Youngs Jr., G.A., Rathge, R., Mullis, R., & Mullis, A. (1990, Summer). Adolescent stress and self-esteem. Adolescence, 25 (98), 333.

OVERVIEW

There is a general feeling among youth workers that today’s adolescents are under more stress than previous generations. Little has been done to measure the stress levels or their effects on adolescents. Lewko (1987) found that parents under social and economic stress communicated it to the children. Other stress causing factors include life situation changes in many areas of an adolescent’s life. Such stress has been related to delinquent conduct (Novy and Donahue, 1985), academic performance (Fontana & Dourdo, 1984), and classroom burnout (Finian & Cross, 1986). Two studies (Johnson & McCutcheon, 1980) and (Kroger, 1980) showed stress to be related to self-esteem, although neither quantified the effects. This study was administered to quantify the effects of life changes causing stress on self-esteem.

Measuring stress in adolescents is complex, since life events can be positive or negative. And some stress is healthy. Several researchers feel it should be diagnosed simply by measuring the number of stressful events (from a pre-determined list) occurring to students. This study also measures the perceived intensity of each event to the adolescent.

DESIGN

The study was conducted among 2,154 high school students in North Dakota. The sample was spread evenly among male and female and across 9th through 12th grades as part of a larger study on career decisions. The students were from six urban (community larger than 2,500) and twelve rural (smaller than 2,500) community schools.

The surveys used were standard Life Experience Surveys. The Stress Life Experience survey listed 36 events that could be negative or positive. Scoring for this survey considered the number of experiences such as changing schools, illness, and boyfriend/girlfriend relationships. Each experience was rated by the student for the positive or negative effect (on a scale from +3 to -3, with 0 being no effect).

The Self-Esteem Inventory lists 58 evaluative self attitudes which are responded to as "like me" or "unlike me." Scoring for each attitude was determined to be either positive or negative self-esteem.

FINDINGS

The results showed that as the number of stressful life experiences increased (overall stress), the level of self-esteem decreased. The events causing negative effect were stronger per event. Positive events had only slight effects.

CONCLUSIONS

The experience of negative stressful events is a primary contributor to lowered self-esteem. In fact, self-esteem seems to suffer to some extent even if students respond positively to objectively negative events such as divorce. Perhaps the mere experience of stressful events, even those positively perceived, leaves adolescents with an awareness that they are not in as much control of their lives as they would like to think.

CRITIQUE AND EVALUATION

There are two immediate concerns with this study: the determining population level (2,500) between rural and urban communities and the way the intensity of events was measured. A community of 2,500 seems to still be somewhat rural; the dividing population should probably be higher. Also, the low perceived impact of events came from the students reflecting on the past with the attitude, "Whew, that wasn’t so bad." Overall, the study is credible.

IMPLICATIONS

1. Stress does seem to affect self-esteem negatively.
2. Self-esteem of stressed adolescents should be monitored and encouraged.
3. Efforts of encouragement should be particularly intense when stress experience is negative.
4. Encouragement should remain high even if positive events or positive reactions to negative events are reported.

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