Psychology and

Institute for Behavioral Research

University of Georgia

ABSTRACT In this article, I report on a research program that hasfocused on the joint roles of stability and level of self-esteem in variousaspects of psychological functioning. Stability of self-esteem refers to themagnitude of short-term fluctuations that people experience in their cur-rent, contextually based feelings of self-worth. In contrast, level of self-esteem refers to representations of people’s general, or typical, feelings ofself-worth. A considerable amount of research reveals that self-esteemstability has predictive value beyond the predictive value of self-esteemlevel. Moreover, considering self-esteem stability provides one way todistinguish fragile from secure forms of high self-esteem. Results froma number of studies are presented and theoretical implications arediscussed.

Some time ago, I had a dream in which I was shopping for clothes

at a department store. Each time that I tried to put an article ofclothing on, it would not go up past my knees. Now, I am a big person,

so this was fast becoming a very frustrating experience. Soon I con-cluded that I must be in the wrong department, and I fell back asleep.

Imagine my surprise when I awoke in the morning to find my wife’s

Address correspondence to Michael Kernis, Department of Psychology, University

of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, or to [email protected]

Journal of Personality 73:6, December 2005r Blackwell Publishing 2005DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-6494.2005.00359.x

closet open and, scattered across the floor laid multiple pairs of her

shorts. I am not recounting this dream because I want readers to im-agine me wearing women’s clothing as they read this article. No, I am

recounting it to make an important point. That is, just as I was tryingunsuccessfully to cram my big body into my wife’s small shorts, self-

esteem researchers have tried unsuccessfully to incorporate all self-esteem processes into one aspect of self-esteem, namely its level

(whether it is high or low). This reliance on self-esteem level to ac-count for the role of self-esteem in psychological and interpersonalfunctioning has produced weak, inconsistent, and sometimes contra-

dictory sets of findings for a wide range of phenomena.

Self-esteem level has been implicated in a vast array of phenomena,including depression and suicidal ideation (Harter, 1993; Rosenberg,

1985), loneliness and peer rejection (Ammerman, Kazdin,& Van Hasselt, 1993; East, Hess, & Lerner, 1987), academic achieve-

ment (Hattie, 1992), and life satisfaction (Huebner, 1991) (for a re-view, see DuBois & Tevendale; 1999). Moreover, self-esteem has

been linked to a wide variety of psychopathologies (Silverstone,1991). A search of the DSM-IV-TR by O’Brien, Bartoletti, and

Leitzel (in press) revealed that ‘‘the term ‘self-esteem’ appears in 24different diagnostic contexts, as a criterion for disorders (e.g.,dysthymia), as a criterion for disorders being considered for inclu-

sion in future DSM editions (e.g., depressive personality disorder),and as an associated feature of disorders (e.g., social phobia)’’ (p. 1).

This does not include the appearance of over 50 ‘‘self’’ terms that‘‘have meanings that overlap with self-esteem, including arrogant

self-appraisal, grandiose sense of self, inflated self-appraisal, lowself-worth (dirtiness, worthlessness), self-assured (cocky), self-blame,

self-confidence, self-critical, self-deprecation, self-doubts, self-evalu-ation, and self-reproach. . . . Grandiose high self-esteem is a criterionused to define hypomanic and manic episodes, which are diagnostic

when linked to instability of mood in cyclothymic and bipolar disor-ders (O’Brien et al., in press).’’

However, despite this presumed centrality of self-esteem to var-ious aspects of psychological functioning, its precise role, more often

than desired, remains unclear. DuBois and Tevendale (1999) notedthat researchers have found self-esteem to relate positively (Hattie,

1992), as well as negatively (Skaalvik & Hagtvet, 1990), to academicachievement. In addition, DuBois and Tevendale (1999) noted that

1570 Kernis

conflicting findings have emerged in studies predicting delinquent

behavior and gang involvement (Baumeister, Smart, & Boden, 1996;Wang, 1994). In addition to the fact that inconsistent findings plague

self-esteem research, the predictive utility of self-esteem with respectto psychological health, well-being, and (mal)adaptive behavior gen-

erally is modest, with the majority of variance in these indices leftunaccounted for (DuBois & Tevendale, 1999). A more recent liter-

ature review further substantiates the claim that self-esteem level isnot a strong predictor of objective outcomes such as school achieve-

ment, occupational success, drug abuse, and criminality (Baumeister,Campbell, Kreuger, & Vohs, 2003). Findings such as these suggestthat self-esteem level, when taken alone, provides an incomplete pic-

ture of the role of self-esteem in psychological and interpersonalfunctioning.

Fortunately, in recent years, a growing number of researchers havebegun to incorporate additional aspects of self-esteem into their re-

search and theories. These aspects include implicit self-esteem (Bos-son, Brown, Zeigler-Hill, & Swann, 2003; Jordan, Spencer, & Zanna,

2002; Pelham, Koole, Hardin, Hetts, Seah, & DeHart, in press), con-tingent self-esteem (Crocker & Wolfe, 2001; Neighbors, Larimer,Geisner, & Knee, 2005) and stability of self-esteem (Kernis &

Goldman, 2002; Kernis & Waschull, 1995). In this article, I reviewa program of research that my students and I have undertaken to

examine the joint implications of level and stability of self-esteem forvarious aspects of psychological and interpersonal functioning. I

begin by discussing some definitional and measurement issues con-cerning these two self-esteem components.

DISTINGUISHING BETWEEN LEVEL AND STABILITYOF SELF-ESTEEM

Self-esteem level refers to people’s representations of their typical, orgeneral, global feelings of self-worth. In our research, we have par-

ticipants complete a standard measure of global self-esteem—foradults, Rosenberg’s (1965) Self-Esteem Scale; for children, either

Rosenberg’s Self-Esteem Scale or the global self-worth subscale ofHarter’s (1985) Self-Perception Profile for Children—under explicit

instructions to ‘‘base their responses on how they typically, or gener-ally, feel about themselves.’’ Assessment of self-esteem level usually

Stability of Self-Esteem 1571

takes place in a laboratory or other formal ‘‘testing’’ setting, outside

the context of people’s everyday lives. Thus, self-esteem level reflectspeople’s representations of how they typically feel about themselves

across time and context. Although these representations can change,the changes usually occur slowly and over an extended time

period (Rosenberg, 1986). Furthermore, self-esteem level exhibitsconsiderable rank-order stability, even over many years (Rosenberg,

1986).In contrast, self-esteem stability refers to the magnitude of short-

term fluctuations that people experience in their contextually based,

immediate feelings of self-worth. In our research, we ask people tocomplete a measure of global self-esteem (either Rosenberg’s or Har-

ter’s) once or twice daily for periods ranging from 5 to 7 days, withinstructions to base their responses on how they feel ‘‘at the moment’’

they are completing each form. We then compute the standard devi-ation of people’s total scores across these multiple assessments: The

greater the standard deviation, the more unstable individuals’ self-esteem. On Rosenberg’s measure, the response format is 10 dots, an-

chored by the labels ‘‘strongly disagree’’ and ‘‘strongly agree.’’ We didthis to reduce the extent to which people linked their responses tospecific numbers, presumably making it easier for them to give dif-

ferent responses across the multiple assessments.The major virtue of obtaining multiple assessments of current self-

esteem is that it provides for the measurement of self-esteem stabilityin the context of everyday events experienced by individuals. Along

with this ecological validity, however, comes a relative lack of con-trol over the data collection. Fortunately, our previous research in-

dicates that the quality of data we obtain is high. That is, the vastmajority of participants take the task seriously and complete themeasures at or close to the times we ask them to (as assessed in

extensive individual debriefing sessions).

