Does unemployment affect the self-esteem of school-leavers?

Abstract

The self‐esteem of school‐leavers was studied in a longitudinal design to determine whether being unemployed was as demoralizing for them as it was reported to be for older workers in the 1930s. Global self‐esteem in fourth and fifth form students at both public and private schools was measured prior to the end of a school year and again 4 months later when respondents could be categorized as returned to school, employed or unemployed. Though girls had significantly lower self‐esteem than boys in the first set of data, there were not significant differences between the within‐sex groupings. There was a significant increase in self‐esteem over the 4‐month period for the employed girls alone. In neither unemployed group, had self‐esteem decreased a significant amount in that time.