An Empirical Investigation of the Relationship Between Resilience and Self-Esteem Among Adolescents

Abstract

Adolescence is a developmental period during which personal resiliency and self-esteem are especially susceptible to change, yet the two constructs are rarely examined together using a validated, multidimensional resiliency framework. The present cross-sectional study examined the relationship between the three components of personal resiliency; Sense of Mastery, Sense of Relatedness, and Emotional Reactivity, and global self-esteem among adolescents, tested whether these components and age predicted self-esteem, and compared resiliency and self-esteem across grade levels and gender. A convenience sample of 597 adolescents (297 male, 300 female), aged 13 to 18 years, completed a demographic sheet, the Resiliency Scales for Children and Adolescents (RSCA; Prince-Embury, 2006), and the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg, 1965). Mastery and Relatedness were positively correlated, whereas both showed weak but significant negative correlations with self-esteem; Emotional Reactivity was positively correlated with self-esteem, and age was significantly negatively correlated with self-esteem. Multiple regression indicated that age, Mastery, Relatedness, and Emotional Reactivity together explained 5.9% of the variance in self-esteem, with age and Mastery emerging as significant negative predictors and Relatedness and Emotional Reactivity as significant positive predictors. One-way ANOVA revealed significant differences in Emotional Reactivity and self-esteem with eleventh-grade students reporting the lowest scores on both. A two-way MANOVA further revealed significant, though small, main effects of gender and grade level and a significant Gender × Grade Level interaction. These findings suggest that personal resiliency and self-esteem follow distinct developmental trajectories across adolescence and that their interrelationship may be more complex than traditionally assumed.