A BRIEF HISTORY AND THEORY PRESENTATION(AND DIGRESSION)

I began my research on stability of self-esteem because of what Ibelieved to be a strong contradiction between data and theory that

existed in the literature on the nature of high self-esteem and its rolein psychological functioning. On the one hand, considerable findings

1572 Kernis

emerged that purported to demonstrate that individuals with high

self-esteem were highly motivated to protect and enhance theirpositive feelings of self-worth even if it meant being overtly self-

serving, self-destructive, or antagonistic toward others. For example,high self-esteem individuals (1) take great pride in their successes

(‘‘I am highly intelligent’’), but tenaciously deny any responsibilityfor their failures (‘‘The instructor designed a very poor test’’) (Fitch,

1970); (2) criticize out-group members who threaten their (or theirgroup’s) sense of value and worth (Crocker, Thompson, McGraw, &

Ingerman, 1987); and (3) create obstacles to successful performancethat can easily backfire (Tice, 1991) just to enhance their sense ofcompetence should they nonetheless succeed. Other research

demonstrates that, when threatened, high self-esteem individualssabotage their own performances in the service of self-esteem

protection. For example, high self-esteem individuals whose egosare threatened take excessive risks by overestimating their compe-

tence, resulting in unnecessary performance declines (Baumeister,Heatherton, & Tice, 1993). Findings such as these imply that indi-

viduals with high self-esteem go around leading their lives with a‘‘defend the fort’’ mentality, tenaciously warding off any and allpotential threats. Importantly, Tennen and Affleck (1993) pointed

out the puzzling nature of these findings, noting that routine use ofvarious self-protective and self-enhancing strategies may have nega-

tive consequences such as undermining an individual’s personalrelationships and the development of skills needed to overcome

future adversities.As I read this research on how individuals with high self-esteem

react to evaluative information, I could not help but think that itcontradicted my own intuitive sense of what it means to have high

self-esteem. If one is truly happy with oneself, being outperformedby others, receiving an unflattering evaluation, or performing poorlyshould not require excessive self-protection; instead, high self-esteem

individuals should roll with the punches so that potentially threat-ening events would not ‘‘stick,’’ but, instead, roll off like ‘‘water off a

duck’s back.’’ As I read more, I found that my intuitive character-ization of high self-esteem was also the view of high self-esteem held

by clinical psychologists with humanistic leanings (e.g., Rogers, 1959),as well as by some major self-esteem theorists (e.g., Rosenberg,

1986). Note that I am not saying that possessing high self-esteemmeans that people are impervious to adverse events. What I am


saying is that while they may feel frustrated, disappointed, or sad,

people with high self-esteem should not generally revise their feelingsof self-worth in the face of adverse occurrences.

It occurred to me that one way out of this potential contradictionbetween research and theory was to presume that multiple forms of

high self-esteem exist that differ in the extent to which they are secureor fragile. The research findings of social-personality psychologists

seemed to be tapping aspects of fragile high self-esteem, whereashumanistically oriented theorists seemed to be capturing aspects ofsecure high self-esteem. If this were true, it would raise the question

of how to measure these different forms of high self-esteem. Aroundthat time, I read a paper by Savin-Williams and Demo (1983)

that suggested to me one way of doing so. Savin-Williams andDemo used the experience sampling method to obtain multiple

assessments of adolescents’ contextually based self-esteem. Specifi-cally, participants in this research completed a self-esteem measure

when prompted by a paging device (‘‘beeper’’) at random timeintervals throughout the day as they were going about their every-

day activities. Findings indicated significant individual variationin how much participants’ contextually based self-esteem fluctuat-ed; specifically, whereas the self-esteem of some adolescents

fluctuated little or not at all, the self-esteem of other adolescentsfluctuated substantially.

As it happened, I had also read a chapter by Rosenberg (1986) inwhich he distinguished between barometric and baseline instability.

Baseline instability refers to long-term fluctuations in one’s self-esteem that occur gradually over an extended time period. For

example, decreases in self-esteem level are common as children tran-sition from the relatively safe environs of elementary school to themore turbulent middle school environment, often followed by slow

but steady increases in self-esteem through the high school years(e.g., Bachman, O’Malley, & Johnston, 1978; Demo & Savin-Will-

iams, 1983; McCarthy & Hoge, 1982; O’Malley & Bachman, 1983;Savin-Williams & Demo, 1984). In contrast, barometric instability

reflects short-term fluctuations in one’s contextually based globalself-esteem. Through many discussions with one of my graduate stu-

dents at the time, Bruce Grannemann, we began to develop a con-ceptualization of the meaning and nature of unstable (barometric)

self-esteem (Kernis, Grannemann, & Barclay, 1989; see also Kernis,2003a; Kernis & Goldman, 2002; Kernis & Paradise, 2002; Kernis &

1574 Kernis

Waschull, 1995). I turn now to a brief discussion of this conceptu-

alization.Unstable self-esteem may take numerous forms. Some people may

experience dramatic shifts from feeling very positively to very neg-atively about themselves. Others, however, may primarily fluctuate

in the extent to which they feel positively or negatively about them-selves. The precise nature of these fluctuations is likely to depend

upon a number of factors, including the salience of specific self-as-pects and the valence of recently experienced self-relevant events

(cf. Markus & Kunda, 1986). The implications of various patterns offluctuations have yet to be examined, but I believe that, in general,they all will reflect an underlying fragility in feelings of self-worth.

Elsewhere (Kernis, Cornell, Sun, Berry, & Harlow, 1993), I haveargued that the essence of unstable self-esteem is the propensity to

experience short-term fluctuations in contextually based feelings ofself-worth that interact with situationally based factors to produce

specific patterns of fluctuations. Thus, these fluctuations may attimes (or for certain people) be primarily unidirectional (e.g., within

either a relatively positive or negative range) or bidirectional (be-tween positive and negative ranges) (for a relevant discussion of thisissue, see Vallacher & Novak, 2000).

Unstable self-esteem reflects fragile, vulnerable feelings of imme-diate self-worth that are influenced by the vicissitudes of potentially

self-relevant events that either are externally provided (e.g., interper-sonal rejection) or self-generated (reflecting on one’s dating prowess).

One core characteristic of people with fragile self-esteem is that theyare highly responsive to events that have potential relevance to their

feelings of self-worth—in fact, they may interpret events as being self-esteem relevant even when they are not (cf. Greenier et al., 1999). For

example, a nonreturned smile to a colleague may be viewed as re-flective of one’s own shortcomings and not of the other being pre-occupied. Individuals with unstable self-esteem may respond by

accepting or exaggerating an event’s evaluative implications (e.g.,they may feel incompetent and demoralized following a specific fail-

ure; Kernis et al., 1998) or by attacking the validity of the threateninginformation or the credibility of its source (Kernis et al., 1989). In

contrast, people with relatively stable self-esteem typically have lessextreme reactions to potentially evaluative events, precisely because

these events have little impact on their immediate feelings of self-worth. In other words, stable self-esteem reflects immediate feelings


of self-worth that generally are unaffected by everyday positive and

negative events. (Although I use the terms stable and unstable self-esteem throughout this article, this is for ease of exposition only.

Conceptually and empirically, we treat stability and level of self-es-teem as continuous dimensions along which people vary).

