Interactionist Theory Of Self Esteem

Self-esteem is commonly defined as “a confidence in one's own worth or abilities.” It’s typically known as a personality trait, so everyone’s idea of “self-esteem” is completely different. Your self-esteem affects how you talk, act, and even think. Do you feel like you’re successful? Are you happy with your appearance? How do you feel about your social status? These are all questions that can help determine whether you have low self-esteem or high self-esteem.

The concept of self-esteem was first discovered by the philosopher and psychologist, William James. James is well known for his brilliant formula for self-esteem, which states that self-esteem is equated to one’s successes divided by pretensions, or one’s expectations of success. This

The interactionist theory began with George Herbert Mead and Charles Horton Cooley. Cooley furthered the belief that we learn who we are by interacting with others by adding that our view of ourselves also comes from our impressions of how others perceive us. Mead then continued with Cooley’s beliefs and developed a model of the process of the “self,” which contains three stages: the preparatory stage, the play stage, and the game stage. During the preparatory stage, children will imitate family members and other people around them, who Mead considered “generalized others.” In the play stage, children will pretend to play the role of a generalized other around them. Lastly, in the game stage, children will play organized games and take on the perspective of the generalized other. Mead also developed a theory known as the “Theory of the Self.” This theory revolves around the idea that the self begins at a “privileged, centralized position in a person’s world” such as a young child who think of themselves as the center of attention. Erving Goffman was the next sociologist to study the interactionist perspective regarding the self. Goffman suggested that many of our daily activities are an attempt to express our “self.” At a young age, we start making effort to control the impressions we make on others so that they form a desired view of us and the situation. He termed this as “impression

According to psychologists Milton Rosenbaum and Richard de Charms, those with a low self-esteem tend to be more easily frustrated and therefore more susceptible to aggression. Hans Toch was a famous author of a study based on prison inmates and their violent behavior. In conclusion to his study, he proposed that their behavior was often “self-image compensating.” More studies have been shown to include other forms of violent behavior such as rape, murder, gang violence, and child abuse.

According to Adrian Furnham and Victoria Lowick, having a damaged self-image is one of the most common explanations for drug abuse. Some of the arguments include that because drugs are illegal and labelled as morally deviant, people will use or abuse them if they already have a poor opinion of themselves. Another argument proposes that those who have a negative attitude toward themselves may abuse drugs as a way to harm their physical health. A third explanation is that drug use tends to make the user feel better about themselves, as a way of temporarily raising their