EDUCATIVE STYLE OF PARENTS AND TEENAGER SELF-ESTEEM

The notion of self-esteem (and more globally that of one's personal image) plays a central role in the conception of socialization seen as a process of interactive construction - between parents and child - based on the aptitude to regulate and adapt a life style. Therefore the question as to how this self-esteem is defined becomes essential. How is self-esteem affected by the type of family cohesion and by the educative style given to the child? Does it also depend on the family's social status ? This article - based on a study carried out among 309 families with 13-14 years old children - attempts to assess the respective importance of the relational and structural elements involved in building a teenager's identity. The article having defined four types of family cohesion and three educative styles goes on to show that the types of family cohesion and the educative style clearly depend on the social position of the family, but that the teenager's self-esteem (developed through feelings of competence and personal values) is in fact modulated by the educative style : structural coordinates (class status) only have an indirect influence. The influence of educative style on self-esteem is directly related to the amount of support, supervision and communication which exists between parents and teenagers.