Several factors have been implicated in why the immediate feel-ings of self-worth of some individuals are highly unstable. These

factors include overreliance on the evaluations, love, and approval ofothers, an impoverished self-concept, and excessive dependencyneeds (Butler, Hokanson, & Flynn, 1994; Kernis, Paradise et al.,

2000; Rosenberg, 1986; Tennen & Affleck, 1993). Developmentally,harsh or controlling family environments are thought to promote

fragile, unstable feelings of self-worth (Kernis, Brown, & Brody,2000; Rogers, 1959). In addition, people with unstable self-esteem

may be especially prone to interpret everyday events as havingrelevance to their feelings of self-worth and to experience their

self-esteem as ‘‘continually on the line’’ (i.e., heightened ego involve-ment). As previously noted, these events may be external, environ-

mentally based (e.g., being turned down for a date) or moreinternally based, such as reflecting on one’s progress toward an im-portant goal. Greenier et al. (1999) portrayed this heightened ego

involvement as an ‘‘evaluative set’’ comprised of several interlockingcomponents. First, an attentional component involves ‘‘zeroing in’’

on information or events that have potentially self-evaluative impli-cations. Second, a bias component involves interpreting ambiguous-

ly or non-self-esteem relevant events as self-esteem relevant. Finally,a generalization component involves linking one’s immediate global

feelings of self-worth to specific outcomes and events (e.g., a poormath performance is taken to reflect low overall intelligence andworth). Each of these components may operate outside of one’s

awareness or be consciously and deliberately invoked (for furtherdiscussion, see Kernis & Paradise, 2002).

Although different in their specifics, each of the aforementionedfactors implies that people with unstable self-esteem do not have a

well-anchored sense of their self-worth. Also they suggest that un-stable self-esteem reflects fragile and vulnerable feelings of self-worth

that are subject to the vicissitudes of externally provided and inter-nally generated positive and negative experiences. The program of

research that I present in this article examines various implicationsof these assertions.

1576 Kernis

OUR FIRST STUDY: PREDICTING ANGER AND HOSTILITYPRONENESS AS A FUNCTION OF STABILITY AND

LEVEL OF SELF-ESTEEM

We conducted this study during the summer of 1988, collaboratingwith another graduate student, Linda Barclay (now Mathis), with

the help of an ‘‘army’’ of undergraduate research assistants. Anothergraduate student at the time, Victor Bissonnette, wrote a computerprogram that would ‘‘call’’ participants’ paging devices (beepers)

once at a random time within each of five 2-hour periods each day.For the first four time periods, we instructed participants to com-

plete a form that asked for their ‘‘current’’ affect; for the last period,we instructed participants to complete a form that asked for their

‘‘current’’ self-esteem. Specifically, we instructed participants tocomplete Rosenberg’s (1965) Self-Esteem Scale based on ‘‘how

they were feeling at the moment they were completing the form.’’They did this for a period of 7 days. We then computed the standard

deviation of individuals’ total scores across these multiple assess-ments; the greater the standard deviation, the more unstable indi-viduals’ self-esteem. The previous week, participants completed

Rosenberg’s Self-Esteem Scale in small group settings based on‘‘how they typically, or generally, felt about themselves’’ (to measure

self-esteem level).Participants returned to the lab the week following assessment of

stability of self-esteem to complete several standard measures of an-ger and hostility proneness. Importantly, no main effects emerged

for self-esteem level. Instead, a number of significant self-esteemstability � self-esteem level interactions emerged. In each instance,predicted values generated from regression equations yielded the

same pattern. Whereas individuals with unstable high self-esteemreported the highest tendencies toward anger/hostility proneness,

individuals with stable high self-esteem reported the lowest tenden-cies; individuals with stable or unstable low self-esteem fell between

these two extremes. Importantly, variability in daily affect did notpredict anger and hostility proneness. These findings support the

contention that, whereas unstable high self-esteem reflects positive,but fragile, feelings of self-worth, stable high self-esteem reflects

positive and secure feelings of self-worth.Since then, we have conducted a number of studies to examine

the joint roles of stability and level of self-esteem in a variety of


phenomena, including depression, excuse making, intrinsic motiva-

tion, reactivity to daily events, psychological well-being, relationshipfunctioning, children’s perceptions of parent-child communication,

self-regulation, and self-concept clarity. Although the bulk of thisresearch involved college students, a few studies involved children

(Kernis, Brown et al., 2000; Waschull & Kernis, 1996). As I will de-scribe, the findings from these studies indicate that a more complete

understanding of the nature and functioning of self-esteem requirestaking into consideration not only its level but also the extent towhich it is stable or unstable.

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO HAVE UNSTABLE SELF-ESTEEM?

Kernis and Waschull (1995) argued that unstable self-esteem reflectsfragile and vulnerable feelings of self-worth that are affected by in-

ternally generated and externally provided evaluative information.A core characteristic of people with unstable self-esteem is that theyreact very strongly to events that they view as self-esteem relevant; in

fact, they may even see self-esteem relevance in cases where it doesnot exist. As in Deci and Ryan’s (1995) conceptualization of con-

tingent self-esteem, we assert that people with unstable self-esteemare highly ego involved in their everyday activities. As noted earlier,

Greenier et al. (1999) portrayed this heightened ego involvement asan ‘‘evaluative set’’ comprised of several interlocking components.

First, an attentional component involves excessively focusing on in-formation or events that have potentially self-evaluative implica-tions. Second, a bias component involves interpreting ambiguously

or non-self-esteem-relevant events as self-esteem relevant. Finally, ageneralization component involves linking one’s immediate global

feelings of self-worth to specific outcomes and events (e.g., a bad‘‘first date’’ is taken to reflect one’s poor social skills). I now turn to

some recent studies that are relevant to this evaluative set.

Heightened Reactivity to Daily Events

If unstable self-esteem reflects heightened investment of self-esteem

in daily activities, the self-feelings of people with unstable as com-pared to stable self-esteem should be more affected by everyday

positive and negative daily events. To test this hypothesis, Greenieret al. (1999) had college students complete measures of self-esteem

1578 Kernis

level and self-esteem stability (once or twice daily, Monday evening

through Friday morning). Participants then provided daily descrip-tions of their most positive and negative experience Monday through

Thursday for two weeks. For each event, participants indicated theextent to which it made them feel better or worse about themselves.

Our findings indicated that the more unstable individuals’ self-es-teem, the worse they reported feeling in response to negative events

and the better they reported feelings in response to positive events.Importantly, these effects emerged after controlling for self-esteem

level, which related to heightened reactivity only to negative events.Greenier et al. (1999) also had independent coders rate each event

on a number of dimensions, including its relevance to self-esteem.

Interestingly, these coders rated the negative (but not the positive)events reported by individuals with unstable self-esteem individuals

as more self-esteem relevant than the events reported by individualswith stable self-esteem. Moreover, when we controlled for self-es-

teem relevance, the relationship between unstable self-esteem andheightened reactivity disappeared for negative events. However, con-

trolling for self-esteem relevance did not substantially alter the re-lation between unstable self-esteem and heightened reactivity topositive events.

Greenier et al. (1999) suggested that one implication of these rat-ings is that individuals with unstable self-esteem encounter more

frequent negative self-esteem-relevant events than do individualswith stable self-esteem. Alternatively, these authors suggested that

the ratings might reflect a heightened tendency of individuals withunstable self-esteem to attend to negative events that are self-esteem

relevant or to bias their event descriptions to emphasize aspects po-tentially implicating self-esteem concerns. Stated differently, the rat-

ings made by these coders may either reflect ‘‘objective’’ differencesin the actual events reported or ‘‘subjective’’ differences associatedwith the way that participants attended to and described particular

events (i.e., components of the evaluative set described earlier). Un-fortunately, given that participants only recorded one event each

day, these data do not address the frequency with which differentindividuals experience self-esteem-threatening events. However, data

that I will present later do indicate that, compared to people withstable self-esteem, people with unstable self-esteem are more respon-

sive to the self-esteem-threatening aspects of aversive interpersonalevents (Waschull & Kernis, 1996). Therefore, while the frequency,


type, and magnitude of evaluative events that people experience in

their everyday lives may affect their degree of unstable self-esteem,this does not fully explain why people possess unstable self-esteem.

