Gender and sex-role influences on children's self-esteem.
This study examined direct and moderating influences of gender and sex-role orientations on children's general self-esteem. Moderating influences of these variables on the prediction of self-esteem were examined with respect to two sets of competence beliefs regarding school achievement: perceived capacities and perceived strategies for doing well in school. One hundred nineteen fourth-, fifth-, and sixth-grade children were assessed using the Perceived Competence Scale for Children (Harter, 1982), the Multidimensional Measure of Children's Perceptions of Control (Connell, 1985), and the Children's Personal Attributes Questionnaire (Hall & Halberstadt, 1980). Correlational and hierarchical multiple regression analyses indicated that upper elementary schoolchildren's general self-esteem is (a) marginally related to biological gender, with boys showing a slight advantage; (b) significantly related to masculinity and androgyny; and (c) predicted more strongly by perceived capacities to do schoolwork in girls than in boys, and by perceived (lack of) strategies for academic success in nontraditionally sex-typed children than in traditionally sex-typed children. Of the two nontraditionally sex-typed groups, androgynous children were found to have more positive school competence beliefs than were undifferentiated children.
Alpert-Gillis
L J
LJ
Department of Psychiatry, University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, NY 14642.
Connell
J P
JP
D000124:Achievement; D001076:Aptitude; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D005783:Gender Identity; D006801:Humans; D007062:Identification, Psychological; D008297:Male; D010553:Personality Development; D010556:Personality Tests; D012649:Self Concept