Students’ Perceptions about Self-Esteem

Abstract

Self-esteem is very important for all of us. The main aim of the paper is the measurememnt of self-esteem of students of Psychology and Social Work branches of the Faculty of Educational Sciences, Bachelor degree and analyzing students’ opinions about the self-esteem in general and about their self-esteem. For the realization of this study it is used the technique of questionaire. The measuring instrument is the Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg, 1965). It is used, also, the the interview technique in order to understand students’ opinions about their self-esteem in general and about their self-esteem. In the study, we had the participation of 209 students of the Faculty of Educational Sciences of the University “Luigj Gurakuqi” of Shkodër city. In the study we had the participation of 105 students of Psychology branch of Bachelor degree and the participation of 104 students of Social Work branch of Bachelor degree. The paper aims, also, to analyze the impact of specific academic programme and course on mean Self-Esteem Scale score of students. The data collected from the questionnaire was analyzed by means of the SPSS program, variant 20. It is used the analysis of variance Anova table and eta to examine the impact of specific academic programme and course on mean Self-Esteem Scale score of students. There are given the appropriate conclusions. The results of students’s self-esteem are good. The mean is 19,94, the median is 20 and the mode is 20. The maximum score obtained is 28 (obtained from 2 students or 1% of students), the minimum score obtained is 8 (obtained from 1 student or 0,5% of students). There is not a significant relationship between the type of academic programme on mean Self-Esteem Scale score of students (Sig=0,125). There is a significant relationship between the specific academic course on mean Self-Esteem Scale score of students (Sig=0,030). The students of the second academic course have a higher average of point (20,75), whereas the students of the first academic course have a lower average of point (19,05), and this relationship is statistically significant. According to the students, the causes of positive self-esteem, in general, are : a)the support from the family, b)the support from the social environment, c)their confidence and strength to face problems. According to them, the causes of negative self-esteem, in general, are : a)trauma in the family, such as death of the parent, b)physical maltretment and physical violence in the family, c)the failures in life, d) the lack of self-confidence. There are given the appropriate suggestions, as the improvement of students’self-esteem, especially for the students of the first academic course.

DOI: 10.5901/jesr.2014.v4n4p0488