Trait and State Self-Esteem

People may constantly assess themselves based on their general feelings, their various abilities and attributes, and their successes and failures.

Such associations relate to the broad concept of self-esteem—an overall measure of how someone feels about and evaluates themselves, which can range from low to high.

For example, a college football player has consistently displayed high self-esteem. This type of overarching self-esteem is called trait self-esteem—an individual’s self-opinion over long periods, which typically remains stable.

This general evaluation may be partly due to how a person views themselves in relation to specific attributes, which is termed domain self-esteem. For example, the football player believes he’s athletically talented, as peers and coaches frequently praise his performance. Consequently, his self-opinion is contingent on this trait.

However, day-to-day incidents can cause temporary fluctuations in self-esteem. For instance, if the player throws an incomplete pass during a game and his team loses, the mood shifts, and he may now view himself as a useless failure and fear that he’ll be ostracized at his school—especially if he receives criticism from fr