Understanding High Self-Esteem in African American Adolescent Girls
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Portia Adams
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GWB School of Social Work
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Washington University
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Campus Box 1196
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St. Louis MO 63130
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(314) 935-8669
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pea1@gwbmail.wustl.edu
Purpose: This study examined high self-esteem in Black adolescent
girls to explore the relationship between race, self-esteem and perceived
control. The study also investigated the relevance of the locus of
control model. The locus of control model has suggested that externality
or system blame protects the self-esteem of Blacks.
Methods: It employed a nationally representative sub-sample
of 740 girls from the Monitoring the Future 1999 data set. A principal
component analysis was utilized to create a perceived control variable.
Using a multiple regression analysis, which controlled for geographic region
and socio-economic status, self-esteem was regressed on the following variables:
race, perceived control, life satisfaction, social skills and school ability.
An interaction between race and perceived control was also examined.
Results: The results demonstrated that eventhough Black girls
ranked poorly on a number of socio-economic factors, they possessed significantly
higher self-esteem scores than their White counterparts. The analysis did
not support the locus of control model that externality protects and facilitates
high self esteem for Blacks. Instead it stated that externality is
not positively related to high self-esteem of Black girls. However
race does moderate the relationship between perceived control and self-esteem
for these two groups. Externality presented a significant and negative
relationship to self-esteem for both Black and White girls; with White
girls displaying a stronger inverse relationship than that of Black girls.
Implications: Findings indicated that externality or system
blame was not positively associated with high self-esteem in Black girls.
Further study into the influence of sex-role development and the impact
of racial identity is suggested to better understand the experience of
high self-esteem of Black girls.