Perceptualand Motor Skills, 1990, 70, 691-702.
63 Perceptual and Motor Skills 1990
"FACES A N D FEELINGS": A PROJECTIVE TECHNIQUE FOR MEASURING YOUNG CHILDREN'S SELF-ESTEEM"' ANNE McCREARY JLJHASZ AND NANDA MUNSHI Loyoka University of Chicago Summary.-A projective type "Faces and Feelings" measure was designed for use with kindergarten and first grade children. The underlying assumption was that the technique would elicit from this age group self-perceptions of worthwhileness. The unique methodology eliminated the most pervasive problems in self-esteem measurement, and results yielded important information about the effects of significant others on young children's self-esteem. Also, feelings about home and school activities addressed the rnulrifaceced and specificity aspect of the self-esteem construct. Differences between American and Australian children and boys and girls in how Mom, Dad, Teacher, Friend, Home, School, Holiday, Reading, Math made children feel about themselves could be identified using "Faces and Feelings."
The primary focus of this paper is the measurement of self-esteem in young children and while the results are interesting it is the methodology which is the major concern. The theoretical framework on which the "Faces and Feelings" measure is based includes Wylie's (1974) focus on self as source of information about esteem, Cooley's (1912) looking-glass self-construct which emphasizes the importance of significant others' appraisals, and Shavelson's and Bolus's (1982) multifaceted approach to the nature of self-esteem. They posit that in addition to a general, fairly stable component, self-esteem also rests on specific aspects of self and of one's behavior. Accordingly, an individual can base feelings of worth on different factors, depending on the situation and the prepotency of the individual's needs and goals at a certain point in time. Theory suggests that any attempt to obtain v&d measures of children's self-esteem should actively involve the actual subjects not only in the self-measurement but also in the content selection and the test methodology. Simply stated, then, children should provide the list of others who affect their self-esteem, and they should also identify the situations in which their feelings of worth are important to them. Any other approach to self-esteem measurement negates the uniqueness of the self and the critical influence of situational and developmental factors on children's feelings of esteem. This is indeed a strong statement which conjures up visions of constantly redesigning any self-esteem measure, leading the researcher to despair and
'Address correspondence to A . M. Juhasz, Educational Psychology, Layola University of Ghicago, 820 N. Michigan Avenue, Chicago, IL 60611. Thanks to the teachers who cooperated in chis study, Ron Chase, Marie Kelliher, Joan McMillen, Kay Roberts, Marisa Shorer.
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frustration. Temporal stability is at the core of the problem and has been the focus of investigation (Shavelson & Bolus, 1982; Wells & Marwell, 1776). However, without the subject's input into the self-esteem measurement base, construct validity is questionable. Most measures are the product of adult researchers' conceptions of children's esteem and on what it rests. The most that one could deduce from test results is the consistency with which children respond to questions posed by test designers and norrned on nonselves. This need to start at the beginning with others and situations which children identify is especially critical. Never has there been such diversity in the familial and societal environments of children. And while currently we can predict, based on developmental theory (Erikson, 1950) and research (Rosenberg, 1779), that parents, especially mothers will be most significant to most young children's esteem, we do not know how the explosion in child day-care will change this. Also, if self-esteem is as important as we believe it is, we need techniques with the power to identify components which fall outside those measured by instruments currently used. The terms self-concept and self-esteem are customarily used interchangeably as are tests purported to measure esteem. This author argues that there is a difference and questions whether or not the self-dimensions set forth by test constructors are indeed those which are most salient to the esteem of each specific individual at a given time. Most measures do not get at the importance of the designated factors to the subject and to the personal feelings of worth. Many measures are general in nature and focus on the self-descriptors which may or may not be included in the individual's esteem constellation. Also, the idea of not necessarily being the best but being "good enough" is usually missing. These important premises guided the design of "Faces and Feelings," a measure of significant others and young children's self-esteem. The uniqueness of the self extends beyond dimensions essential to esteem, to include personal views of those whose appraisals significantly influence feelings of worth. Each individual is the best contributor of the test content for his own self-esteem. The problem in this project was to design a method which would allow young children to indicate the content of the measure and their relevant feelings of self-esteem.
Literature Review Self-esteem measures typically consist of a group of statements or adjectives which the individual must read and then respond to by either indicating agreement or rating the item on a multidimensional scale (Coopersmith, 1767; Piers-Harris, 1764). Not only does this type of instrument measure self-concept rather than self-esteem but also the response format is unsuited for young children who are better able to respond to projective-type tests. Also few studies have dealt specifically with young children's self-esteem. Researchers have designed instruments which respond to single aspects
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of the problem noted above. Although none satisfactorily deals with all of these (suitable format, direct information from the tested subject, self-esteem rather than self-concept), results and recommendations were considered in the design of the instrument discussed in this paper. Joseph's Self-concept Screening Test (1979) uses a series of dichotomous pictures from which the child must select those like hmself in response to questions. This procedure is suitable for primary school children as a screening device for those at risk for adjustment and learning. However, this test is for clinical use, presents researcher-designed situations and materials and would not be appropriate for regular classroom settings and teacher-pupil input and discussion. Also the like-not like me designation does not necessarily reflect feelings related to esteem. Bolea, Felker, and Barnes (1971) used a pictorial self-concept scale for primary school children. I t requires subjects to sort 50 cartoon-like picture cards into three piles according to whether the figure on the card is "Like," "Sometimes Like," or "Not at aU Like" the subject. This scale does not reflect children's perceptions of their worthwhileness since it is based upon psychologists' categories of self-concept. Neither is the "reflected-appraisal of significant others" aspect of self-esteem tapped by this instrument. Sauls and colleagues (1977), in an important study, asked children to identify the face they would wear if "they" could make the teacher happy with [their] arithmetic." They also circled yes or no statements related to family, school, and peer influences on self-appraisal. The researchers designed both the faces and the questions. Achievement, role expectancy, and self-acceptance were identified, as specific dimensions of self. These researchers also stressed the importance of sensitivity to specifics rather than a global approach to self. Relevant to this study is the question of children's ability to identify emotions in facial expressions. Edwards and Eden (1987) found that 5'/2-yr.-olds could d o this even though they did not display as wide a range as did older subjects. Trembay, Kerowac, and Dore (1987) noted that 5-yr.-olds are less accurate than older subjects in the recognition of facial expressions. From this review of materials happy and sad faces emerged as a useful measurement device. Happy and sad are concepts w h c h are readily understood by children. They can identify these feelings in others and in themselves. They can also tell others what makes them feel happy or sad and the situations in which they experience these feelings. Going one step further, an investigation of children's feelings could shed light upon situations, activities and others who make them feel good or bad about themselves. The initial assumption is made here that these feelings reflect the child's perceptions of his value and self-esteem. These dynamics of the child's perceptual
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and emotional reactions to significant others' responses to his behavior are indicated in the flow chart shown in Fig. 1. The assumptions underlying this figure remain to be tested. Developmental Tasks 1 Child's Behavior 1 Child's Perceptions of Significant Others' Evaluation/Feedback 1 Child's Feelings of Own Confidence and Competence
1 Child's Emotions (happy, sad, OK)
1 Child's Translation to Image of Self (good me, bad me, O K me) 1 Chdd's Self-esteem Level (high-positive) (low-negative) (OK-OK) FIG. 1. Perceptual and emotional pathway to child's self-esteem
