Calibrating the sociometer: The relational contingencies of self-esteem.

A longitudinal daily diary study examined how chronic perceptions of a partner's regard for oneself might affect the day-to-day relational contingencies of self-esteem. Married partners each completed a diary for 21 days, and completed measures of satisfaction twice over the year. Multilevel analyses revealed that people who chronically felt more positively regarded compensated for one day's acute self-doubts by perceiving greater acceptance and love from their partner on subsequent days. In contrast, people who chronically felt less positively regarded by their partner internalized acute experiences of rejection, feeling worse about themselves on days after they feared their partner's disaffection. Over the year, such self-esteem sensitivity to rejection predicted declines in the partner' s satisfaction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Through the looking glass darkly? When self-doubts turn into relationship insecurities.

The authors argue that individuals regulate perceptions of their relationships in a self-protective way, finding virtue in their partners only when they feel confident that their partners also see virtues in them. In 4 experiments, the authors posed an acute threat to low and high self-esteem individuals' feelings of self-worth (e.g., guilt about a transgression, fears of being inconsiderate or intellectually inept). They then collected measures of confidence in the partner's positive regard and acceptance (i.e., reflected appraisals) and perceptions of the partner. The results revealed that low self-esteem individuals reacted to self-doubt with heightened doubts about their partners' regard, which then tarnished impressions of their partners. In contrast, high self-esteem individuals reacted to self-doubts by becoming more convinced of their partners' continued acceptance, using their relationships as a resource for self-affirmation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Deconfounding the effects of dominance and social acceptance on self-esteem.

Three studies examined the independent effects of social acceptance and dominance on self-esteem. In Studies 1 and 2, participants received false feedback regarding their relative acceptance and dominance in a laboratory group, and state self-esteem was assessed. Results indicated that acceptance and dominance feedback had independent effects on self-esteem. Study 2 showed that these effects were not moderated by individual differences in participants' self-reported responsivity to being accepted versus dominant. In Study 3, participants completed multiple measures of perceived dominance, perceived acceptance, and trait self-esteem. Results showed that both perceived dominance and perceived acceptance accounted for unique variance in trait self-esteem, but that perceived acceptance consistently accounted for substantially more variance than perceived dominance. Also, trait self-esteem was related to the degree to which participants felt accepted by specific people in their lives, but not to the degree to which participants thought those individuals perceived them as dominant. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Acceptance is in the eye of the beholder: Self-esteem and motivated perceptions of acceptance from the opposite sex.

Social risk elicits self-esteem differences in signature social motivations and behaviors during the relationship-initiation process. In particular, the present research tested the hypothesis that lower self-esteem individuals' (LSEs) motivation to avoid rejection leads them to self-protectively underestimate acceptance from potential romantic partners, whereas higher self-esteem individuals' (HSEs) motivation to promote new relationships leads them to overestimate acceptance. The results of 5 experiments supported these predictions. Social risk increased activation of avoidance goals for LSEs on a word-recall task but increased activation of approach goals for HSEs, as evidenced by their increased use of likeable behaviors. Consistent with these patterns of goal activation, even though actual acceptance cues were held constant across all participants, social risk decreased the amount of acceptance that LSEs perceived from their interaction partner but increased the amount of acceptance that HSEs perceived from their interaction partner. It is important to note that such self-esteem differences in avoidance goals, approach behaviors, and perceptions of acceptance were completely eliminated when social risk was removed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Putting the Partner Within Reach: A Dyadic Perspective on Felt Security in Close Relationships.

The authors argue that felt insecurity in a partner's positive regard and caring stems from a specifically dyadic perception--the perception that a partner is out of one's league. A cross-sectional sample of dating couples revealed that people with low self-esteem feel inferior to their partner and that such feelings of relative inferiority undermine felt security in the partner's regard. Three experiments examined the consequences of reducing such perceived discrepancies by pointing to either strengths in the self or flaws in the partner. Low, but not high, self-esteem participants reacted to new strengths in the self or faults in the partner by reporting greater felt security in their specific partner's positive regard and commitment and more positive, general feelings about their own interpersonal worth. Thus, putting the partner more within the psychological grasp of low self-esteem people may effectively increase felt security in the partner's regard. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-esteem moderates neuroendocrine and psychological responses to interpersonal rejection.

