Imitation and Self-Esteem as Determinants of Self-Critical Behavior

Abstract

This study investigated the influence of self-rated esteem and exposure to an adult model on children's learning of self-critical behavior. Half the Ss first observed a same-sex model playing a bowling game on which scores were experimentally controlled. Following low scores, the model gave up rewards and made self-critical comments. While Ss imitated the model s performance standards for forgoing reinforcement, few of them imitated self-critical comments. Children not exposed to a model neither gave up tokens nor made any comments while playing the game. Scores from 3 self-rating esteem measures were not related to any dependent variable. Apparently, self-critical behavior can be learned through imitation of models, and self-denial of rewards is relatively independent of other types of self-evaluations.