Young people may crave boosts to their self-esteem a little too
much, new research suggests.
Researchers found college students valued pumping up their egos
more than any other pleasant activity they were asked about --
including sex, favorite foods, drinking alcohol, seeing a best
friend or receiving a paycheck.
“It is somewhat surprising how this desire to feel worthy and
valuable trumps almost any other pleasant activity you can
imagine,” said Brad Bushman, lead author of the research and
professor of communication and psychology at The Ohio State
University.
Bushman conducted the research with Scott Moeller of Brookhaven National
Laboratory and Jennifer Crocker, professor of psychology at
Ohio State.
Sense of self
In two separate studies, the researchers asked college students
how much they wanted and liked various pleasant activities, such as
their favorite food or seeing a best friend.
They were asked to rate how much they wanted and liked each
activity on a scale of 1 (not at all) to 5 (extremely).
One of the items they were asked about was self-esteem building
experiences, such as receiving a good grade or receiving a
compliment.
“We found that self-esteem trumped all other rewards in the
minds of these college students,” Bushman said.
In one of the studies, the participants took a test which
purportedly measured their intellectual ability. Afterwards,
they were told if they waited another ten minutes, they could have
their test re-scored using a new scoring algorithm that usually
yields higher test results.
Students who highly valued self-esteem were more likely to stay to
get the new scores.
“They were willing to spend their own precious time just to
get a small boost in their self-esteem,” said Bushman.
Too much focus
While Bushman admits there’s nothing wrong with a healthy
sense of self-esteem, the results of this study suggest many young
people may be a little too focused on pumping up their sense of
self.
Here’s why: for all the pleasant activities examined in this
study, participants were asked to rate both how much they liked the
activity and how much they wanted it.
Both questions were asked because addiction research suggests that
addicts tend to report they “want” the object of their
addiction (drugs, alcohol, gambling) more than they actually
“like” it, Bushman said.
“The liking-wanting distinction has occupied an important
place in addiction research for nearly two decades,” said
Moeller. “But we believe it has great potential to
inform other areas of psychology as well.”
According to Bushman, the study participants all reported liking
the pleasant activities more than wanting them -- even in regards
to self-esteem. But the difference between liking and wanting was
smallest when it came to self-esteem.
“It wouldn’t be correct to say that the study
participants were addicted to self-esteem,” Bushman
said. “But they were closer to being addicted to
self-esteem than they were to being addicted to any other activity
we studied.”
Findings showed the participants with a strong sense of entitlement
were the ones who were most likely to “want” the good
things in life -- including boosts to their self-esteem -- even
more than they actually “like” them.
Entitlement
Entitlement was measured as part of a narcissism scale which
participants completed.
In the scale, participants had to choose which of two statements
they most agreed with. For example, people who scored high on
entitlement were more likely to agree with “If I ruled the
world, it would be a much better place” rather than
“The thought of ruling the world frightens the hell out of
me.”
“Entitled people want all the good things in life, even if
they don’t particularly like them,” Bushman said.
“Of course, there’s no problem with enjoying good
things, but it is not healthy to want them more than you like
them.”
Dangerous obsession
Bushman said he sees danger in this obsession with
self-esteem. Research has shown that levels of self-esteem
have been increasing, at least among college students in the United
States, since the mid-1960s.
“American society seems to believe that self-esteem is the
cure-all for every social ill, from bad grades to teen pregnancies
to violence,” he said. “But there has been no
evidence that boosting self-esteem actually helps with these
problems. We may be too focused on increasing
self-esteem.”
Study co-author Crocker added the problem isn‘t having high
self-esteem, but rather how much people are driven to boost
it.
“When people highly value self-esteem, they may avoid doing
things such as acknowledging a wrong they did. Admitting you were
wrong may be uncomfortable for self-esteem at the moment, but
ultimately it could lead to better learning, relationships, growth,
and even future self-esteem,” said Crocker.
The study appears online in the Journal of Personality and will be published in
a future print edition.
