Self‐esteem and culture: Differences in cognitive self‐evaluations or affective self‐regard?

Abstract

Although people from East Asian countries consistently report lower self‐esteem than do those from Western countries, the origins of this difference are unclear. We conducted two studies to illuminate this issue. Study 1 found that Chinese participants appraised themselves less positively than American participants on a cognitive measure of self‐evaluations, but cultural differences were absent on a measure of affective self‐regard. Moreover, cultural differences in global self‐esteem were eliminated once cognitive self‐evaluations were statistically controlled. Study 2 found that cultural differences in modesty underlie cultural differences in cognitive self‐evaluations. These findings suggest that Chinese feel as positively toward themselves as Americans do, but are less inclined to evaluate themselves in an excessively positive manner.