Instead, we also must consider the inner psychological worlds ofpeople with unstable self-esteem to account for the heightened reac-

tivity and defensiveness they exhibit in response to evaluative events.This heightened reactivity often has adverse consequences, as dem-

onstrated by a study on fragile self-esteem and depressive symptomsconducted by Kernis et al. (1998).

DAILY HASSLES AND STABILITY OF SELF-ESTEEM ASPREDICTORS OF DEPRESSIVE SYMPTOMS

Clinical theory and observation suggest that people who are vulner-able to depression are susceptible to substantial downward fluctua-

tions in their feelings of self-worth, particularly in response tonegative events (e.g., Chodoff, 1973; Jacobson, 1975; for a review,

see Tennen & Affleck, 1993). Consistent with this contention, severalstudies have shown that aversive events exacerbate depressive symp-

toms, especially among people with unstable self-esteem. Robertsand Monroe (1992) reported that among initially nondepressed in-dividuals, failure on a college examination predicted increases in de-

pression only among individuals with unstable self-esteem. Butler,Hokanson, & Flynn (1994) found that, as major life stressors in-

creased, unstable self-esteem predicted greater depression amonglow-, but not among high-, self-esteem individuals. Roberts and

Gotlib (1997) reported that day-to-day variability in either globalself-esteem or specific self-evaluations, in combination with stressful

life events, predicted increases in depressive symptoms over a 6-weekperiod, particularly in individuals who had a history of depressiveepisodes. These findings emerged after controlling for other variables

such as Neuroticism and self-concept certainty. Importantly, neithervariability in day-to-day affect nor any of the other predictor var-

iables interacted with life stressors to predict depression. Finally,none of the predictor variables (including self-esteem stability) in-

teracted with life stressors to predict increases in anxiety.Kernis et al. (1998) examined the extent to which stability of self-

esteem, level of self-esteem, and daily hassles (e.g., not havingenough time to do things, money shortages, interpersonal conflicts,

1580 Kernis

etc.) predicted increases in depressive symptoms among college stu-

dents across a 4-week period. Participants first completed Rosenb-erg’s (1965) Self-Esteem Scale (to measure self-esteem level) and two

measures of depressive symptoms (the Beck Depression Inventoryand the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale). The

following week they completed multiple measures of current self-es-teem to assess stability of self-esteem. Three weeks later, participants

returned to the lab to complete a measure of daily hassles (Kanner,Coyne, Schaefer, & Lazarus, 1981), calibrated for the intervening

time period, and the same measures of depressive symptoms. Re-gression analyses indicated that self-esteem level did not predict in-creases in depressive symptoms, either as a main effect or when

interacting with daily hassles experienced. With respect to self-es-teem stability, increases in depressive symptoms were most evident

among individuals who reported experiencing considerable dailyhassles and whose self-esteem was unstable (as reflected in significant

self-esteem stability � hassles interactions).Additional findings from this study pertained to the links between

unstable self-esteem and overgeneralization following failure (Carver& Ganellen, 1983) and depressive attributional styles. First, unstableself-esteem significantly correlated with tendencies to overgeneralize

the negative implications of failure. That is, whereas people withunstable self-esteem react to a specific failure by feeling incompetent

and stupid (the generalization component of the evaluative set de-scribed earlier), people with stable self-esteem have more localized

reactions (i.e., if they question anything, it may be their ability tosucceed at the task at hand). Second, compared to participants with

stable self-esteem, participants with unstable self-esteem reportedgreater tendencies to explain negative events in terms of factors that

were internal, stable, and global.Interestingly, additional analyses indicated that overgeneraliza-

tion tendencies and depressive attributional styles each interacted

with daily hassles in predicting increases in depressive symptoms.That is, in separate analyses, increases in depressive symptoms were

highest among individuals who experienced considerable daily has-sles and who were high overrgeneralizers or who reported depressive

attributional styles. When we entered self-esteem stability and eitherovergeneralization or attributional styles along with daily hassles

in regression models predicting change in depressive symptoms,the overgeneralization � hassles (or attributional styles� hassles)


interaction became nonsignificant, but the self-esteem stability �hassles interaction remained significant (on the Center for Epidemi-ological Studies Depression Scale). Kernis et al. (1998) speculated

that depressive attributional styles or negative overgeneralizationtendencies exacerbate the adverse implications of daily hassles for

depressive symptoms to the extent that they contribute to experi-encing short-term shifts in feelings of self-worth (for a similar view,

see Kuiper’s self-worth contingency model of depression; Kuiper &Olinger, 1986). In other words, experiencing downward self-esteemfluctuations in response to negative events may account for why

overgeneralization tendencies and depressive attributional styles areassociated with heightened depressive symptoms in the face of

aversive daily events (for a more extensive discussion, see Kerniset al., 1998).

Although there are some differences in findings across studies thathave examined the role of unstable self-esteem in depressive symp-

toms, they support the general conclusion that unstable self-esteem,in combination with aversive events, precipitates or promotes de-

pressive symptoms. However, as alluded to in the previous para-graph, researchers have not definitively established the precisemechanism by which this occurs. Some research (Roberts & Mon-

roe, 1992) demonstrates that threats to self-esteem interact with un-stable self-esteem to promote depressive symptoms. These studies

suggest that the particular vulnerability exhibited by individuals withunstable self-esteem pertains to the way they react to self-esteem

threats, perhaps involving internalization, attributional, or overgen-eralization processes. However, other studies (e.g., Kernis et al.,

1998; Roberts & Gotlib, 1997) show that daily hassles, which may ormay not have direct self-relevant implications, interact with unstableself-esteem to exacerbate depressive symptoms. At least two expla-

nations of these latter findings exist. First, people with unstable self-esteem may interpret non-self-relevant events as relevant to their

self-esteem, as suggested by the ‘‘evaluative set’’ described earlier.Second, unstable self-esteem may relate more generally to a variety

of suboptimal coping strategies or personal characteristics that areassociated with susceptibility to depression or poor psychological

adjustment. Kernis and Paradise et al. (2000) obtained findings sup-porting the latter supposition in a study that focused on self-concept

clarity (Campbell, 1990) and self-regulatory styles (Ryan & Connell,1989), to which I now turn.