Design of the "Faces and Feelingx" Measure Forty-seven Austrahan kindergarten students and their teacher cooperated with the researcher in designing and piloting the methods and materials for the "Faces and Feelingso measure. A teaching unit on feelings provided the context for this ongoing activity which took from two to three weeks. Preactivity discussion focused on feelings, on what and who made the children feel really good about themselves, really important, able to d o well, and the negative opposites. Children's experiences at home, at school and in the neighborhood added concreteness for conceptualizing the meaning of esteem although that term was not used. Rather, children were asked to tell how they felt about themselves in different situations or how they thought other people would feel about them and their behavior. From this pool of words, the children identified "Happy," "Sad," and "OK" as best representing feelings that "I am worthwhile and feel good about myself," "I am no good and feel bad about myself," "I am good enough, am satisfied but don't feel really great or really bad about myself." From their pooled contributions children agreed upon five people who most influenced their feelings about themselves: "Mum, Dad, Teacher, F a d y , and Friend." "Other" was added to cover a wide variety of persons
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also mentioned, such as my dog, God, and grandmother. The kindergarteners selected these common places and activities in which they felt able or not able to do well, and good or bad about themselves: Home, School, Vacation, Free-time, Mathematics, Reading. Under the children's guidance the teacher drew, on each of three yellow, precut round circles, eyes, nose and mouth. The mouth became the single feature identifying each feeling: happy, a concave half-circle; sad, a convex half-circle; and OK, closed lips. (The teacher's initial horizontal line was perceived as a "cross' person; lips had to be added.) In separate work sessions children developed their own individualized pictures, first of the six people, second of the places or situations. I n preparation the teacher had taught the key words and prepared two sheets with appropriately labeled boxes. All children recognized each of the words on sight and understood the meaning. No label was placed in the sixth person box. Children were instructed to draw a picture of "someone else who was important to them" (significant other). The teacher cut each child's completed worksheets into a set of picture cards and established a code sheet with each child's name, picture labels, and code columns: 1. happy, 2. sad, 3. O K . During the following days, on an individual basis, the teacher played the Faces-Feelings game asking each child to, (1) "identify each picture by name, (2) tell how the person or place makes the child feel about himherself, (3) point to the face which belongs to the way he/she feels." For the "places" pictures the teacher asked children to follow the same procedure identifying their pictures and pointing to the appropriate face in response to the question, "How do you feel about yourself when you are here, doing ths?" The teacher marked each child's responses on the code sheet. I n summary, the test procedures require children to: (1) draw 6 pictures representing people who are important and significant in their lives, (2) draw 6 pictures of situations which are important in their lives, (3) draw 3 faces on precut circles representing happy, sad, O K emotions, and (4) match a face to each picture showing how this person or situation makes them feel about themselves.
Characteristics of "Faces and Feelings" An associative (projective) technique, the "Faces and Feelings" measure was designed for use with kindergarten (5- to 6-yr.-old) children. A combination of stimulus-response options is used; (1) printed word stimuli-drawing response, (2) verbal stimuli-drawing response, (3) matching two drawing responses. This technique utilizes less structured stimuli than are typically used in other projective-type assessments. The subject brings to the printed word and to the verbal stimulus h s own interpretation based on individual differences in perception. The child's drawing represents his personal inter-
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pretation of the concept rather than a preestablished model provided by the adult researcher. This eliminates confusion, lending conceptual clarity and validity to the associative process. The child need not be taught the meaning of the pictures used in the test. He already "owns" his pictures through the process of drawing them. For the child, the picture of mother on the page represents his own mother. Unlike other human figure drawing techniques (Goodenough & Harris, 1950; Koppitz, 1984), the figures themselves are not the subject of analysis in this measure. Rather, they enhance the validity of the test. I t is the assigning of the happy, sad, or OK faces to the pictures of people and situations which is of interest. This measure was developed by children for children and therefore does not suffer from the shortcomings noted by McArthur and Roberts (1982): inappropriate stimulus materials, useful only with a limited age group, dated, specific-theory based.
Extension of the Project The techniques developed with the Australian sample were presented to American first grade and kindergarten teachers who worked with a total of 90 children to test the procedures. Discussion and pupil preparation for the activity followed the same directions in both countries. The American children specified situations, activities, and significant others comparable to those identified by their Australian peers. Some spelling and terminology was different. "Mum" became "Mom," "Free-time" became "Play-time" and "Vacation" was changed to "Holiday." Teacher preparation and pupil procedures were the same for all kindergartners; however, these differed for the first-grade American sample. The teacher prepared for each child a 12-page "My Feelings Book." O n the cover were the three faces, "Happy," "Sad," "OK." Each page had one of the key words designating person, place or activity at the bottom and a blank yellow face in the top corner. The child's task was to draw an appropriate picture for the word, and to draw the features on the face which would show how he felt about himself. Children were involved in this work over a 2-wk. period as scheduled class activities. On completion of the assignment, the teacher coded responses from each book. For all groups, follow-up class and/or individual discussion was planned by each teacher based on the for this project on self-esteem. Esting the Procedures Of the 137 children who participated in the project, 47 were Australian kindergarteners, 25 boys and 22 girls, ages from 5 to 7 yr. (M age, 6.3) and 90 were Americans, 47 boys and 43 girls in kindergarten and first grade, ages from 5 to 7 (M age, 6.5). Socioeconomic background and school environment were similar in both samples, providing an homogeneous sample of
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convenience. Family status and composition, race and ethnic background were not factors under study in this project. Rather we were interested in the effectiveness of the procedure to elicit varied responses reflecting the uniqueness of self. Responses to the "Faces and Feelings" measure did yield unexpected findings and between-group differences, even in these samples which were fairly homogeneous. One could expect the measure to be a powerful indicator of self-esteem feelings in more diverse populations of young children. Research controlling for family constellation, ethnicity, intellectual, social and emotional adjustment will test further the power of the "Faces and Feelings" technique. Percentages were computed for the children's responses to each stimulus picture for each of the three feelings. A majority of the responses were either happy or sad, so no reference is made to the O K category. Data were examined for the total sample of children (137), the Americans (90), Australians (47), boys (72), girls (65), and by sex within each nationality. In addition, persons and situations were rank-ordered for choices of feeling category. TABLE 1 HAPPYFEELINGS ASSOCIATED WITH OTHERS: PERCENTAGES BY SAMPLEAND SWL Others Mom
Dad Teacher Friend Family Significant Other n
Boys Austr- Ameralian ican 95 68 72 56 72 76
94 77 66 66 91 77
All 97 74 74 63 84 76
Girls Austr- Ameralian ican 84 82 100 86 100 86
98 80 74 79 79 81
AU 90 80 89 82 86 83
Total Austr- Ameralian ican 89 74 85 70 85 81 47
97 84 81 72 86 79 90
All 93 77 82 70 85 78 137
Persons These ratings and percentages yielded interesting differences in self-feelings relative to significant others (Table 1). Examples of some results illustrate this poinr. Australian girls had the lowest Mum = Happy percentage, and over-all more girls than boys felt happy about Dad. There was also a 28% difference between Australian girls' and boys' happy feelings associated with both Teacher and FamiIy. The expected rank order (Mom, Dad, Family) of others who made the children feel happy did not emerge from the data. Dad is the missing component, his place most frequently taken by teacher. Teachers evoke happier feelings in girls (89%) than in boys (74%)
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and in Australian (100%) than in American (74%) girls. Friends were relatively insignificant and interestingly, the greatest difference in happiness is that generated by Friend for boys (63%) and girls (82%), with the greatest differential for Australian children. TABLE 2
HAPPY FEELINGS ASSOCIATED WITHSITUATIONS: PERCENTAGES BY SAMPLEA N D SEX Situation
Holiday FreeIPlay Time Home School Reading Mathematics n
