Phony vs. Earned Self-Esteem

A study by Jean Twenge of San Diego State University, published in the current issue of Social Psychological and Personality Science, is getting a lot of news this week. Twenge found that college kids today are more likely to call themselves gifted and driven to succeed, while their test scores and hours spent studying are decreasing. She also found that the tendency toward narcissism among college students has also increased over the last 30 years.

Some reports get a bit more frenzied than I prefer. Titles and writing like, "We are raising a generation of deluded narcissists!" just gets us scared, whereas I prefer to be effective. Twenge has been studying this trend for several years, has accumulated some impressive research and has written several books.

Today I want to look at what I consider one of the sources of this trend: the phony self-esteem movement, and how it feeds the fixed trait mindset – and thus the need to see oneself as just fantastic. This also shows what can be done to remedy the situation, instead of just freaking out.

I have written before about Carol Dweck's work on mindsets. The fixed trait mindset is one based on inborn gifts or shortcomings; the growth mindset is one based on what we do with our gifts and circumstances. The growth mindset is much more desirable. Different views of self-esteem feed into each.

Many years ago, when I was a young psychology graduate student studying with Nathaniel Branden, I remember him talking one day about having been invited to be part of The California Task Force to Promote Self-Esteem, led by California State Assemblyman John Vasconcellos.

Nathaniel declined, as he couldn't see why he would be involved in that since he did not see a role for government in the development of self-esteem. Nonetheless, the task force carried on and created guidelines for building "self-esteem" in a way that Branden would never have advocated.

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