1582 Kernis

MASTER OF ONE’S ‘‘PSYCHOLOGICAL’’ DOMAIN? STABILITYOF SELF-ESTEEM, SELF-CONCEPT CLARITY, AND

SELF-REGULATORY STYLES

Kernis, Paradise, et al. (2000) theorized that stability of self-esteem isone aspect of the self-system that reflects whether a person has a

strong (vs. weak) sense of self. Whereas someone who has a strongsense of self is confident about his self-knowledge, makes activechoices that reflect her likes and dislikes, and has secure feelings of

self-worth, someone who has a weak sense of self is plagued by self-doubt and confusion and acts to comply with internally and exter-

nally based pressures and controls. Technically speaking, we hy-pothesized that stable (and high) self-esteem would be associated

with self-regulatory styles (Ryan & Connell, 1989) that reflect agencyand self-determination and with self-concepts that are clearly and

confidently defined (Campbell et al., 1996).As described by Ryan and Connell, self-regulatory styles

refer to individual differences in the extent to which people engagein goal-directed activities for reasons that reflect varying degrees ofchoicefulness, self-determination, and integration with one’s core

self. At one extreme, external regulation reflects the absenceof self-determination wherein the impetus for action is external to

the actor (e.g., another person’s request tied implicitly or explicitlyto reward or punishment). Introjected regulation involves mini-

mal self-determination and is ‘‘an internally controlling state inwhich affective and self-esteem contingencies are applied to enforce

or motivate an adopted value or set of actions’’ (Ryan, Rigby, &King, 1993, p. 587). Gaining the approval of self and others pro-motes behaviors that ‘‘are performed because one ‘should’

do them, or because not doing so might engender anxiety, guilt, orloss of self-esteem’’ (1993, p. 587). Introjected regulation goes hand-

in-hand with heightened ego involvement. Identified regulation in-volves considerably more self-determination, as the individual

personally and freely identifies with the activity’s importance forhis or her functioning and growth. At the other extreme, intrinsic

regulation reflects maximal self-determination as an individualchooses to engage in actions purely for the pleasure and enjoyment

they provide.Self-determination theory (e.g., Deci & Ryan, 1991) holds that the

self-regulatory styles of optimally functioning individuals consist


primarily of identified and intrinsic regulation, rather than

introjected and external regulation. Consistent with this assertion,Sheldon and Kasser (1995) found that the more self-determined

individuals’ self-regulatory styles, the higher their life satisfaction,vitality, daily positive affect, and self-esteem level. Given that indi-

viduals with unstable self-esteem are especially likely to link theirimmediate feelings of self-worth to specific outcomes and experienc-

es (heightened ego involvement), we anticipated that the moreunstable (or lower) individuals’ self-esteem, the more they wouldengage in external and introjected regulation and the less they would

engage in identified and intrinsic regulation.Possessing a well-developed self-concept also is implicated

in optimal psychological functioning (Campbell, 1990; Campbell etal., 1996). When self-knowledge is confused and conflicted, it will fail

to provide meaningful input into people’s behaviors and reactionsand instead promote heightened responsiveness to immediately sa-

lient situational cues and outcomes (Brockner, 1983). When thesecues and outcomes are negative, this heightened responsiveness can

be particularly detrimental. Campbell and her colleagues (1990,1996) introduced the construct of self-concept clarity, which theydefine as ‘‘the extent to which the contents of an individual’s

self-concept (e.g., perceived personal attributes) are clearly and con-fidently defined, internally consistent, and temporally stable’’

(Campbell et al., 1996, p. 141). Importantly, findings indicate thathigh self-concept clarity relates to a variety of indices of psycho-

logical health and well-being, including high self-esteem and lowneuroticism (Campbell et al., 1996). Having a poorly developed self-

concept may lead individuals to rely on and be more affected byspecific evaluative information, thereby enhancing unstable self-esteem (Kernis & Waschull, 1995). Consequently, we anticipated

that the more unstable (or lower) individuals’ self-esteem, the lowertheir self-concept clarity.

To test these hypotheses, Kernis, Paradise, et al. (2000) had par-ticipants complete measures of stability and level of self-esteem

along with measures of self-regulatory styles and self-concept clar-ity (Campbell et al., 1996). Specifically, participants completed the

Self-Concept Clarity Scale (Campbell et al., 1996) that contains 12items (e.g., ‘‘My beliefs about myself often conflict with one anoth-

er’’; ‘‘In general, I have a clear sense of who I am and what I am.’’).In addition, participants generated a list of eight personal strivings

1584 Kernis

(recurrent goals), and they indicated the extent to which they

engaged in each striving because of reasons reflecting external, in-trojected, identified, and intrinsic self-regulatory processes. Approx-

imately 4 weeks later, participants returned to the lab and indicatedthe intensity with which they experienced various emotions while

engaged in each striving during the intervening time period. Al-though the retrospective nature of these emotion accounts limits

their definitiveness, we included them because of their potentialto provide interesting information that can be pursued in future

research.We conducted simultaneous regression analyses separately

for each self-regulatory style by entering level and stability of self-

esteem in the same step. Our findings indicated that, compared toindividuals with unstable (or low) self-esteem, individuals

with stable (or high) self-esteem regulated their goal strivings morein terms of external and introjected regulations and less in terms of

identified and intrinsic (marginally, for self-esteem stability)regulations. Analyses of the retrospective emotion accounts

indicated that, compared to individuals with stable self-esteem, in-dividuals with unstable self-esteem felt more tense and pressuredwhen pursuing their strivings. This last finding provides

indirect support for our contention that individuals with unstableself-esteem are chronically ego involved as they go about their

everyday activities. Finally, regression analyses indicated that,compared to individuals with unstable (or low) self-esteem,

individuals with stable (or high) self-esteem were higher in self-concept clarity.

Kernis, Paradise, et al. (2000) suggested that self-esteem stabilityand level, self-regulatory styles and self-concept clarity are compo-

nents of an interlocking system that are likely to have reciprocalinfluences upon one another. Our theoretical interests led us to enterthe system at the self-esteem variables to determine their associations

with other variables in the system. In most cases, the two self-esteemvariables had additive effects. Thus, individuals with stable high self-

esteem were the most self-determining in their self-regulatory styles,were highest in self-concept clarity, and were most favorable in

their goal-related affect (high interest and low tension). AsKernis, Paradise, et al. (2000) stated, ‘‘[Individuals with stable

high self-esteem] . . . are the masters of their psychological domain’’(p. 1304).


STABILITY OF SELF-ESTEEM AND INTRINSIC MOTIVATIONIN THE CLASSROOM

Waschull and Kernis (1996) obtained findings conceptually similarto those of Kernis, Paradise, et al. (2000) in a study that focused on

fifth-grade children’s intrinsic motivation in the classroom. Researchindicates that situational factors that emphasize the link between

specific outcomes and self-esteem often undermine intrinsic motiva-tion (Ryan, 1993). Stated differently, heightened concerns aboutone’s self-esteem may undermine the desire to take on challenges and

instead promote a more cautious, but safer, route to positive out-comes. Given that unstable self-esteem reflects a heightened tenden-

cy to link one’s self-esteem to specific events and outcomes, weexpected that it would relate to lower levels of intrinsic motivation in

children. We administered Harter’s Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Orienta-tion in the Classroom Scale as well as Harter’s Perceived Compe-

tence Scale for Children (using the global self-worth subscale tomeasure stability and level of self-esteem). To assess self-esteem sta-

bility, experimenters went to children’s classrooms twice dailyover the course of 1 week to administer measures of ‘‘current’’self-esteem. Our findings indicated that, the more unstable children’s

self-esteem, the lower their Preference for Challenge (Does the childprefer challenging tasks or those that are easy?) and Curiosity/In-

terest scores (Is the child motivated by curiosity or to get goodgrades and please the teacher?). These effects emerged with self-es-

teem level controlled. Thus, it appears that unstable self-esteem inchildren is linked to a learning orientation that is directed toward

self-esteem protection rather than toward enhancing learning andgrowth.

Another aspect of this study focused on children’s reasons for

becoming angry with their peers. Participants read five vignettes de-picting aversive interpersonal events, each of which constituted an

instrumental thwarting as well as a potential self-esteem threat (e.g.,‘‘You are really thirsty after playing outside with your classmates.

Just when you are next in line to get a drink from the fountain, an-other boy (girl) pushes ahead of you, making you wait’’). The results

(controlling for self-esteem level) indicated that the more unstablechildren’s self-esteem, the more likely they were to indicate that they

would become angry because of the events’ self-esteem-threateningaspects (‘‘because you would feel or appear weak’’).