Boys Austr- Amer&an ican 72 83 72 87 52 70 80 57 72 83 64 68
All 79 82 64 65 79 67
Girls Austr- Amer&an ican 82 84 86 84 77 79 73 74 77 67 86 67
All 83 86 78 74 71 74
Total Austr- Amer&an ican 77 83 79 86 64 74 77 66 74 76 74 68 47 90
All 81 88 71 69 75 72 137
I n Tables 2 and 3 happy and sad feelings about the different situations in children's lives are presented. Some of these could be predicted. More interesting are the unexpected findings. Irrespective of nationality or sex TABLE 3
SADFEELINGS ASSOCIATED WITH SITUATIONS: PERCENTAGES BY SAMPLEA N D SEX Situation
Holiday FreeIPlay Time Home School Reading Mathematics n
Boys Austr- Ameralian ican 8 6 2 6 20 19 4 27 12 8 8 21
All 8 4 19 20 10 16
Girls Austr- Ameralian ican 14 5 2 9 13 14 4 19 5 16 9 21
ALI 8 8 14 14 12 17
Total Austr- Amer&an ican 11 5 4 7 17 17 4 21 8 12 9 21 47 90
All 8 6 17 17 11 17 137
children perceive Playtime and Holiday as their happiest experiences. However, more Australians (11%) than Americans (5%) matched sad faces to Holiday. Reading ranked next to these fun times in happiness for three samples, American, boys, and total, but had the fewest happy associations of all situations for girls in this study. This is an interesting finding since more boys than girls have difficulty and are retained or given special assistance at this grade, primarily on the basis of reading readiness or progress (Aiken,
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1973). The sex differences in happy-Reading are most pronounced for the Americans: boys 83%, girls 67%. Sad associations also reflect thls trend: boys 8%, girls 16%. Math percentages show very similar feeling responses among subjects except for Australina girls; 86% of them, the same as for top-ranking Playtime, felt happy. About two-thirds of the other groups responded with happy feelings, although more Americans than Austrahans gave sad responses, 21% vs 9%. Girls in both countries were similar in feelings about Home which was not viewed as the happiest place to be. Fewer than three-quarters of them matched happy faces, and for 17% sadness was evoked. At school, more American children were sad (21%). Australian boys were significantly more happy at school (80%) than were American boys (57%). Even in this primarily homogeneous population the "Faces and Feelings" technique produced unexpected dfferences. Stereotypic beliefs about sex differences are not consistently reflected in the data, leading one to consider possible reasons for such a discrepancy. For example, girls are supposed to excel in reading, boys in math. Girls are supposed to like school more than do boys. If teachers' positive feedback and self-evaluation of progress is reflected in the data, these stereotypical designations are not at all consistent. Girls feel better about their math classes, while American boys top all others in reading self-approval. These findings are interesting, when one examines the data for School and Teacher. Of all settings, American boys feel least good about being in school and for fewer of them than the others is the Teacher a source of positive feelings. This suggests that there is something intrinsically rewarding in the activity. Or, perhaps, the concepts of School and Teacher are multidimensional, including positives and negdtlves related to classroom management or to some immediate past event. P a d and Kafer (1983) feel that preoperational children cannot differentiate among minor self-concepts, that they would be expected to show momentary, fluctuating, field-dependent, easily generalized responses to their experiences. It has been reported that teachers treat boys and girls differently (Etaugh & Harlow, 1975) and that girls receive more positive feedback through praise (Sears & Feldman, 1974), boys receive more negative feedback through reprimands and disapproval (McNeil, 1964). Children's teacher-based self-feelings in this study may be related to factors such as these. Boys' early academic underachievement (Brophy & Good, 1972) and greater difliculty in learning to read (Aiken, 1973) have been documented. Generally, girls have tended to score higher on measures of reading, verbal skills and rote memory. Boys, on the other hand, have scored higher on measures of mathematical reasoning, spatial and mechanical abilities, and problem solving (Maccoby & Jacklin, 1974). Entwisle, et al. (1987) report that school performance does not shape the academic self-image of very young children. However, Marsh, Smith, and Barnes (1985) report that sex differences in mathematics set€-concept occur at younger ages than do differences in mathematics achievement. The more positive American male self-feelings for reading and Australian female self-feelings for mathematics contradict other reports. However, this concurs with previous cross-cultural studies, indicating that, while schoolboys in the United States are poorer readers than elementary school girls, this relationship does not hold true for those in Germany or England (Brophy & G o o d , 1974; Preston, 1962). Bronfenbrenner's concept of "mesosystem" (1986) has explanatory power for the unexpected finding that Australian girls feel much better about themselves and mathematics than do
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boys. Entwisle, et al. (1987) found that girls depended more on parents' evaluations than boys did, while boys depended more on self-evaluations. However, Mom evoked fewer happy responses for Australian girls than for boys. Reportedly, mothers of elementary children emphasize mathematics more for boys than girls (Baker & Entwisle, 1986). If this were true for these subjects, then boys could be receiving more attention at home, and motivation to seek approval for boy-valued activity could bolster girls' self-feelings about mathematics. According to Entwisle, et a/. (1987), children of the two sexes define their images differently. A surprising finding is that, for this age group, Friends are not a source of good self-feelings for all children. Boys have more "bad-me" feelings than girls and Australian girls have more positive self-perceptions. Selman (1980) identifies trust as the critical component in friendship. At this age it is basically a one-way proposition based on getting the other person to do what the chdd wants the friend to do. Selman quotes a child saying, "You trust a friend if he does what you tell him" (Selman, Jaquette, & Lavin, 1977, p. 268). Child-rearing practices, family composition, parental employment, work schedules, and child-care arrangements are all important variables which could explain children's feelings about the significance of parents, family members, and others. The fact that mother ranked higher than father is congruent with studies indicating that both boys and girls regard fathers as more punitive, more threatening and less friendly than mothers (Kegan & Lemkin, 1960). It would be interesting to examine whether Kirchner and Vondracek's (1975) findings hold true for the Australian and American samples. They found that father was mentioned significantly less often in mother-only families than in father-only and two-parent families and that there were not parallel results for mention of mother (p. 174). Conclusions Using the "Faces and Feelings" technique, young children provide interesting constellations of significant others who are perceived as esteem-building by primary school children. One can find through analysis and examination support for developmental theory and stereotypic sex-role definition. However, more variation than consensus emerged. I t would be easy to attribute this to culture, parenting style, teachers' personality, curriculum content, socioeconomic status or family composition. These variables used in a controlled study would answer some important questions about factors which affect children's self-esteem. Hughes (19841, reviewing measures of self-concept and self-esteem for children ages 3 to 12 yr., points to major problems for researchers: social desirabilitv, .. method variance, and construct validitv. Since school was the setting for this project, it is possible that need for approval influenced children's matching of happy faces to the reachers' picture. However, replication and expansion of this work with diverse p o p ulations could tease out dimensions of the self-esteem construct whch are valid for this age group, while still retaining the individually unique components. Piagetians would doubt that children, not yet at the formal operations stage of cognitive development could process information evaluatively. But functioning at the good-me, bad-me stage, even if more emotional than cognitive, gives the child his sense of self-worth. According to Selman (1980), at ages 3 to 6 children go through an egocentric, undifferentiated stage of social development. Through ages 5 to 9 they are in a differentiated and subiective perspective-taking stage. I n this stage children are capable of inferring the other person's intentions, feelings and thoughts with some accuracy. This beginning of decentering in perspective is similar to Piaget's transition from preoperational to operational thinking. For young children affective status affects cognitive status rather &an the reverse. This causal ordering differs from that seen in older children for whom educational achievement influences academic self-perceptions (Harter & Connell, 1982). Entwisle, et al. (1987) report that the earliest marks and evaluations children receive do not appear to be related to the academic self-image. The "Faces and Feelings" methodology used in this study depicts children's affective response to persons and situations which are significant to their achievement.
