An investigation into the relationship between self-evaluation processes, specific and global self esteem : why is importance so unimportant?

Three questionnaire studies were conducted to examine how global self-esteem relates to social psychological processes (i.e. social and temporal comparisons, reflected appraisals and self discrepancy) as well as to domain-specific evaluations of self-worth in domains of differential importance to the self (i.e. interactive hypothesis; Rosenberg, 1965). The first and the second study examined some of the most influential types of self-evaluation processes and their relationship with self-esteem in a sample of 242 and 527 participants respectively. In addition, the importance attached to domains of the self in the relationship between domain-specific and global self-esteem was explored using an idiographic (self-reported) and a nomothetic measure of importance (i.e. the importance attached to physical appearance). Results revealed that although all different types of self-evaluation processes are important to self-esteem, some types may be more group dependent (e.g. temporal comparisons) than others (e.g. self-ideal self-discrepancy). In addition, and contrary to the majority of past studies, it was found that self-esteem is more dependant on domains of higher importance to the individual. However, this was only the case when domains were reported idiographically by the participants. These results led to the re-conceptualisation of the importance attached to domains of the self in the third study by developing a multifaceted scale of importance in a sample of 647 participants. The scale showed good psychometric properties and it was the first scale of importance that has found supportive evidence for the interactive hypothesis. Results are discussed in the light of the implications they may have for the way individuals and particular groups (e.g. stigmatized groups) engage in self-evaluation processes and the way particular domains of the self are related to global evaluations of self-worth.