1586 Kernis

A final aspect of this study involved examining whether fluctua-

tions in children’s daily global feelings of self-worth related to fluc-tuations in their daily appraisals of competence and social

acceptance. To the extent that unstable self-esteem is associatedwith generalizing the implications of domain-specific evaluative in-

formation to global feelings of self-worth, the magnitude of day-to-day fluctuations in perceived competence and social acceptance

should relate to the magnitude of fluctuations in global feelings ofself-worth. To examine this issue, we asked participants to rate their

current felt competence and social acceptance each time they ratedtheir current self-esteem. As anticipated, the magnitude of dailyfluctuations in perceived competence and social acceptance each

correlated with the magnitude of daily fluctuations in global self-esteem (rs5 .59, .62, respectively).

In related research involving college students, Kernis et al. (1993,Study 2) tested the hypothesis that variability in specific evaluations

and global self-esteem would relate more strongly if the self-evalu-ative dimension were high rather than low in importance. In addition

to daily ratings of current self-evaluations and global self-esteem,participants also rated how important each domain (competence,social acceptance, physical attractiveness) was to their feelings of

self-worth. A number of interesting findings emerged. First, repli-cating Waschull and Kernis (1996), day-to-day variability along each

dimension significantly correlated with global self-esteem variability.Second, the relation between greater variability in perceived compe-

tence and unstable self-esteem was especially strong among peoplewho viewed competence as an important determinant of their overall

self-worth. Third, the same pattern emerged for physical attractive-ness and social acceptance, but only among people who rated them-

selves relatively favorably along these dimensions. For people whorated themselves unfavorably on these dimensions, high daily vari-ability related to highly unstable self-esteem regardless of the di-

mension’s importance. Kernis et al. (1993) speculated that thesubstantial interpersonal consequences associated with low social

acceptance and physical attractiveness may have overshadowed theimpact of personal importance.

Summary. Our program of research has revealed that stability of

self-esteem relates to a variety of aspects of psychological function-ing. Among the findings reviewed so far, compared to individuals


with stable self-esteem, individuals with unstable self-esteem (a) have

self-feelings that are more affected by everyday negative and positiveevents (Greenier et al., 1999); (b) experience greater increases in de-

pressive symptoms when faced with daily hassles (Kernis et al.,1998); (c) report greater tendencies to overgeneralize the negative

implications of specific failures and to attribute negative outcomes tointernal, stable, and global factors (Kernis, Paradise, et al., 1998);

(d) have more impoverished self-concepts (Kernis, Paradise, et al.,2000); (e) regulate goal-directed behaviors suboptimally (Kernis,Paradise, et al., 2000) and (f) adopt a cautious, self-esteem-protective

orientation toward learning as opposed to curiosity and challengeseeking (fifth-grade children; Waschull & Kernis, 1996).

Very little is known about the developmental factors that areresponsible for individual differences in stability of self-esteem. In

the next section, I discuss our research that addressed this issue.

FRAGILE SELF-ESTEEM AND CHILDREN’S PERCEPTIONS OFPARENT-CHILD COMMUNICATION

Kernis, Brown, and Brody (2000) examined how stability of self-es-teem in children relates to their perceptions of how their parentscommunicate with them. Participants in this study consisted of 11- to

12-year-old boys and girls who resided with both of their biologicalparents. Seventy-nine percent of participants self-identified as Cau-

casian and the remainder as African American. Ninety-five percentof mothers and 91 percent of fathers had graduated from high

school, and the majority had pursued further education.Experimenters collected the data in two home visits. At the end of

the first home visit, the interviewer provided the child and his or herparents with instructions for completing the stability of self-esteemmeasure. A packet of self-esteem measures (Rosenberg’s Self-Esteem

Scale, with added instructions to base their responses on how theyfeel ‘‘right at this moment’’) were left with the child. Participants

were asked to complete one form before bedtime and one beforeleaving for school in the morning for a period of 5 consecutive days.

Analyses indicated that children’s perceptions of many aspects ofparent-child communication patterns (especially fathers’) were

linked to the degree to which they possessed unstable or low self-esteem. Children who perceived their fathers to be highly critical, to

1588 Kernis

engage in insulting name calling, and to use guilt arousal and love

withdrawal as control techniques had more unstable (as well as low-er) self-esteem than did children who did not perceive their fathers in

this manner. In addition, compared to children with stable self-es-teem, children with unstable self-esteem indicated that their fathers

less frequently talked about the good things that they (the children)had done and were less likely to use value-affirming methods when

they did show their approval. Still other findings indicated that,compared to fathers of children with low self-esteem, fathers of chil-

dren with stable but not unstable high self-esteem were perceived asusing better problem-solving methods to solve disagreements withtheir children. Interestingly, perceptions of mothers’ communication

styles were more consistently related to children’s self-esteem levelthan to their self-esteem stability. The findings for self-esteem sta-

bility that did emerge, however, were largely consistent with thosethat emerged for fathers.

Although disconcerting, it is not surprising that derogatory namecalling and criticism by parents is associated with lower and more

unstable self-esteem in children. Children generally are sensitive toevaluative information conveyed to them by their parents and othersignificant adults (Dweck & Goetz, 1978; Rosenberg, 1986). Unfor-

tunately, when this information is clearly and frequently negative, itis very difficult for children to avoid questioning their own value and

worth (Harter, 1993). Receiving substantial overt criticism as a childmay promote the overgeneralizing tendencies and detrimental

attributional styles that we have observed among college studentswith unstable (or low) self-esteem. When fathers attempt to control

children’s unwanted behaviors by arousing guilt or by withdrawingtheir love, they unwittingly create contingencies wherein children feel

worthy and valuable when they act appropriately, but unlovable andunworthy when they act inappropriately. Such contingencies or con-ditions of worth (Rogers, 1959) can foster the type of non-self-

determined self-regulatory styles that we observed in college students(external and introjected rather than identified and intrinsic; Kernis,

Paradise, et al., 2000).On a more positive note, the more that fathers were reputed to

show their approval of their children in value-affirming ways, thehigher and more stable was their children’s self-esteem. Spending

time together and displaying physical affection signals to childrenthat they are valued provide opportunities to deepen affective bonds.


Instead of promoting an external or introjected self-regulatory style

in children, value-affirming methods promote identified and intrinsicself-regulation (Ryan, 1993) as they encourage children to trust and

utilize their own internal states as guides for action. In addition, fa-thers of children with stable (but not unstable) high self-esteem were

perceived as being especially high in positive problem-solving be-haviors (e.g., considering child’s feelings, listening to child’s view-

point) and especially low in negative problem-solving behaviors(e.g., getting angry and criticizing the child’s ideas, insisting on get-ting his way). These fathers’ problem-solving styles are very similar

to the authoritative parenting style described by Baumrind (1971)that previous research has linked to high self-esteem in children (Buri

et al., 1988; Coopersmith, 1967). Kernis, Brown et al.’s (2000) find-ings that children with unstable high self-esteem did not differ from

children with (stable or unstable) low self-esteem in how they char-acterized their fathers’ problem solving styles suggest that this rela-

tionship may be limited to promoting stable high self-esteem.