[Correction Notice: An erratum for this article was reported in Vol 98(6) of Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (see record 2010-09990-008). This article contained a misspelling in the last name of the first author in the below reference. The complete correct reference is included. The online version of the article has been corrected.] In this study, the authors investigated self-esteem as a moderator of psychological and physiological responses to interpersonal rejection and tested an integrative model detailing the mechanisms by which self-esteem may influence cognitive, affective, and physiological responses. Seventy-eight participants experienced an ambiguous interpersonal rejection (or no rejection) from an opposite sex partner in the context of an online dating interaction. Salivary cortisol was assessed at 5 times, and self-reported cognitive and affective responses were assessed. Compared with those with high self-esteem, individuals with low self-esteem responded to rejection by appraising themselves more negatively, making more self-blaming attributions, exhibiting greater cortisol reactivity, and derogating the rejector. Path analysis indicated that the link between low self-esteem and increased cortisol reactivity was mediated by self-blame attributions; cortisol reactivity, in turn, mediated the link between low self-esteem and increased partner derogation. Discussion centers on the role of self-esteem as part of a broader psychobiological system for regulating and responding to social threat and on implications for health outcomes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Correction to Ford and Collins (2010).

Reports an error in "Self-esteem moderates neuroendocrine and psychological responses to interpersonal rejection" by Máire B. Ford and Nancy L. Collins (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2010[Mar], Vol 98[3], 405-419). This article contained a misspelling in the last name of the first author in the below reference. The complete correct reference is included. The online version of the article has been corrected. (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record 2010-02829-005.) In this study, the authors investigated self-esteem as a moderator of psychological and physiological responses to interpersonal rejection and tested an integrative model detailing the mechanisms by which self-esteem may influence cognitive, affective, and physiological responses. Seventy-eight participants experienced an ambiguous interpersonal rejection (or no rejection) from an opposite sex partner in the context of an online dating interaction. Salivary cortisol was assessed at 5 times, and self-reported cognitive and affective responses were assessed. Compared with those with high self-esteem, individuals with low self-esteem responded to rejection by appraising themselves more negatively, making more self-blaming attributions, exhibiting greater cortisol reactivity, and derogating the rejector. Path analysis indicated that the link between low self-esteem and increased cortisol reactivity was mediated by self-blame attributions; cortisol reactivity, in turn, mediated the link between low self-esteem and increased partner derogation. Discussion centers on the role of self-esteem as part of a broader psychobiological system for regulating and responding to social threat and on implications for health outcomes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Optimizing assurance: The risk regulation system in relationships.

A model of risk regulation is proposed to explain how people balance the goal of seeking closeness to a romantic partner against the opposing goal of minimizing the likelihood and pain of rejection. The central premise is that confidence in a partner's positive regard and caring allows people to risk seeking dependence and connectedness. The risk regulation system consists of 3 interconnected "if-then" contingency rules, 1 cognitive, 1 affective, and 1 behavioral. The authors describe how general perceptions of a partner's regard structure the sensitivity of these 3 "if-then" rules in risky relationship situations. The authors then describe the consequences of such situated "if-then" rules for relationship well-being and conclude by integrating other theoretical perspectives and outlining future research directions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-esteem and "if…then" contingencies of interpersonal acceptance.

The degree to which an individual perceives interpersonal acceptance as being contingent on successes and failures, versus being relatively unconditional, is an important factor in the social construction of self-esteem. The authors used a lexical-decision task to examine people's "if…then" expectancies. On each trial, participants were shown a success or failure context word and then they made word-nonword judgments on a second letter string, which sometimes was a target word relating to interpersonal outcomes. For low-self-esteem participants, success and failure contexts facilitated the processing of acceptance and rejection target words, respectively, revealing associations between performance and social outcomes. Study 2 ruled out a simple valence-congruency explanation. Study 3 demonstrated that the reaction-time pattern was stronger for people who had recently been primed with a highly contingent relationship, as opposed to one based more on unconditional acceptance. These results contribute to a social-cognitive formulation of the role of relational schemas in the social construction of self-esteem. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Parental acceptance, postpartum depression, and maternal sensitivity: Mediating and moderating processes.

