High self-esteem is beneficial in various life domains, with benefits across age, gender, and race/ethnicity, and may benefit individuals and society when properly designed and implemented.

Is high self-esteem beneficial? Revisiting a classic question.

Self-esteem shows substantial continuity over time, with a developmental trend of low stability in childhood, increasing in adolescence and young adulthood, and declining in midlife and old age.

Stability of self-esteem across the life span.

Self-esteem is a necessary and result of the self-verification process within groups, maintaining individuals and the group by increasing worth-based and efficacy-based self-esteem and buffering negative emotions during self-verification challenges.

A Theory of Self-Esteem

Self-esteem increases from adolescence to middle adulthood, peaks at age 50-60, and is a relatively stable trait that predicts success and well-being in relationships, work, and health throughout life.

The Development of Self-Esteem

Self-esteem levels increase from age 4 to 11, stabilize from age 11 to 15, increase strongly until age 30, continue to increase until age 60, peak at age 60, and decline slightly until age 90 and more strongly until age 94.

Development of Self-Esteem From Age 4 to 94 Years: A Meta-Analysis of Longitudinal Studies

Self-esteem evolved as a monitor of social acceptance, with the self-esteem motive functioning to avoid social devaluation and rejection, rather than maintaining self-esteem itself.

Making Sense of Self-Esteem

Self-esteem and social relationships have a reciprocal influence on each other across all developmental stages, with a positive feedback loop between the two constructs.

The link between self-esteem and social relationships: A meta-analysis of longitudinal studies.

Three dimensions of self-esteem, worth, efficacy, and authenticity, are linked to three motives of the self and are primarily influenced by identity verification.

Self-Esteem and Identities

Self-esteem generally begins high in childhood, drops during adolescence, rises gradually throughout adulthood, and declines sharply in old age, with some stability.

Self-Esteem Development Across the Lifespan

The importance of self-esteem is in how people strive for it, rather than its high or low status, as it can undermine learning, relatedness, autonomy, and self-regulation, with long-term costs outweighing short-term benefits.

The costly pursuit of self-esteem.

Self-esteem is influenced by what people believe they need to do or be to have worth, but this pursuit can negatively impact learning, relationships, autonomy, self-regulation, and mental and physical health.

Contingencies of Self-Worth

Optimal self-esteem is characterized by genuine, true, stable, and congruent qualities, and is linked to authenticity, which is the unobstructed operation of one's true self in daily life.

TARGET ARTICLE: Toward a Conceptualization of Optimal Self-Esteem

Blacks have higher self-esteem than Whites, but Whites score higher than other racial minority groups, with the Black advantage appearing in the 1980s.

Race and self-esteem: meta-analyses comparing whites, blacks, Hispanics, Asians, and American Indians and comment on Gray-Little and Hafdahl (2000).

Self-esteem has a small to moderate association with objective interpersonal indicators, but may predict later interpersonal experiences.

Does Self-Esteem Have an Interpersonal Imprint Beyond Self-Reports? A Meta-Analysis of Self-Esteem and Objective Interpersonal Indicators

Episodic self-esteem is a self-conscious emotion influenced by social esteem, where the subject evaluates herself in the same way as others do, and is relevant only to in-group members.

Self-Esteem, Social Esteem, and Pride

High self-esteem is associated with self-enhancing presentation, while low self-esteem is associated with self-protective presentation, and past findings with self-esteem scales may be interpreted in self-presentational terms.

Self-Presentational Motivations and Personality Differences in Self-Esteem

Self-esteem is crucial for mental and social well-being, and promoting it is crucial for preventing and treating various mental disorders and social problems.

Self-esteem in a broad-spectrum approach for mental health promotion.

Promoting self-esteem in education is often a desirable goal, but it's crucial to consider the ideological orientations and cultural norms before implementing it in policy and practice.

The Politics of Self-Esteem

High self-esteem positively impacts the quality of romantic relationships, but self-esteem similarity between partners does not influence the couple's relationship satisfaction.

Self-esteem and the quality of romantic relationships

Low self-esteem and negative self-schemas are associated with persecutory delusions, not self-esteem enhancement, and instability in self-esteem contributes to the development of persecutory delusions.

The relevance of self-esteem and self-schemas to persecutory delusions: a systematic review.

Some studies suggest self-esteem is beneficial across various life domains and stable over time, while other studies highlight its potential to undermine learning and autonomy if not properly managed.