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Results of this initial work on the "Faces and Feelings" technique for investigating young children's self-esteem indicate that it is effective in identifying esteem components and significant others. It is appropriate for use cross-culturally, with other age groups, and with those who have language or reading problems. I t could be combined with other types of instrumentation in education, prevention or therapy. In addition, the methodology can be varied without loss of power to provide valuable flexibility relative to the child's capabilities. Older children can work more independently and may conceptualize differenrly depending upon various factors. For example, Reading in the Australian kindergarten was perceived more similar to that in the American first grade. To the American kindergarteners Reading consisted of readiness activities. However, each child did the faces-feelings exercise using his conceptual base for the persons and situations. It was fortunate that master teachers who were deeply interested in children's self-esteem participated in this work. The care with which they conceptualized the study procedures and adapted their teaching, administration, and follow-up to the unique characteristics of their groups and to their own personal styles of interacting and educating ensured good understanding by students and completion of the task. Research to date has been primarily concerned with ascertaining children's self-images. The group differences reported here suggest that important processes underlie their formation and that this should be the focus of study. Responses of the children using the "Faces and Feelings" technique indicate that the chddren strive for positive self-feelings, using the mechanisms of balancing and counterbalancing positive and negative self-perceptions relative to significant others and available situations and activities. This conception of the development of esteem by young children requires an approach which is reflective of the complexity of the pmcess as well as the multiFaceted nature of self-esteem. REFERENCES Ability and creativity in math. Review of Educational Research, 43, &N, L. R., JR. (1973) 405-432. BAKER,D. P., & ENTWISLE,D. R. (1986) The influence of mothers on academic expectations of young children: a longitudinal study of how gender differences arise. Social Forces, 65, 670-694. BOLEA,A., FELKER,D., & BARNES,M. (1971) A pictorial self-concept scale for children in K-4. Journal of Educational Measurement, 8, 223-224. BRONFENBRENNER, U. (1986) Ecology of the family as a context for human development: research perspectives. Developmental Psychology, 22, 723-742. BROPHY,J. E., & GOOD, T. L. (1974) Tencber-student rektionrbips: causes and consequences. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston. COOLEY,C. (1912) Human nature and the social order. New York: Scribners. COOPERSMITH, S. (1967) The antecedents of self-esteem. San Francisco, CA: Freeman. EDWARDS, L., & EDER,R. (1987) Individual differences in young children's sensitivity to social cues: the emergence of self-monitoring. Paper presented at the Biennial Meetings of the Sociecy for Research in Child Development, Baltimore. ELKIND, D. (1989) The hurried child. Boston, M A : Addison-Wesley. ENTWISLE, D. R., ALESANDER, K. L., PUS, A. M., & CADIGAN, D. (1987) The emergent academic self.~mageof first graders: its response to social structure. ChiM Deoelopment, 58, 1190-1206 ERIKSON,E. H. (1950) Chzldbood and socieo. New York: Norton. ETAUGH, C., & HARLOW,H . (1975) Behavior of male and female teachers as related to behaviors and attitudes of elementary school children. Journal of Genetic Psychology, 127, 163-170. GOODENOUGH, F. L. (1926) Measurement of intelligence by drawings. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World. HARTER,S., & CONNELL, J. P. (1982) A model of the relationship among children's academic achievement and their self-perceptions of competence, control, and motivational orientation. (Unpublished manuscript, name of institution)
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D. (1979) Cognitive, social, and emotional behaviors exhibited b kindergarten HOLLANDER, d boys and girls in mixed- gender versus same-gender classrooms. ~ n ~ u b i s h edoctoral dissertation, Loyola Univer. of Chicago. HUGHES,H . (1984) Measures of self-concept and self-esteem for children ages 3-12 years: a review and recommendations. Clinical Psychology Review, 4, 657-692. JENKINS,C. (1947) These are your children. Toronto: Gage. JOSEPH,J. (1979) Joseph Pre-school and Primary Self-Concept Screening Test. Chicago, IL: Stoeltiie. " KAGAN,J. (1956) The child's perception of the parent. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 53, 257-258. KAGAN,J., & LEMKTN, J. (1960) The child's differential perception of parental attributes. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 61, 440-447. K~RCHNER, E., & VONDRACEK, S. (1975) Perceived sources of sel€-esteem in early childhood. Journal of Genetic Psychology, 126, 169-176. KOPPITZ,E . M. (1984) Psychological evaluation of human figure drawings by middle school pupils. New York: Grune & Stratton. MARSI-~, H. W., SMITH, I. D., & BARNES,J. (1985) Multidimensional self-concepts: relations with sex and academic achievement. Jortrnal of Educational Psychology, 77, 581-596. MCARTHUR,D. S., & ROBERTS,G. E. (1982) Roberts Apperception Test for Children-manual. Los Angeles, CA: Western Psychological Services. MCNEIL, J. D. (1964) Programmed instruction versus usual classroom procedures in teaching boys to read. American Educational Research Iournal, 1, 113-119. PAULL,S. L., & KAFER,N. F. (1983) Preoperational to operational: some implications for the dwelopment of the self-concept. Australian Journal of Educafion, 28, 304-308. RAGET,J. (1932) The moral jrrdgrnent of the child. London: Kegan Paul. PIERS, E., & HARRIS,D. (1969) The Piers-Harris Children's Self-concept Scale. Los Angeles, CA: Western Psychological Services. PRESTON,R. C. (1962) Reading achievement of German and American children. School and Sociely, 90, 350-354. ROSENBERG, M. (1979) Conceiving the self. New York: Basic Books. SAULS,J. M., & LARSON,R. C. (1977) Exploring national assessment using singular value decorn osition. Education commission of the States, Denver, April, 1975. [Reported in F. & C. Wesley, Sex-role psychology. New York: Human Sciences.] SEARS,P. S., & FELDMAN, D. H . (1966) Teacher interactions with boys and with girls. National Elementary Principal, 46, 30-37. SELMAN, R. J. (1980) The growth of interpersonal understanding: developmental and clinical analysix. New York: Academic Press. SELMAN,R. J., JAQUETTE,D., & LAVIN,D. R. (1977) Inter ersonal awareness in children: toward an integration of developmental and clinical chgd psychology. American Iournal of Ortbopsychiatry, 47, 264-274. SHAVELSON, R., & BOLUS,R. (1982) Self-concept: the interplay of theory and methods. Journal of Edrrcational Psychology, 74, 3-17. T R ~ L A C., Y , KIROUAC,G., & DORE,F, (1987) The recognition of adults' and children's facial expressions of emotions. Journal of Psychology, 12, 341-350. WELLS,L., & MARWELL,G . (1976) Self-esteem: its conceptrralization and measurement. Beverly HAS, CA: Sage. W ~ I ER., (1974) The self-concept.Lincoln, N E : Univer. of Nebraska Press. Accepted March 18, 1990.