Mothers (n=92), fathers (n=84), and their infants (60% male) participated in a longitudinal study of postpartum depression and maternal sensitivity. Mothers completed questionnaire measures of remembered parental acceptance, depressive symptoms, and infant distress to novelty and limits. Mothers and partners reported on marital aggression and avoidance. Maternal sensitivity was observed in the laboratory at 6 months. Characteristics of mothers, partners, and infants combined to predict postpartum depression and maternal sensitivity. Remembered parental rejection predicted postpartum depressive symptoms with prenatal depression controlled; self-esteem mediated this effect. Paternal acceptance buffered against postpartum depression when infants were highly reactive and when partners were aggressive. Paternal acceptance reduced the impact of postpartum depression on maternal sensitivity; having an aggressive marital partner exacerbated the effect. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

"Walking on eggshells": How expressing relationship insecurities perpetuates them.

The authors present a model positing that when people are insecure about a relationship partner's acceptance, they often express emotional vulnerabilities to the partner, which causes them to believe the partner views them as highly vulnerable and insecure. In turn, this belief causes them to doubt the authenticity of the partner's expressions of positive regard, which may perpetuate the experience and expression of insecurity that initiated the process. Prototypes of interactions with interpersonally vulnerable individuals included partners' inauthentic expressions of regard (Study 1). Suggesting that these prototypes are applied to personal relationships when vulnerabilities are expressed, those who claimed to have expressed vulnerabilities doubted the partner's authenticity because they believed that they were viewed as vulnerable (Studies 2A, 2B, and 4). Authenticity doubts in turn predicted perceptions of rejection (Studies 3 and 4), which in turn predicted partner derogation and subsequent expressions of vulnerability (Study 4). An experimental manipulation of reflected appraisals of vulnerability increased doubts about the authenticity of a new acquaintance's expressions of emotion (Study 5). Relational insecurity may be perpetuated via the intrapersonal cognitive consequences of expressing it. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The pushes and pulls of close relationships: Attachment insecurities and relational ambivalence.

Attachment theorists have emphasized that attachment-anxious individuals are ambivalent in their relational tendencies, wishing to be close to their relationship partners but also fearing rejection. Here we report 6 studies examining the contribution of attachment anxiety and experimentally induced relational contexts (both positive and negative) to explicit and implicit manifestations of (a) attitudinal ambivalence toward a romantic partner and (b) motivational ambivalence with respect to the goals of relational closeness and distance. Attachment-anxious individuals exhibited strong attitudinal ambivalence toward a romantic partner, assessed by both explicit and implicit measures. They also exhibited strong motivational ambivalence regarding closeness (both explicit and implicit), and this motivational conflict was intensified in relational contexts that encouraged either approach or avoidance tendencies. Participants who scored relatively high on avoidant attachment proved to be implicitly ambivalent about distance issues but mainly in negative relational contexts. Several alternative interpretations of the results were considered and ruled out. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Once hurt, twice hurtful: How perceived regard regulates daily marital interactions.

A daily diary study exantined how chronic perceptions of a partner's regard affect how intimates interpret and respond to daily relationship stresses. Spouses each completed a diary for 21 days. Multilevel analyses revealed that people who felt less positively regarded read more into stressful events than did people who felt highly regarded, feeling more hurt on days after acute threats, such as those posed by a moody or ill-behaved partner. Intimates who felt less valued responded to feeling hurt by behaving badly toward their partner on subsequent days. In contrast, intimates who felt more valued responded to feeling hurt by drawing closer to their partner. Ironically, chronically activated needs for belongingness might lead people who are trying to find acceptance to undermine their marriage. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-esteem and the quest for felt security: How perceived regard regulates attachment processes.

The authors proposed that personal feelings of self-esteem foster the level of confidence in a partner 's regard critical for satisfying attachments. Dating and married couples described themselves, their partners, how they thought their partners saw them, and how they wanted their partners to see them on a variety of interpersonal qualities. The results revealed that low self-esteem individuals dramatically underestimated how positively their partners saw them. Such unwarranted and unwanted insecurities were associated with less generous perceptions of partners and lower relationship well-being. The converse was true for high self-esteem individuals. A longitudinal examination of the dating couple revealed that the vulnerabilities of lows were only exacerbated over time. A dependency regulation model is proposed, wherein felt security in a partner's perceived regard is suggested as a prime mechanism linking self-esteem to relational well-being. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reward allocation and self-esteem: The roles of modeling and equity restoration.

