Increasing Educational Achievement via Self Concept Change

Abstract

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Does High Self-Esteem Cause Better Performance, Interpersonal Success, Happiness, or Healthier Lifestyles?

“…An impressive review of research on such programs was published by Scheirer and Kraut (1979). The title, "Increased Educational Achievement via Self-Concept Change," sounds promising with respect to the benefits of self-esteem, but the findings were not.…”

“…Programs that targeted factors other than self-esteem (such as by encouraging parents to become involved in their children's schoolwork) seemed to get better results. Scheirer and Kraut (1979) carefully considered a variety of factors that could have led to the general pattern of null results, including poor measurement, methodological problems, and failure to implement interventions properly, among others. Yet as far as they could tell, these factors were not sufficient to explain the broad pattern of results.…”

Tensions, Trends, Tools, and Technologies: Time for an Educational Sea Change

“…In their article, they argued for the equivalent of an FEA, analogous to the Federal Drug Scheirer and Kraut (1979) showed that selfesteem and achievement are correlated mainly because achievement enhances self-esteem, not because self-esteem enhances achievement.…”

The causal ordering of academic achievement and self-concept of ability during elementary school: A longitudinal study.

“…Self-enhancement programs, for example (see Scheirer & Kraut, 1979), rely on the assumption that an improvement in self-concept will lead to a gain in academic achievement.…”