63 Perceptual and Motor Skills 1990
"FACES A N D FEELINGS": A PROJECTIVE TECHNIQUE FOR MEASURING YOUNG CHILDREN'S SELF-ESTEEM"' ANNE McCREARY JLJHASZ AND NANDA MUNSHI Loyoka University of Chicago Summary.-A projective type "Faces and Feelings" measure was designed for use with kindergarten and first grade children. The underlying assumption was that the technique would elicit from this age group self-perceptions of worthwhileness. The unique methodology eliminated the most pervasive problems in self-esteem measurement, and results yielded important information about the effects of significant others on young children's self-esteem. Also, feelings about home and school activities addressed the rnulrifaceced and specificity aspect of the self-esteem construct. Differences between American and Australian children and boys and girls in how Mom, Dad, Teacher, Friend, Home, School, Holiday, Reading, Math made children feel about themselves could be identified using "Faces and Feelings."
The primary focus of this paper is the measurement of self-esteem in young children and while the results are interesting it is the methodology which is the major concern. The theoretical framework on which the "Faces and Feelings" measure is based includes Wylie's (1974) focus on self as source of information about esteem, Cooley's (1912) looking-glass self-construct which emphasizes the importance of significant others' appraisals, and Shavelson's and Bolus's (1982) multifaceted approach to the nature of self-esteem. They posit that in addition to a general, fairly stable component, self-esteem also rests on specific aspects of self and of one's behavior. Accordingly, an individual can base feelings of worth on different factors, depending on the situation and the prepotency of the individual's needs and goals at a certain point in time. Theory suggests that any attempt to obtain v&d measures of children's self-esteem should actively involve the actual subjects not only in the self-measurement but also in the content selection and the test methodology. Simply stated, then, children should provide the list of others who affect their self-esteem, and they should also identify the situations in which their feelings of worth are important to them. Any other approach to self-esteem measurement negates the uniqueness of the self and the critical influence of situational and developmental factors on children's feelings of esteem. This is indeed a strong statement which conjures up visions of constantly redesigning any self-esteem measure, leading the researcher to despair and
'Address correspondence to A . M. Juhasz, Educational Psychology, Layola University of Ghicago, 820 N. Michigan Avenue, Chicago, IL 60611. Thanks to the teachers who cooperated in chis study, Ron Chase, Marie Kelliher, Joan McMillen, Kay Roberts, Marisa Shorer.
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frustration. Temporal stability is at the core of the problem and has been the focus of investigation (Shavelson & Bolus, 1982; Wells & Marwell, 1776). However, without the subject's input into the self-esteem measurement base, construct validity is questionable. Most measures are the product of adult researchers' conceptions of children's esteem and on what it rests. The most that one could deduce from test results is the consistency with which children respond to questions posed by test designers and norrned on nonselves. This need to start at the beginning with others and situations which children identify is especially critical. Never has there been such diversity in the familial and societal environments of children. And while currently we can predict, based on developmental theory (Erikson, 1950) and research (Rosenberg, 1779), that parents, especially mothers will be most significant to most young children's esteem, we do not know how the explosion in child day-care will change this. Also, if self-esteem is as important as we believe it is, we need techniques with the power to identify components which fall outside those measured by instruments currently used. The terms self-concept and self-esteem are customarily used interchangeably as are tests purported to measure esteem. This author argues that there is a difference and questions whether or not the self-dimensions set forth by test constructors are indeed those which are most salient to the esteem of each specific individual at a given time. Most measures do not get at the importance of the designated factors to the subject and to the personal feelings of worth. Many measures are general in nature and focus on the self-descriptors which may or may not be included in the individual's esteem constellation. Also, the idea of not necessarily being the best but being "good enough" is usually missing. These important premises guided the design of "Faces and Feelings," a measure of significant others and young children's self-esteem. The uniqueness of the self extends beyond dimensions essential to esteem, to include personal views of those whose appraisals significantly influence feelings of worth. Each individual is the best contributor of the test content for his own self-esteem. The problem in this project was to design a method which would allow young children to indicate the content of the measure and their relevant feelings of self-esteem.