In this experiment we explored the impact of several factors on reward allocation in a dyadic exchange relationship. Participants with varying levels of self-esteem, who took part in a creativity task along with a partner, were led to believe that they had outperformed their partner on some trials and that their partner had outperformed them on others. Participants and partners alternated allocating rewards to themselves and the other person. The partner's self-reward allocations were experimentally programmed to follow one of four types of patterns: equitable, egalitarian, selfish, or generous. Consistent with equity theory, participants made greater self-allocations when they performed better rather than worse than their partner. In addition, the participants' self-reward allocations matched those of the partners, such that they made the largest self-allocations in the selfish condition, the smallest in the generous condition, and moderate-sized allocations in the equitable and egalitarian conditions. Subsequent analyses revealed that self-esteem moderated the extent to which individuals' reward allocations were affected by these two factors. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-esteem and organization of valenced information about others: The "Jekyll and Hyde"-ing of relationship partners.

The authors theorize that individuals with high self-esteem functionally integrate positive and negative partner information in memory, whereas those low in self-esteem segregate such information. The authors obtained support for this view in 7 studies. In a first set, participants judged whether positive and negative traits presented in an alternating or nonalternating order applied to a partner. Low but not high self-esteem individuals were slowed by the alternating order when judging relationship partners (but not inanimate objects). In a 2nd set, participants answered questions tapping integrated thinking, self-esteem, and other attributes. Higher self-esteem was associated with more integrated thinking when other attributes were controlled. In a final study, anxiously attached individuals were more labile in rating their spouse over a 5-day period. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

When and why do ideal partner preferences affect the process of initiating and maintaining romantic relationships?

Three studies explored how the traits that people ideally desire in a romantic partner, or ideal partner preferences, intersect with the process of romantic relationship initiation and maintenance. Two attraction experiments in the laboratory found that, when participants evaluated a potential romantic partner's written profile, they expressed more romantic interest in a partner whose traits were manipulated to match (vs. mismatch) their idiosyncratic ideals. However, after a live interaction with the partner, the match vs. mismatch manipulation was no longer associated with romantic interest. This pattern appeared to have emerged because participants reinterpreted the meaning of the traits as they applied to the partner, a context effect predicted by classic models of person perception (S. E. Asch, 1946). Finally, a longitudinal study of middle-aged adults demonstrated that participants evaluated a current romantic partner (but not a partner who was merely desired) more positively to the extent that the partner matched their overall pattern of ideals across several traits; the match in level of ideals (i.e., high vs. low ratings) was not relevant to participants' evaluations. In general, the match between ideals and a partner's traits may predict relational outcomes when participants are learning about a partner in the abstract and when they are actually in a relationship with the partner, but not when considering potential dating partners they have met in person. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Commitment insurance: Compensating for the autonomy costs of interdependence in close relationships.

A model of the commitment-insurance system is proposed to examine how low and high self-esteem people cope with the costs interdependence imposes on autonomous goal pursuits. In this system, autonomy costs automatically activate compensatory cognitive processes that attach greater value to the partner. Greater partner valuing compels greater responsiveness to the partner’s needs. Two experiments and a daily diary study of newlyweds supported the model. Autonomy costs automatically activate more positive implicit evaluations of the partner. On explicit measures of positive illusions, high self-esteem people continue to compensate for costs. However, cost-primed low self-esteem people correct and override their positive implicit sentiments when they have the opportunity to do so. Such corrections put the marriages of low self-esteem people at risk: Failing to compensate for costs predicted declines in satisfaction over a 1-year period. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cued activation of relational schemas: Self-evaluation and gender effects.

In two studies, men's and women's self-evaluative responses following presentation of rejection and acceptance cues were examined. Two different conditioning procedures were utilized to associate computer-generated tones with images of social rejection or acceptance. When these tones were played later in a self-evaluative situation, women tended to respond to rejection cues by becoming more self-critical, and to acceptance cues by becoming less self-critical. On some indicators, men responded in the opposite fashion. These findings are discussed in light of recent analyses of gender differences in the sources of self-esteem. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)