Self-Esteem and Human Attraction - Literature review Example

Self-esteem and human attraction s Introduction Self-esteem is among components in psychology that have received a lot of attention. Self-esteem is a personality variable that focuses on how people feel about themselves. It may also refer to the way people evaluate themselves based on their attributes and abilities in life. Self-esteem is viewed as the panacea for the modern human life. It is regarded as central to financial success, relationships, health and personal fulfillment. It social psychology, self-esteem has been implicated and linked to conformity and human attraction. Human attraction is a function of several factors that interplay together. Several characteristics and attributes of people determine whether they will be attracted to others on not. Human attraction is a precursor of human interpersonal relationships especially romantic relationships. Since self-esteem is a characteristic of humans, it is paramount to assess the link between self-esteem and human attraction. Understanding how the two parameters are related to each other and to what extent is the relationship is critical. Physical attractiveness is associated with many benefits to individuals. Perhaps, one of the significant benefits of attractiveness can be identified through social interactions in everyday lives. In day-to-day social interactions, attractive individuals elicit favorable reactions from other people compared to less attractive persons. The attribution of judging people based on attraction occurs subconsciously in the minds of people suggesting a strong tendency of people to make positive judgments to persons who are more attractive. Self-esteem is one the criteria people use to judge other at a subconscious level (Mares, Leeuw, Scholte, & Engels, 2010). The link between human attractions and self-esteem can be understood by assessing the social feedback people receive from their social environments. Whereby, the social feedback from others is largely dependent on the physical attractiveness of that particular person. Studies show that people with greater levels of self-esteem have higher chances of receiving positive feedback (Mares, Leeuw, Scholte, & Engels, 2010). Self-esteem may play a critical role in interpersonal attraction and subsequent acceptance by others in the society. A person’s self-esteem moderates how the person is liked and attracted to other people. People with moderate or high self-esteem are attracted and tend to interact with people of similar levels of self-esteem. Self-esteem largely depends on the level of acceptance and appreciation a person receives from other people in the social environment. Based on the sociometer theory self-esteem marks the degree to which a person may be included or excluded from the social environment. The level of acceptance largely depends on the physical attraction of these people. More physically attractive people tend to be more accepted by others thus, exhibit higher levels of self-esteem compared to less attractive people. According to the Terror Management Theory, self-esteem concept emphasizes on the extent to which others may value an individual in the society. Thus, individuals with higher level of self-esteem owe their esteem to the positive evaluations and feedback from other people in their social surroundings. Often, Social evaluations are made based on how people look especially facial and physical attractiveness. Because first impression evaluations are often based on appearance, it is expected that there is a definite link between self-esteem and attractiveness (Mares, Leeuw, Scholte, & Engels, 2010). Attraction plays a vital role in influencing self-esteem notably during the adolescent stage because of the various changes a person undergoes. The individual differences in attractiveness among these youths may be a critical factor in determining the development of self-esteem. It is possible that learning a person has low or high self-esteem may affect other social dimensions such as how we are attracted to that particular person. Individuals with high self-esteem are also thought to possess other desirable traits. Therefore, Self-esteem may affect how other people perceive a person in the social dimension. It may affect the levels of attraction by other people. In relationships, self-esteem determines the level of attraction and satisfaction between the two people (Zeigler-Hill & Myers, 2011). Attraction in most cases is positively correlated with various personality characteristics among people such as self-concept and self-esteem. Clinical theorists studying self-esteem have predicted that a simple positive relationship exists between self-esteem and attraction (Jacob & Berscheid, 1971). Individuals with high self-esteem accept themselves in the society. As such, they tend to have better interpersonal relations with others and are better attracted to other people as well. Attraction and love are capacities such that the love of self and the love for other are correlated. According to clinicians, high rather than low self-esteem persons tend to be more attracted to the affectionate others. Various dimensions