IMPLICATIONS OF STABILITY OF SELF-ESTEEM FORDISTINGUISHING FRAGILE FROM SECURE HIGH SELF-ESTEEM

A considerable amount of research on stability of self-esteem illu-

minates the distinction between fragile and secure high self-esteem.Secure high self-esteem reflects positive feelings of self-worth that are

well anchored and secure and that are positively associated with awide range of psychological health and well-being indices. Individ-

uals with secure high self-esteem like, value, and accept themselves,‘‘warts and all.’’ They do not frequently need to bolster their feelings

of worth through self-promoting or self-protective strategies becausetheir feelings of self-worth are not challenged easily. In short, indi-viduals with secure high self-esteem typically experience everyday

positive and negative outcomes in ways that do not implicate theirglobal feelings of worth or value. In contrast, fragile high self-esteem

reflects positive feelings of self-worth that are vulnerable to threat, asthey require continual bolstering, protection, and validation through

various self-protective or self-enhancement strategies. Individualswith fragile high self-esteem do not like to see any weaknesses in

themselves, and they work very hard to avoid doing so (for moreextensive discussion of the secure versus fragile high self-esteem

1590 Kernis

distinction, see Kernis, 2003a; Kernis & Paradise, 2002). As I will

discuss, research demonstrates that, compared to individuals withstable high self-esteem, individuals with unstable high self-esteem

engage in greater self-protection and self-enhancement strategies, yetthey are lower in psychological adjustment.

FRAGILE VERSUS SECURE HIGH SELF-ESTEEM AND CLOSERELATIONSHIP FUNCTIONING

Lydon, Jamieson, and Holmes (1997) distinguished between being ina relationship and the time period when a relationship is desired butnot yet formed. During this so-called pre-unit phase, seemingly in-

nocuous events (e.g., not returning a phone call) are imbued with agreat deal of meaning and implications for the perceived fate of the

relationship and the desired partner’s view of oneself. Rather thanfocus on relationship stage, Kernis et al. (2003) focused on the degree

to which individuals’ high self-esteem is secure versus fragile. Wereasoned that individuals with secure high self-esteem would inter-

pret and react to ambiguously negative actions by their partner bytreating them as innocuous, either by minimizing their negative as-pects or by offering a benign interpretation of them. In contrast, we

surmised that, just as individuals in the pre-unit phase of relationshipdevelopment, individuals with fragile high self-esteem would imbue

these events with negative implications, in this instance either by‘‘internalizing’’ their negative implications or by resolving to recip-

rocate in kind to get even with their partner.Approximately 120 male and female undergraduates currently in

a relationship for 3 or more months read nine scenarios that depictedambiguously negative events in which their partner might engage.

Each event had multiple plausible causes and implications for self,partner, and the relationship. Participants rated the likelihood thatthey would respond in each of four different ways designed to cap-

ture this multiplicity of potential causes and implications. Two re-sponse options signaled overinvestment of the self and implied that

the self somehow was threatened by the event. Of these, one (per-sonalizing) involved magnifying the event’s negative implications for

the self. The other (reciprocating) involved resolving to ‘‘get even’’with one’s partner as a way to deal with the self-esteem threat. The


two remaining response options captured reactions or interpreta-

tions that did not involve overinvestment of the self. One of these(benign) involved a transient, externally based (usually partner-re-

lated) explanation, and the other (minimize) involved taking theevent at ‘‘face value,’’ i.e., not making a big deal of it. An example

scenario with response options is as follows:

Your partner does not look up from what he or she is doing when youfirst enter the room and begin talking. You ask several questions and

still your partner answers without looking up. To what extent wouldyou . . .

(a) not think very much about it (Minimize)?

(b) think that your partner is engrossed in something very interesting or important(Benign)?

(c) think that your partner does not care, value, or respect youenough (Personalize)?

(d) go about your business, but treat your partner that very same

way when he/she later approaches you (Get even)?

Regression analyses indicated that whereas unstable high self-es-teem individuals reported being most likely to engage in personal-izing and get-even reactions, stable high self-esteem individuals

reported being least likely (low self-esteem individuals fell between).Conversely, whereas stable high self-esteem individuals reported be-

ing most likely to engage in benign and minimizing reactions, un-stable high self-esteem individuals reported being least likely (again,

low self-esteem individuals fell between). These findings are impor-tant because they point to the operation of dynamics associated with

fragile high self-esteem that until now have been ascribed to low self-esteem individuals (Murray, Holmes, MacDonald, & Ellsworth,1998), or to those highly sensitive to rejection (Downey, Freitas,

Michaelis, & Khouri, 1998).To the extent that participants’ responses reflected their actual

responses to partner behaviors, the defensive and hostile reactionsreported by unstable high self-esteem individuals may have had cu-

mulative, adverse effects on the development of intimacy and rela-tionship quality. To investigate this possibility, participants

completed Spanier’s (1976) Relationship Quality scale twice, onceat the session when they completed the scenario measure and again

1592 Kernis

approximately 4–6 weeks later. Predicted values generated from sig-

nificant self-esteem stability� self-esteem level interactions indicat-ed that whereas individuals with stable high self-esteem reported the

highest relationship quality, individuals with unstable high self-es-teem reported the lowest (and individuals with either stable or un-

stable low self-esteem fell between these two extremes). We thenexamined the potential mediating role of responses to the scenario

measure by repeating the regression analyses adding each of the re-sponse types individually. These analyses indicated that when we

added either personalizing or get-even responses, the self-esteemstability � self-esteem level interaction no longer was significant(while the responses continued to exert significant main effects).

Earlier evidence regarding the heightened defensiveness associatedwith unstable high self-esteem came from Kernis et al.’s (1989) ex-

amination of anger and hostility proneness. Defensiveness oftenmanifests itself in outbursts of anger and hostility that are aimed at

restoring damaged self-feelings (Felson, 1984; Feshbach, 1970).Kernis et al. (1989) reported that unstable high self-esteem individ-

uals scored the highest on several well-validated anger and hostilityinventories (e.g., the Novaco Anger Inventory; Novaco, 1975), stablehigh self-esteem individuals scored the lowest, and stable and un-

stable low self-esteem individuals scored between these two extremes.As evidence of self-aggrandizing tendencies, compared with stable

high self-esteem individuals, people with unstable high self-esteemreported being more likely to boast about a success to their friends

(Kernis, Greenier, Herlocker, Whisenhunt, & Abend, 1997); after anactual success, they were more likely to claim that they did so in spite

of the operation of performance-inhibiting factors (Kernis, Granne-mann, & Barclay, 1992).

Importantly, the enhanced tendencies toward self-enhancementand self-protection exhibited by unstable high self-esteem individualsdo not translate into greater psychological adjustment and well-be-

ing. Indeed, this is what we (Paradise & Kernis, 2002) expected givenour characterization of unstable high self-esteem as reflecting fragile

high self-esteem. College student participants completed Ryff’s(1989) psychological well-being measure as well as measures of lev-

el and stability of self-esteem. Ryff’s measure assesses six corecomponents of psychological well-being, as follows: (1) self-accept-

ance (‘‘I like most aspects of my personality’’); (2) positive relationswith others (‘‘I have not experienced many warm and trusting


relationships with others’’ [reversed]); (3) autonomy (‘‘I judge myself

by what I think is important, not by the values of what others thinkis important’’); (4) environmental mastery (‘‘I am quite good at man-

aging the many responsibilities of my daily life’’); (5) purpose in life(‘‘Some people wander aimlessly through life, but I am not one of

them’’); and (6) personal growth (‘‘I think it is important to havenew experiences that challenge how you think about yourself and

the world’’).Our findings indicated that individuals with high self-esteem re-

ported higher scores on each of the subscales than did individuals

with low self-esteem. In addition, on all subscales except personalgrowth, individuals with unstable high self-esteem reported lower

scores than did individuals with stable high self-esteem. This differ-ence was reflected in either self-esteem stability� self-esteem level

interactions or in two main effects. Thus, whereas individuals withstable high self-esteem reported that they functioned autonomously,

possessed a clear sense of meaning in their lives, related effectivelywithin both their physical and social environments, and were highly

self-accepting, the same was less true of individuals with unstablehigh self-esteem.

