Correlation between Self-Esteem and Memory - Research Proposal Example

Correlation between Self-Esteem and Memory (Write your first middle initial(s), and type the of your here) Correlation between Self-Esteem and Memory It has been claimed that people's self esteem produces an affective state that facilitates retrieval remembering. Those low in self-esteem are quicker at identifying information suggestive of failure than those high in self-esteem. Many Former studies have indicated a correlation between self-esteem and memory retrieval in individuals. Following is a correlational study that aimed to find a link between self-esteem and memory retrieval in individuals. Twenty-five undergraduate students, from the Psychology department, aged between 20-30 years were used for the experiment where 16 were females and 9 were males. The study employed standardized measures constituting a Rosenberg Self-Esteem questionnaire given to participants to be completed in class; followed by a series of fifteen words read aloud to them and to be written down on a sheet of paper shortly afterward to test their memory. This experiment used a within-subject design where the researcher tested the participants independently and analyzed their results in SPSS, running a Pearson Correlation Test to find any correlation. Several specific studies have highlighted many cases that demonstrate how memories affect self-esteem both positively and negatively. Psychologists have long been studying "Self-esteem" as an independent concept in cognitive-behavioral therapy, mistaking it as something characteristic of maladjustment in one's social environment. It was until only recently that Social Scientists like Rubenstein (1999) defined self-esteem as the "belief" that one is capable of making competent and appropriate decisions about his life. (p. 76) This belief, Rubenstein explains, is based on how we evaluate our actions where such evaluation is, in turn, driven by concepts such as memory and self-concept. Healthy self-esteem is achieved when people are able to validate their actions positively. (p. 76) Constituting one of the four components of self-concept, Carpenito-Moyet (2007) state that self-esteem has many types and kinds depending on several factors that are driven by experiences and memory (p. 563). Psychologists have discovered that self-esteem fluctuates as life events range from positive to negative incidents, where negative life events predict lower self-esteem (e.g., Lakey, Tardiff, & Drew, 1994). Sternberg and Mio, discussing autobiographical memory; which is the memory of an individual's history, state that experiences in the life of an individual are constructive, wherein one does not recall exactly what happened but one's own construction or reconstruction of what happened. (p. 237) Which brings us to the concept of what one "believes" to be true about himself. These investigations about autobiographical memory show that memories affect self-esteem especially when the individual has a distorted recall. There are several studies highlighting many cases that demonstrate how memories affect self-esteem both positively and negatively. One such study is that of Uttl, Ohta and Siegenthaler's (2006) introduction and study of the so-called "self-defining memories". Their study showed that, in the case of mother-daughter bonding, daughters that were narrated more positive birth narratives showed higher self-esteem and those, with more frequently told and descriptive stories were closer to their mothers than those who weren't told any positive birth narratives. Uttl, Ohta and Siegenthaler found support from a similar research on SDMs conducted by Cohen and Conway. Their studies led them to the finding that these memories have links to personality styles. For instance, there was the case that reported the way students at the end of their third year of college have described and evaluated a significant life experience from the preceding 3 years and how these correlated with their personality, well-being and academic achievement during those 3 years. Here, Conway and Cohen, maintained that "high positive effect in the memory description was related to higher levels of self-esteem and well-being, and levels of self-esteem, agreeableness, and conscientiousness showed a tendency to increase over the course of college for these students." There are many psychological trauma cases documented that demonstrate the negative effects of bad memories on self-esteem. Many researchers have worked on the connection between traumatic memories to a person's belief that he or she is worthless, for example Wilson, Friedman and Lindy's (2004) research on childhood sexual abuse survivors. Kudia (2006) states that negative events when recorded as a memory can lead to further low self-esteem as they contribute to social emotions such as anxiety, shyness and stress. According to Rue (2005), enhanced working memory in humans resulted in an entirely new homeostatic system, which motivates individuals to maintain a positive image of self-esteem as judged by socially induced standards of performance. (p. 64) The importance of this system is that once it is supposedly established, it functions as a powerful organizer of an individual's experiences and activity that, in turn, is pivotal in nearly all aspects of information processing, including attention, perception, memory, concept formation, and all manners of judgments concerning which things matter. In applying this or in a consciously designed way to improve self-esteem, one could create positive memories. For example, consistently poor performances/memory will contribute to a sense of negative self-esteem, while good outcomes/memories will count as evidence favoring a sense of positive self-esteem. The strategy is to reinforce the positive memories by doing the things or pursuing those that contribute to positive performance/memories. According to Conway and Cohen, positive achievements in life can be a great contributing factor to positive memories that shape and determine an individual's identity; because such experiences are fundamental in the establishment of the knowledge base of people and their self-conceptualization. Rue (2005) believes that, enhancing memory in humans brings about a wholly new homeostatic system, which will drive individuals to maintain a positive image of self-esteem as judged by socially induced standards of performance. As negative events occur in one's life over time, their memory may injure one's self-esteem and lead to more reminders of self-doubts, inadequacy and a general lack of self-efficacy. An individual more successful in fulfilling his intentions all his life will feel more positive, high in self-esteem and more effective. Studying