Literature Review Self-esteem measures typically consist of a group of statements or adjectives which the individual must read and then respond to by either indicating agreement or rating the item on a multidimensional scale (Coopersmith, 1767; Piers-Harris, 1764). Not only does this type of instrument measure self-concept rather than self-esteem but also the response format is unsuited for young children who are better able to respond to projective-type tests. Also few studies have dealt specifically with young children's self-esteem. Researchers have designed instruments which respond to single aspects
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of the problem noted above. Although none satisfactorily deals with all of these (suitable format, direct information from the tested subject, self-esteem rather than self-concept), results and recommendations were considered in the design of the instrument discussed in this paper. Joseph's Self-concept Screening Test (1979) uses a series of dichotomous pictures from which the child must select those like hmself in response to questions. This procedure is suitable for primary school children as a screening device for those at risk for adjustment and learning. However, this test is for clinical use, presents researcher-designed situations and materials and would not be appropriate for regular classroom settings and teacher-pupil input and discussion. Also the like-not like me designation does not necessarily reflect feelings related to esteem. Bolea, Felker, and Barnes (1971) used a pictorial self-concept scale for primary school children. I t requires subjects to sort 50 cartoon-like picture cards into three piles according to whether the figure on the card is "Like," "Sometimes Like," or "Not at aU Like" the subject. This scale does not reflect children's perceptions of their worthwhileness since it is based upon psychologists' categories of self-concept. Neither is the "reflected-appraisal of significant others" aspect of self-esteem tapped by this instrument. Sauls and colleagues (1977), in an important study, asked children to identify the face they would wear if "they" could make the teacher happy with [their] arithmetic." They also circled yes or no statements related to family, school, and peer influences on self-appraisal. The researchers designed both the faces and the questions. Achievement, role expectancy, and self-acceptance were identified, as specific dimensions of self. These researchers also stressed the importance of sensitivity to specifics rather than a global approach to self. Relevant to this study is the question of children's ability to identify emotions in facial expressions. Edwards and Eden (1987) found that 5'/2-yr.-olds could d o this even though they did not display as wide a range as did older subjects. Trembay, Kerowac, and Dore (1987) noted that 5-yr.-olds are less accurate than older subjects in the recognition of facial expressions. From this review of materials happy and sad faces emerged as a useful measurement device. Happy and sad are concepts w h c h are readily understood by children. They can identify these feelings in others and in themselves. They can also tell others what makes them feel happy or sad and the situations in which they experience these feelings. Going one step further, an investigation of children's feelings could shed light upon situations, activities and others who make them feel good or bad about themselves. The initial assumption is made here that these feelings reflect the child's perceptions of his value and self-esteem. These dynamics of the child's perceptual
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and emotional reactions to significant others' responses to his behavior are indicated in the flow chart shown in Fig. 1. The assumptions underlying this figure remain to be tested. Developmental Tasks 1 Child's Behavior 1 Child's Perceptions of Significant Others' Evaluation/Feedback 1 Child's Feelings of Own Confidence and Competence
1 Child's Emotions (happy, sad, OK)
1 Child's Translation to Image of Self (good me, bad me, O K me) 1 Chdd's Self-esteem Level (high-positive) (low-negative) (OK-OK) FIG. 1. Perceptual and emotional pathway to child's self-esteem
Design of the "Faces and Feelingx" Measure Forty-seven Austrahan kindergarten students and their teacher cooperated with the researcher in designing and piloting the methods and materials for the "Faces and Feelingso measure. A teaching unit on feelings provided the context for this ongoing activity which took from two to three weeks. Preactivity discussion focused on feelings, on what and who made the children feel really good about themselves, really important, able to d o well, and the negative opposites. Children's experiences at home, at school and in the neighborhood added concreteness for conceptualizing the meaning of esteem although that term was not used. Rather, children were asked to tell how they felt about themselves in different situations or how they thought other people would feel about them and their behavior. From this pool of words, the children identified "Happy," "Sad," and "OK" as best representing feelings that "I am worthwhile and feel good about myself," "I am no good and feel bad about myself," "I am good enough, am satisfied but don't feel really great or really bad about myself." From their pooled contributions children agreed upon five people who most influenced their feelings about themselves: "Mum, Dad, Teacher, F a d y , and Friend." "Other" was added to cover a wide variety of persons
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also mentioned, such as my dog, God, and grandmother. The kindergarteners selected these common places and activities in which they felt able or not able to do well, and good or bad about themselves: Home, School, Vacation, Free-time, Mathematics, Reading. Under the children's guidance the teacher drew, on each of three yellow, precut round circles, eyes, nose and mouth. The mouth became the single feature identifying each feeling: happy, a concave half-circle; sad, a convex half-circle; and OK, closed lips. (The teacher's initial horizontal line was perceived as a "cross' person; lips had to be added.) In separate work sessions children developed their own individualized pictures, first of the six people, second of the places or situations. I n preparation the teacher had taught the key words and prepared two sheets with appropriately labeled boxes. All children recognized each of the words on sight and understood the meaning. No label was placed in the sixth person box. Children were instructed to draw a picture of "someone else who was important to them" (significant other). The teacher cut each child's completed worksheets into a set of picture cards and established a code sheet with each child's name, picture labels, and code columns: 1. happy, 2. sad, 3. O K . During the following days, on an individual basis, the teacher played the Faces-Feelings game asking each child to, (1) "identify each picture by name, (2) tell how the person or place makes the child feel about himherself, (3) point to the face which belongs to the way he/she feels." For the "places" pictures the teacher asked children to follow the same procedure identifying their pictures and pointing to the appropriate face in response to the question, "How do you feel about yourself when you are here, doing ths?" The teacher marked each child's responses on the code sheet. I n summary, the test procedures require children to: (1) draw 6 pictures representing people who are important and significant in their lives, (2) draw 6 pictures of situations which are important in their lives, (3) draw 3 faces on precut circles representing happy, sad, O K emotions, and (4) match a face to each picture showing how this person or situation makes them feel about themselves.
Characteristics of "Faces and Feelings" An associative (projective) technique, the "Faces and Feelings" measure was designed for use with kindergarten (5- to 6-yr.-old) children. A combination of stimulus-response options is used; (1) printed word stimuli-drawing response, (2) verbal stimuli-drawing response, (3) matching two drawing responses. This technique utilizes less structured stimuli than are typically used in other projective-type assessments. The subject brings to the printed word and to the verbal stimulus h s own interpretation based on individual differences in perception. The child's drawing represents his personal inter-
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pretation of the concept rather than a preestablished model provided by the adult researcher. This eliminates confusion, lending conceptual clarity and validity to the associative process. The child need not be taught the meaning of the pictures used in the test. He already "owns" his pictures through the process of drawing them. For the child, the picture of mother on the page represents his own mother. Unlike other human figure drawing techniques (Goodenough & Harris, 1950; Koppitz, 1984), the figures themselves are not the subject of analysis in this measure. Rather, they enhance the validity of the test. I t is the assigning of the happy, sad, or OK faces to the pictures of people and situations which is of interest. This measure was developed by children for children and therefore does not suffer from the shortcomings noted by McArthur and Roberts (1982): inappropriate stimulus materials, useful only with a limited age group, dated, specific-theory based.