of human attraction relate to self-esteem. According to Bale & Archer (2013), self-perceived attractiveness and self-confidence are important predictors of self-esteem among people (p. 77). People who feel and believe that they are attractive to other usually find themselves having high self-esteem. Everybody wants to feel accepted by other people especially by members of the opposite sex. As such, the belief in attractiveness helps boost the self-esteem of such people. The relationship between self-esteem and perceived attractiveness among people can be explained using the sociometer theory. The theory suggests that self-esteem is sensitive to perceptions of individual desirability whereby individuals believe that by having self-esteem and confidence, they have higher chances of being attracted to other people. Self-perceived Attractiveness may influence an individual’s romantic desirability, which will in turn affect their self-esteem. Studies provide evidence that self-esteem is very sensitive to an individual’s desirability as a potential mate. Persons with higher levels of self-esteem tend to have more attraction to other people because they are viewed as desirable potential mates (Bale & Archer, 2013). Since Human attraction and subsequent mating relationships have evolutionary relevance, assessments of a person’s eligibility to engage in such relationships have strong effects on self-esteem. People who perceive themselves as more attractive tend to exhibit higher levels of self-esteem. This is because self-esteem is an evaluation of personal attributes and characters. Therefore, self-perceived attractiveness will automatically lead to an increase in the level of self-esteem, as the individual will believe in oneself and have higher self-confidence. This may influence the individual’s desirability among other people who may in turn be attracted to that particular individual. Other-rated attractiveness may also have some relationship with an individual’s self-esteem. Other-rated attractiveness is how other people perceive the attractiveness of a person. Compared to self-rated attractiveness, other-rated attractiveness has a minimal association with a person’s self-esteem. According to Bale (2010), self-esteem is thought to be based on an individual’s rating of personal attributes and qualities. Thus, it is unclear whether individuals can correctly assess their attractiveness (p. 17). The small relationship between other-rated attractiveness and self-esteem may be due to personal biases and disparity from self-assessments. As such, observers or judges should provide attractiveness rating similar to those used for self-assessment. When other people rate the level of attraction, it is difficult to ascertain whether attractive individuals have high self-esteem. However, many studies have shown that based on self-rated attractiveness, attractive people have higher self-esteem (Bale, 2010). However, studies that compare the association between attractiveness and self-esteem show varying results. Most studies show a positive relationship between attractiveness and self-esteem suggesting that attractive people tend to have more self-esteem. Other studies in the same field found in no relationship between the self-esteem and attraction while others found a negative association between attractiveness and self-esteem (Mares, Leeuw, Scholte, & Engels, 2010). Conclusion Self-esteem is an important component of psychology that determines how people feel about themselves and how they relate to their social surrounding. However, not many studies have assessed the relationship between self-esteem and attraction among people. Physical attraction is related to self-esteem through its relation to evaluation and positive feedback from other people. Physically attractive people tend to receive positive feedback from people thus, boosting their self-esteem. Attraction and subsequent acceptance by other people depends on the level of self-esteem. Self-perceived attractiveness also influences self-esteem in the sense that people with high self-rated attraction tend to have high self-esteem. Despite the evidence of the various relationships between self-esteem and attraction, little has been done to assess the difference between self-perceived attraction and other-rated attraction. These different variables affect self-esteem in various ways. References Bale. (2010). Attractiveness and self-esteem: A test of sociometer theory. University of Lancashire. Bale, C., & Archer, J. (2013). SelfPercieved Attractiveness, Romantic Desirability and Self-Esteem: A Mating Sociometer Perspective. Evolutionary Psychology, Vol. 11, No. 1, 68-84. Jacob, L., & Berscheid, E. (1971). Self-Esteem and Attraction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 17, No. 1, 84-91. Mares, S., Leeuw, R., Scholte, H., & Engels, R. (2010). Facial Attractiveness and Self-Esteem in Adolescence. Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology, Vol. 39, No. 5, 627-637. Zeigler-Hill, V., & Myers, M. (2011). An Implicit Theory of Self-Esteem: The Consequences of Percieved Self-Esteem for Romantic Desirability. Evolutionary Psychology, Vol. 9(2), 147-180. Read More