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Self-esteem is an important and also a very popular construct in social psychology, and it is widely used in everyday life: It is the evaluative aspect of the self-concept that corresponds with an overall view of the self as worthy or unworthy (Leary and Baumeister 2000). Those that possess high self-esteem are presumably psychologically healthy and happy (Branden 1994). On the contrary, those that possess low self-esteem are presumably psychologically distressed and even depressed (Tennen and Afleck 1993). Its potential relationship with subjective well-being (SWB) derives from research results that correlate low self-esteem with depression and loneliness (Peplau and Perlman 1982).
Self-esteem refers to the self or to specific areas of the self, such as how people feel in relation to their social standing, their belongingness to a specific ethnic group, their physical appearance,...
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References
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Wills-Herrera, E. (2023). Self-Esteem. In: Maggino, F. (eds) Encyclopedia of Quality of Life and Well-Being Research. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17299-1_2635
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