By Miki Patel
When students with low self-esteem are inadequately judgmental about themselves, they are more likely to be prejudice towards others who are different. Low self-esteem can affect the students negatively in many areas of life, including school.
According to a study published in the journal of Psychological Science, “This is one of the oldest accounts of why people stereotype and have prejudice: It makes us feel better about ourselves. When we feel bad about ourselves, we can denigrate other people, and that makes us feel better about ourselves.”
Self-esteem isn’t just about how you see yourself as an individual but it’s also about how you believe others see you as well. Self-esteem is dependent on many things, such as your happiness, thinking, attitude, failures, accomplishments, courage, confidence, and actions.
Self-esteem differs among gender. For instance, a girl’s self-esteem is closely related to how she views her body shape and a boy’s self-esteem may include how confident they look. According to the Do Something website, 78 percent of the girls admitted to having low self-esteem and 75 percent of these girls admit to engaging in negative activities such as smoking, drinking, and bullying. These activities make these girls feel better about who they are as an individual.
Amish Sharma, a personal therapist, deals with people with low self-esteem.
“The treatment that therapist use to deal with people with low self-esteem is Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy,” said Sharma. “This is used to explore the cause of low esteem.”
A Loy Norrix senior (she wanted her name to remain anonymous) has low self-esteem and is trying to be happy with who she is without professional therapy.
“I don’t like taking pictures because I don’t like the way I look but I guess I just have to accept what god gave me and I don’t know how to do that either,” said Loy Norrix Senior.
Having low self-esteem is really a thinking disorder in which individuals believe themselves to be unworthy, incompetent, or unlovable, but there are many ways of dealing with low self-esteem without being judgmental towards peers around you and making them feel bad as well. Some of the ways are to keep your thoughts positive, participate in activities, meditate in a quiet place, or seek help from a professional therapist.