an individual's self-esteem based on their memory of their past life can be complex due to individual differences and motivational implications. However, studying the effects of their self-esteem, measured from a self-report questionnaire, on their memory can be achieved in a lab experiment using reliable measures. The dimension offered by positive and negative experiences as contained in the study of memory as well as the other variables that come into play such the self-concept and identity underscore the fact that self-esteem may be adjusted. This highlighted the developmental formulations of the self as a cognitive-affective representation that is constructed through cognitive processes. Psychologists believe that self-esteem influences memory rather than being influenced by it. The present study seeks to test this hypothesis using standardized measures. Method Participants Participants were twenty-five undergraduate students in the Psychology Department, participating in the study in order to complete a coursework; sixteen of them female while nine male. Their ages ranged between 20 to 30 years (mean age = 22.16; standard deviation = 2.80). Design This correlational study employed a within-subject experimental design where the researcher tried to minimize order and learning effects by counter-balancing the order of the two tasks given to the students to do. All participants were tested independently. Rosenberg's Self-Esteem Scale was used to determine the level of self-esteem in each participant. The scale has a 10-item self-report measure of global self-esteem and uses a four-point scale with the options "Strongly disagree", "Disagree", "Agree" and "Strongly agree". Measurement of memory was achieved by having the participants remember as many words as they could from a list of fifteen items and then told to write down shortly afterward. The researcher took care of "counterbalancing" by Procedure The study was held within a classroom in the presence of the researcher. The students were given an overview of the experimental tasks and given the Rosenberg Self-Esteem questionnaire along with a sheet to report gender and age. In order to test their memory the researcher read aloud a series of 15 words to the participants and then proceeded in asking them to write down as many as they could recall on a sheet of paper regardless of their sequence. They were all tested independently. After all data was collected, the researcher introduced it into the SPSS for data analysis. The participants were not really aware of what was being measured. Results A moderate positive correlation was found when computing the scores for self-esteem and recalled words number. The mean number of words recalled was 11.2 (SD= 2.14). The average score for self-esteem using Rosenberg's self-esteem Scale was 20.64(SD = 4.9). Analyzing variance using Pearson's correlation coefficient confirmed a significant correlation: (r (23) = .459, p < 0.05). Discussion The results showed a positive correlation between short-term memory retrieval and self esteem. There is a great deal of literature on the interplay and interdependence of memory and self-esteem already; although mostly only studied in the wider context of self-concept. Participants scoring low on the Rosenberg Self-Esteem questionnaire did not do as well as those scoring high on the self-esteem scale. This reinforces the idea, as Howe (2004) put it, that who we are influences what we attend to, encode, and store about our everyday experiences and that our current needs, wishes, aspirations, and intents often control what is reported to others about our life experiences. Thus our performance is affected by our self-esteem. Psychologists have discovered that self-esteem also affects one's memory retrieval about positive and negative information. However, there is no tangible evidence for any memory bias or memory selectivity as a function of self-esteem as no studies have clearly addressed it. It would be good to include negative and positive words in the list of words given to students and compare if those low in self-esteem tend to recall words suggestive of failure more or not. Story (1998, Study 1) conducted a similar experiment though. Analyzing a group of college students' short-term memory retrieval, he found no differences in the accurate recall of any positive/negative personality feedback for those who were low in self-esteem than those high in self-esteem. However, those high in self-esteem provided more positive guesses, when they could not recall accurately than those low in self-esteem. This shows that self-esteem influences memory rather than being influenced by it. This is because as negative events occur in one's life over time, their memory may injure one's self-esteem and lead to more reminders of self-doubts, inadequacy and a general lack of self-efficacy affecting one's performance. Participants having doubts and lack of confidence about themselves reported a low self-esteem on the scale and happened to recall fewer words as compared to others. To improve this study, a bigger sample would have given a clearer idea, as generalizations cannot be made from such small a sample. One drawback of using Rosenberg Self-Esteem questionnaire is that although it measures global self-esteem, we need to account for individual and cultural differences while conducting such a study on a wider scale. The same study in field settings may give more insight to the researcher and perhaps different results as the participants would not be aware they are under study, for example a shopping mall. However, counter-balancing would be a challenge for the researcher in that case. It would be interesting to compare women and men and discover any gender differences with regards to memory recall and self-esteem. References Baddeley, A. D. (1999). Essentials of Human Memory. U.K: Psychology Press. Dewhurst, S., & Marlborough, M. (2003). Memory bias in the recall of pre-exam anxiety: The influence of self-enhancement. Applied Cognitive Psychology 17: 695-702 Gathercole, S. E (Ed.) (1996). Models of short-term memory. U.K.: Psychology Press. Hunt, R. R. & Ellis, C. H. (2004). Fundamentals of Cognitive Psychology. NY. McGraw Hill Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Tafarodi, R., Marshall T. &Milne, A. (2003). Self esteem and memory. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology Vol. 84, No. 1, 29-45 Beike, D., Lampinen, J. and Behrend, D. (2004). The self and memory. New York: Psychology Press. Cohen, G. and Conway, M. (2008). Memory in the real world. London: Routledge. Uttl, B., Ohta, N., and Siegenthaler, A. (2006). Memory and emotion: interdisciplinary perspectives. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. Read More