Extension of the Project The techniques developed with the Australian sample were presented to American first grade and kindergarten teachers who worked with a total of 90 children to test the procedures. Discussion and pupil preparation for the activity followed the same directions in both countries. The American children specified situations, activities, and significant others comparable to those identified by their Australian peers. Some spelling and terminology was different. "Mum" became "Mom," "Free-time" became "Play-time" and "Vacation" was changed to "Holiday." Teacher preparation and pupil procedures were the same for all kindergartners; however, these differed for the first-grade American sample. The teacher prepared for each child a 12-page "My Feelings Book." O n the cover were the three faces, "Happy," "Sad," "OK." Each page had one of the key words designating person, place or activity at the bottom and a blank yellow face in the top corner. The child's task was to draw an appropriate picture for the word, and to draw the features on the face which would show how he felt about himself. Children were involved in this work over a 2-wk. period as scheduled class activities. On completion of the assignment, the teacher coded responses from each book. For all groups, follow-up class and/or individual discussion was planned by each teacher based on the for this project on self-esteem. Esting the Procedures Of the 137 children who participated in the project, 47 were Australian kindergarteners, 25 boys and 22 girls, ages from 5 to 7 yr. (M age, 6.3) and 90 were Americans, 47 boys and 43 girls in kindergarten and first grade, ages from 5 to 7 (M age, 6.5). Socioeconomic background and school environment were similar in both samples, providing an homogeneous sample of
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convenience. Family status and composition, race and ethnic background were not factors under study in this project. Rather we were interested in the effectiveness of the procedure to elicit varied responses reflecting the uniqueness of self. Responses to the "Faces and Feelings" measure did yield unexpected findings and between-group differences, even in these samples which were fairly homogeneous. One could expect the measure to be a powerful indicator of self-esteem feelings in more diverse populations of young children. Research controlling for family constellation, ethnicity, intellectual, social and emotional adjustment will test further the power of the "Faces and Feelings" technique. Percentages were computed for the children's responses to each stimulus picture for each of the three feelings. A majority of the responses were either happy or sad, so no reference is made to the O K category. Data were examined for the total sample of children (137), the Americans (90), Australians (47), boys (72), girls (65), and by sex within each nationality. In addition, persons and situations were rank-ordered for choices of feeling category. TABLE 1 HAPPYFEELINGS ASSOCIATED WITH OTHERS: PERCENTAGES BY SAMPLEAND SWL Others Mom
Dad Teacher Friend Family Significant Other n
Boys Austr- Ameralian ican 95 68 72 56 72 76
94 77 66 66 91 77
All 97 74 74 63 84 76
Girls Austr- Ameralian ican 84 82 100 86 100 86
98 80 74 79 79 81
AU 90 80 89 82 86 83
Total Austr- Ameralian ican 89 74 85 70 85 81 47
97 84 81 72 86 79 90
All 93 77 82 70 85 78 137
Persons These ratings and percentages yielded interesting differences in self-feelings relative to significant others (Table 1). Examples of some results illustrate this poinr. Australian girls had the lowest Mum = Happy percentage, and over-all more girls than boys felt happy about Dad. There was also a 28% difference between Australian girls' and boys' happy feelings associated with both Teacher and FamiIy. The expected rank order (Mom, Dad, Family) of others who made the children feel happy did not emerge from the data. Dad is the missing component, his place most frequently taken by teacher. Teachers evoke happier feelings in girls (89%) than in boys (74%)
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and in Australian (100%) than in American (74%) girls. Friends were relatively insignificant and interestingly, the greatest difference in happiness is that generated by Friend for boys (63%) and girls (82%), with the greatest differential for Australian children. TABLE 2
HAPPY FEELINGS ASSOCIATED WITHSITUATIONS: PERCENTAGES BY SAMPLEA N D SEX Situation
Holiday FreeIPlay Time Home School Reading Mathematics n
Boys Austr- Amer&an ican 72 83 72 87 52 70 80 57 72 83 64 68
All 79 82 64 65 79 67
Girls Austr- Amer&an ican 82 84 86 84 77 79 73 74 77 67 86 67
All 83 86 78 74 71 74
Total Austr- Amer&an ican 77 83 79 86 64 74 77 66 74 76 74 68 47 90
All 81 88 71 69 75 72 137
I n Tables 2 and 3 happy and sad feelings about the different situations in children's lives are presented. Some of these could be predicted. More interesting are the unexpected findings. Irrespective of nationality or sex TABLE 3
SADFEELINGS ASSOCIATED WITH SITUATIONS: PERCENTAGES BY SAMPLEA N D SEX Situation
Holiday FreeIPlay Time Home School Reading Mathematics n
Boys Austr- Ameralian ican 8 6 2 6 20 19 4 27 12 8 8 21
All 8 4 19 20 10 16
Girls Austr- Ameralian ican 14 5 2 9 13 14 4 19 5 16 9 21
ALI 8 8 14 14 12 17
Total Austr- Amer&an ican 11 5 4 7 17 17 4 21 8 12 9 21 47 90
All 8 6 17 17 11 17 137
children perceive Playtime and Holiday as their happiest experiences. However, more Australians (11%) than Americans (5%) matched sad faces to Holiday. Reading ranked next to these fun times in happiness for three samples, American, boys, and total, but had the fewest happy associations of all situations for girls in this study. This is an interesting finding since more boys than girls have difficulty and are retained or given special assistance at this grade, primarily on the basis of reading readiness or progress (Aiken,
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1973). The sex differences in happy-Reading are most pronounced for the Americans: boys 83%, girls 67%. Sad associations also reflect thls trend: boys 8%, girls 16%. Math percentages show very similar feeling responses among subjects except for Australina girls; 86% of them, the same as for top-ranking Playtime, felt happy. About two-thirds of the other groups responded with happy feelings, although more Americans than Austrahans gave sad responses, 21% vs 9%. Girls in both countries were similar in feelings about Home which was not viewed as the happiest place to be. Fewer than three-quarters of them matched happy faces, and for 17% sadness was evoked. At school, more American children were sad (21%). Australian boys were significantly more happy at school (80%) than were American boys (57%). Even in this primarily homogeneous population the "Faces and Feelings" technique produced unexpected dfferences. Stereotypic beliefs about sex differences are not consistently reflected in the data, leading one to consider possible reasons for such a discrepancy. For example, girls are supposed to excel in reading, boys in math. Girls are supposed to like school more than do boys. If teachers' positive feedback and self-evaluation of progress is reflected in the data, these stereotypical designations are not at all consistent. Girls feel better about their math classes, while American boys top all others in reading self-approval. These findings are interesting, when one examines the data for School and Teacher. Of all settings, American boys feel least good about being in school and for fewer of them than the others is the Teacher a source of positive feelings. This suggests that there is something intrinsically rewarding in the activity. Or, perhaps, the concepts of School and Teacher are multidimensional, including positives and negdtlves related to classroom management or to some immediate past event. P a d and Kafer (1983) feel that preoperational children cannot differentiate among minor self-concepts, that they would be expected to show momentary, fluctuating, field-dependent, easily generalized responses to their experiences. It has been reported that teachers treat boys and girls differently (Etaugh & Harlow, 1975) and that girls receive more positive feedback through praise (Sears & Feldman, 1974), boys receive more negative feedback through reprimands and disapproval (McNeil, 1964). Children's teacher-based self-feelings in this study may be related to factors such as these. Boys' early academic underachievement (Brophy & Good, 1972) and greater difliculty in learning to read (Aiken, 1973) have been documented. Generally, girls have tended to score higher on measures of reading, verbal skills and rote memory. Boys, on the other hand, have scored higher on measures of mathematical reasoning, spatial and mechanical abilities, and problem solving (Maccoby & Jacklin, 1974). Entwisle, et al. (1987) report that school performance does not shape the academic self-image of very young children. However, Marsh, Smith, and Barnes (1985) report that sex differences in mathematics set€-concept occur at younger ages than do differences in mathematics achievement. The more positive American male self-feelings for reading and Australian female self-feelings for mathematics contradict other reports. However, this concurs with previous cross-cultural studies, indicating that, while schoolboys in the United States are poorer readers than elementary school girls, this relationship does not hold true for those in Germany or England (Brophy & G o o d , 1974; Preston, 1962). Bronfenbrenner's concept of "mesosystem" (1986) has explanatory power for the unexpected finding that Australian girls feel much better about themselves and mathematics than do
