Further supporting the causal role of actual-desired self-esteem discrepancies in predicting self-clarity, Study 3 found that a manipulation designed to make high self-esteem seem less desirable reduced the relationship between self-esteem and clarity.
RESULTS: No significant differences between African American and white women were found for body dissatisfaction, self-esteem, discrepancies between actual and ideal weight and shape, or the relationship between self-esteem and body dissatisfaction.
Because people tend to desire high self-esteem, such discrepancies are generally larger among individuals low in self-esteem.
Yet, rather than by low self-esteem per se, socially anxious people are characterised by a small discrepancy between esteem of self and others, and it may be this reduced tendency to self-favouring that is pivotal to social anxiety.
Low self-esteem arises when the discrepancy is great.
In this research, we examined a novel predictor of clarity in one's self-conceptions: discrepancies between actual and desired levels of self-esteem.
There are discrepancies in findings of major studies on self-esteem and obesity in children [ 19].
Individuals experience high self-esteem when there is little discrepancy between the ideal and the perceived real self.
What explains the discrepancies?
There are other discrepancies.
