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Effect of unemployment on school leavers' self‐esteem
Author(s) -
Dooley David,
Prause JoAnn
Publication year - 1995
Publication title -
journal of occupational and organizational psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.257
H-Index - 114
eISSN - 2044-8325
pISSN - 0963-1798
DOI - 10.1111/j.2044-8325.1995.tb00580.x
Subject(s) - unemployment , self esteem , psychology , explanatory power , national longitudinal surveys , longitudinal data , longitudinal study , face (sociological concept) , developmental psychology , social psychology , demographic economics , demography , economics , sociology , economic growth , medicine , philosophy , social science , epistemology , pathology
Young people who do not go to college after high school face much higher unemployment rates than adults, and their failure to find satisfactory employment may impede the growth of self‐esteem at a crucial developmental stage. The effect of unemployment was studied in a subsample from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth whose self‐esteem was measured in 1980 while still in school and again in 1987. Unemployment and unsatisfactory employment in 1987 were both negatively related to self‐esteem in 1987. All groups showed increases in self‐esteem between interviews, but those satisfactorily employed gained most. In a different analysis, the percentage of time unemployed since leaving school was also negatively related to self‐esteem. Although percentage of time unemployed did not add any explanatory power to the prediction of 1987 self‐esteem by 1987 unemployment, it may operate indirectly on self‐esteem via 1987 employment status.