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boys. Entwisle, et al. (1987) found that girls depended more on parents' evaluations than boys did, while boys depended more on self-evaluations. However, Mom evoked fewer happy responses for Australian girls than for boys. Reportedly, mothers of elementary children emphasize mathematics more for boys than girls (Baker & Entwisle, 1986). If this were true for these subjects, then boys could be receiving more attention at home, and motivation to seek approval for boy-valued activity could bolster girls' self-feelings about mathematics. According to Entwisle, et a/. (1987), children of the two sexes define their images differently. A surprising finding is that, for this age group, Friends are not a source of good self-feelings for all children. Boys have more "bad-me" feelings than girls and Australian girls have more positive self-perceptions. Selman (1980) identifies trust as the critical component in friendship. At this age it is basically a one-way proposition based on getting the other person to do what the chdd wants the friend to do. Selman quotes a child saying, "You trust a friend if he does what you tell him" (Selman, Jaquette, & Lavin, 1977, p. 268). Child-rearing practices, family composition, parental employment, work schedules, and child-care arrangements are all important variables which could explain children's feelings about the significance of parents, family members, and others. The fact that mother ranked higher than father is congruent with studies indicating that both boys and girls regard fathers as more punitive, more threatening and less friendly than mothers (Kegan & Lemkin, 1960). It would be interesting to examine whether Kirchner and Vondracek's (1975) findings hold true for the Australian and American samples. They found that father was mentioned significantly less often in mother-only families than in father-only and two-parent families and that there were not parallel results for mention of mother (p. 174). Conclusions Using the "Faces and Feelings" technique, young children provide interesting constellations of significant others who are perceived as esteem-building by primary school children. One can find through analysis and examination support for developmental theory and stereotypic sex-role definition. However, more variation than consensus emerged. I t would be easy to attribute this to culture, parenting style, teachers' personality, curriculum content, socioeconomic status or family composition. These variables used in a controlled study would answer some important questions about factors which affect children's self-esteem. Hughes (19841, reviewing measures of self-concept and self-esteem for children ages 3 to 12 yr., points to major problems for researchers: social desirabilitv, .. method variance, and construct validitv. Since school was the setting for this project, it is possible that need for approval influenced children's matching of happy faces to the reachers' picture. However, replication and expansion of this work with diverse p o p ulations could tease out dimensions of the self-esteem construct whch are valid for this age group, while still retaining the individually unique components. Piagetians would doubt that children, not yet at the formal operations stage of cognitive development could process information evaluatively. But functioning at the good-me, bad-me stage, even if more emotional than cognitive, gives the child his sense of self-worth. According to Selman (1980), at ages 3 to 6 children go through an egocentric, undifferentiated stage of social development. Through ages 5 to 9 they are in a differentiated and subiective perspective-taking stage. I n this stage children are capable of inferring the other person's intentions, feelings and thoughts with some accuracy. This beginning of decentering in perspective is similar to Piaget's transition from preoperational to operational thinking. For young children affective status affects cognitive status rather &an the reverse. This causal ordering differs from that seen in older children for whom educational achievement influences academic self-perceptions (Harter & Connell, 1982). Entwisle, et al. (1987) report that the earliest marks and evaluations children receive do not appear to be related to the academic self-image. The "Faces and Feelings" methodology used in this study depicts children's affective response to persons and situations which are significant to their achievement.
"FACES AND FEELINGS": SELF-ESTEEM
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Results of this initial work on the "Faces and Feelings" technique for investigating young children's self-esteem indicate that it is effective in identifying esteem components and significant others. It is appropriate for use cross-culturally, with other age groups, and with those who have language or reading problems. I t could be combined with other types of instrumentation in education, prevention or therapy. In addition, the methodology can be varied without loss of power to provide valuable flexibility relative to the child's capabilities. Older children can work more independently and may conceptualize differenrly depending upon various factors. For example, Reading in the Australian kindergarten was perceived more similar to that in the American first grade. To the American kindergarteners Reading consisted of readiness activities. However, each child did the faces-feelings exercise using his conceptual base for the persons and situations. It was fortunate that master teachers who were deeply interested in children's self-esteem participated in this work. The care with which they conceptualized the study procedures and adapted their teaching, administration, and follow-up to the unique characteristics of their groups and to their own personal styles of interacting and educating ensured good understanding by students and completion of the task. Research to date has been primarily concerned with ascertaining children's self-images. The group differences reported here suggest that important processes underlie their formation and that this should be the focus of study. Responses of the children using the "Faces and Feelings" technique indicate that the chddren strive for positive self-feelings, using the mechanisms of balancing and counterbalancing positive and negative self-perceptions relative to significant others and available situations and activities. This conception of the development of esteem by young children requires an approach which is reflective of the complexity of the pmcess as well as the multiFaceted nature of self-esteem. REFERENCES Ability and creativity in math. Review of Educational Research, 43, &N, L. R., JR. (1973) 405-432. BAKER,D. P., & ENTWISLE,D. R. (1986) The influence of mothers on academic expectations of young children: a longitudinal study of how gender differences arise. Social Forces, 65, 670-694. BOLEA,A., FELKER,D., & BARNES,M. (1971) A pictorial self-concept scale for children in K-4. Journal of Educational Measurement, 8, 223-224. BRONFENBRENNER, U. (1986) Ecology of the family as a context for human development: research perspectives. Developmental Psychology, 22, 723-742. BROPHY,J. E., & GOOD, T. L. (1974) Tencber-student rektionrbips: causes and consequences. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston. COOLEY,C. (1912) Human nature and the social order. New York: Scribners. COOPERSMITH, S. (1967) The antecedents of self-esteem. San Francisco, CA: Freeman. EDWARDS, L., & EDER,R. (1987) Individual differences in young children's sensitivity to social cues: the emergence of self-monitoring. Paper presented at the Biennial Meetings of the Sociecy for Research in Child Development, Baltimore. ELKIND, D. (1989) The hurried child. Boston, M A : Addison-Wesley. ENTWISLE, D. R., ALESANDER, K. L., PUS, A. M., & CADIGAN, D. (1987) The emergent academic self.~mageof first graders: its response to social structure. ChiM Deoelopment, 58, 1190-1206 ERIKSON,E. H. (1950) Chzldbood and socieo. New York: Norton. ETAUGH, C., & HARLOW,H . (1975) Behavior of male and female teachers as related to behaviors and attitudes of elementary school children. Journal of Genetic Psychology, 127, 163-170. GOODENOUGH, F. L. (1926) Measurement of intelligence by drawings. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World. HARTER,S., & CONNELL, J. P. (1982) A model of the relationship among children's academic achievement and their self-perceptions of competence, control, and motivational orientation. (Unpublished manuscript, name of institution)
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