The Effects of Birth Order, Age, Gender, and Socioeconomic Level Upon the Self-Esteem of Graduate Students

The purpose of the researcher was to evaluate the effects of certain variables upon self-esteem in graduate students. Four independent variables were investigated: 1) gender, 2) age, 3) birth order, and 4) socioeconomic level. The dependent variable was self-esteem scores. Two instruments were used: an information form constructed by the researcher to obtain the independent variables, and Coopersmith Inventory (Adult form) to obtain the dependent variable. The subjects consisted of 85 graduate students, 29 male and 56 female, from a small university. A mixed status survey design with both pregrouping and post hoc grouping was employed. A total of five null hypotheses were tested. Four three-way analyses of variance and one z-test were employed. All five null hypotheses were retained. A total of 29 comparisons were made. No comparison was found to be statistically significant between the variables. From the results it was concluded that advanced educational attainment may mask the effects of gender, age, birth order, and socioeconomic level upon self-esteem. The relationship may be between advanced educational attainment and self-esteem rather than gender, age, birth order, and socioeconomic level