New Directions

Recently, we have examined how stability of self-esteem relates to au-thenticity, variability in daily need satisfaction, and attachment styles.

Authenticity. A multicomponent conceptualization. Goldman and

Kernis (2002; Kernis & Goldman, 2004, 2005; Kernis, 2003a) recentlyintroduced a conceptualization of authenticity, which we define asthe unobstructed operation of one’s true or core self in one’s daily

enterprise. In our view, authenticity that has four interrelated, butdistinct, components: awareness, unbiased processing, behavior, and

relational orientation. Brian Goldman and I developed the Authen-ticity Inventory (AI) to assess each of these four components: aware-

ness (‘‘For better or for worse, I am aware of who I truly am’’);unbiased processing (‘‘I find it easy to pretend I don’t have faults’’)

(reversed); behavior (‘‘I find it easy to pretend to be something otherthan my true self’’) (reversed); and relational orientation (‘‘My open-ness and honesty in relationships are essential for their develop-

ment’’). Confirmatory factor analyses indicate that items in our

1594 Kernis

latest version (AI, Version 3) do tap four discriminable components

of authenticity that comprise a general authenticity construct (Gold-man, Kernis, & Lance, 2004).

Goldman and Kernis (2002) administered the AI and measures oflife satisfaction, affect, self-esteem level, and contingent self-esteem to

approximately 70 individuals. The findings indicated that total au-thenticity scores positively related to life satisfaction and high self-

esteem and negatively related to contingent self-esteem and negativeaffect. In other research (described in Kernis &Goldman, 2004, 2005),

we have found robust relationships between authenticity and its com-ponents and various aspects of psychological health and well-being,including Ryff’s (1989) measure. As part of a larger study, Herrmann,

Kernis, and Goldman (2004) correlated stability and level of self-es-teem with overall authenticity and each of its components. As dis-

played in Table 1, stability of self-esteem correlated negatively withawareness, unbiased processing, behavior, and total authenticity; lev-

el of self-esteem correlated positively with awareness, behavior, rela-tional orientation, and total authenticity. Thus, individuals with high

and stable self-esteem obtained the highest authenticity scores, sup-porting the view that stable high self-esteem reflects a healthier formof high self-esteem than does unstable high self-esteem.

Attachment styles. Mikiluncer and Shaver (in press) review a con-

siderable amount of research showing that the defensiveness andself-aggrandizing tendencies that we have found associated with un-

stable (in particular, high) self-esteem is absent in people with secureattachment representations. For example, in a series of four studies,

Table 1Correlations Between Components of Authenticity and Stability

and Level of Self-esteem

Authenticity Self-Esteem Level Self-Esteem Stability

Awareness .26nn � .29nn

Unbiased Processing .08 � .33nn

Behavior .35nn � .24nn

Relational Orientation .22n � .01

Total Authenticity .32nn � .29nn

npo.05. nnpo.01.


Mikiluncer (1998) found that avoidant individuals were especially

likely to engage in defensive self-inflation when threatened but thatsecure individuals were unaffected by these same threats. They state,

‘‘In our view, interactions with available, caring, and loving attach-ment figures in times of need constitute the most important form of

personal protection and the primary source of an authentic, stablesense of self-worth. Accordingly, we view the activation of repre-

sentations of attachment security as a default inner resource thatsupercedes self-enhancement needs and renders self-enhancementmaneuvers less necessary’’ (Mikiluncer & Shaver, in press, p. 13).

These considerations suggest that the higher and more stable indi-viduals’ self-esteem, the more secure and less insecure their attach-

ment representations. Foster, Kernis, and Goldman (2004) hadapproximately 100 male and female undergraduate students com-

plete measures of attachment representations and stability and levelof self-esteem. The correlations are displayed in Table 2, where it can

be seen that self-esteem level correlates positively with secure repre-sentations and negatively with preoccupied, fearful, and (marginally)

dismissive representations. Self-esteem level also correlates negative-ly with rejection sensitivity (Downey et al., 1998). On the other hand,self-esteem stability correlates negatively with secure representations

and positively with preoccupied and fearful representations, and re-jection sensitivity. These data are consistent with Mikiluncer and

Shaver’s contentions, given that stable high self-esteem related to themost secure and least insecure attachment representations. Moreo-

ver, the fact that unstable self-esteem was associated with more pre-occupied and less secure attachments is consistent with sociometer

Table 2Correlations Between Attachment Styles, Rejection Sensitivity,

Stability of Self-Esteem, and Level of Self-Esteem

Attachment Self-Esteem Level Self-Esteem Stability

Secure .47nn � .35nn

Preoccupied � .21n .28nn

Fearful � .29nn .23n

Dismissive � .19w .04

Rejection Sensitivity � .40nn .22n

wpo.07. npo.05. nnpo.01.

1596 Kernis

theory (Leary & Baumeister, 2000), which holds that people’s state

self-esteem is responsive to feelings of acceptance and rejection. Ac-cording to sociometer theory, the roller-coaster-like relationships—

extreme highs (acceptance) and extreme lows (rejection)—of thosewith preoccupied attachments may promote unstable self-esteem,

whereas the relatively harmonious relationships associated withsecure attachment may promote stable self-esteem.

Stability of self-esteem and variability in daily need satisfaction. Foster,Kernis, Heppner, Lakey, and Goldman (2004) recently completed a

study that focused on the relationship between satisfaction of var-ious psychological needs and individual differences in stability of

self-esteem. Theory and research link some psychological needs toself-esteem (competence, autonomy, relatedness, authenticity, self-

actualization) but not others (money, security, physical well-being,pleasure, influencing others). Accordingly, we expected variability in

satisfaction of the former, but not the latter, set of needs to relate tostability of self-esteem. We assessed stability of self-esteem in theusual manner. The next two weeks, Sunday through Thursday, par-

ticipants rated the extent to which they fulfilled each of eleven psy-chological needs (those just mentioned, plus self-esteem). Two sets of

preliminary findings corroborated our expectations. First, factoranalysis revealed two factors, the first of which represented varia-

bility in the self-esteem-relevant needs (all loadings .70 or greater)and the second of which represented variability in the non-self-

esteem-relevant needs (all loadings .61 or higher). Physical pleasurewas the only need that loaded on both factors (.51 on the first factor,

.55 on the second factor). Thus, variability in daily self-esteem co-incided with variability in the self-esteem-relevant needs. Second,when we regressed stability of self-esteem on to composite self-

esteem-relevant and non-self-esteem-relevant variability indexes,only the composite self-esteem-relevant index was significant. These

initial findings link daily fulfillment of certain psychological needs tovariability in people’s day-to-day feelings of self-worth.

CONCLUSION

In this article, I reviewed the major findings from our researchprogram that has focused on the joint roles of self-esteem level and


self-esteem stability in various aspects of psychological functioning

and well-being. In numerous studies, important findings would havegone undetected had we not measured people’s contextually based

current feelings of self-worth. The findings that emerged indicatethat a full understanding of self-esteem processes will require taking

into consideration multiple components of self-esteem. These com-ponents include stability of self-esteem, implicit self-esteem, and the

extent to which self-esteem is contingent (for discussion of theseother components, see Kernis, 2003a, 2003b).

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