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Self-esteem are made up of beliefs about oneself eg; "I am unloved", "I am unworthy" as well as emotional states such as triumph, shame, pride, and dispair.
Self-esteem was defined by Smith and Mackie as seen below.
"The self-concept is what we think about the self; self-esteem, is the positive or negative evaluations of the self, as in how we feel about it."
Self-esteem is very attractive because it predicts certain outcomes, such as academic excellence,happiness in life, happiness in marriage and relationships, and less criminal tendencies.
Synonyms or near-synonyms of self-esteem include: self-worth, self-love, self-regard, and self-respect. Jordan Peterson and Albert Ellis are two of the most prominent psychologists to find fault in the term.
American psychologist Abraham Maslow included self-esteem in his pyramid of human needs and wants.
He explained two different forms of "esteem"
"The need for respect from others in the form of recognition, success and admiration. And "The need for self-respect in the form of self-love, self-confidence, skill, or aptitude".
Respect from others was believed to be easily lost and broken than inner self-esteem.
Maslow stated,
"Without the fulfillment of the self-esteem need, individuals will be driven to seek it and unable to grow and obtain self-actualization".
Theories of self-esteem explore the reasons humans are driven to maintain a high standard for themselves.
Experiences in a person's life are a major form of how self-esteem is formed. In the early stage of a child's life, parents have a huge influence on self-esteem of a child and can be looked as the main source of good and bad habits a child will posses
Love from parents helps a child form a stable sense of being loved, cared for and respected. These feelings later has effects on self-esteem as the child grows. Students in elementary school who have high self-esteem tend to have commanding parents who are caring and helps them in decision making.
Academic excellence can also help to boost up self esteem. Constantly achieving success or constantly failing will have a strong effect on an individual's self-esteem.
Problems like the ones stated, can cause children or people to doubt themselves. Social experiences are another important factor to increase self-esteem.
As children go through school, they begin to understand and recognize differences between themselves and their peers. Using social comparisons, children assess whether they did better or worse than classmates in different activities and school work.
These comparisons play an important role in influencing the child's self-esteem and the influence may either have positive or negative feelings they have about themselves.
As children go through adolescence, peer influence becomes very important. Adolescents makes praise of themselves based on their relationships with close friends and people. Happy relationships among friends are very important to the formation of high self-esteem for children.
Social acceptances brings about confidence and high self-esteem, however rejection from peers can bring about self-doubts and low self-esteem.
Ways self esteem can be improved are:
Nobody is perfect so accept yourself for who you are.
Remember that everyone tends to make mistakes.
Always do what makes you happy always.
Focus mainly on things you can change, write down things you aren't happy about and ways you can change them.
Exercise regularly as it can help boost confidence.
Surround yourself with positive people
Do what makes you happy and feel good about yourself.