Unconditional self-acceptance group

Xiaochun Zhu (Vickey)

Have you ever seen such a student…

• Verbalization of many personal weakness and few strengths.• An expressed desire to become someone else.• Feels disliked by peers.• Feeling fearful of disappointing the parents, peers or teachers.• Feels neglected or ignored by others.• Feels unable to meet own performance expectations.• ……

Low self-esteem!

What happens when self-esteem is low?

• Depression. Lack sufficient coping resources (Deborah,2011).• Distress, hopelessness, and pathology (Orth, Robins, and

Roberts, 2008).• Suicidal ideation was significantly related to level of self-

esteem (Man, & Gutierrez, 2002).

• A child has low self-esteem, a hundred people can tell him that he has done well but he will believe the one who says he needs to do better.

What happens when self-esteem is high?

• Reduce anxiety and anxiety-related defensive behavior (Pyszczynski, Greenberg, Solomon, Amdt, & Schimel, 2004).

• An indicator of good mental health.

• Increased Self-Esteem Reduces Mortality Salience Effects (Schmeichel, Gailliot, Filardo, McGregor, Gitter, & Baumeister, 2009).

What is self-esteem?

• Self-esteem is a primary factor in the building and maintenance of social and emotional well-being.

• Self-esteem is about feeling lovable and feeling competent.

Acceptance Rejection

Virtue Guilt

Influence Powerlessness

Achievements Failures

Research facts:• The connection between Wellness and self-esteem has been established in the

education, counseling, and adolescent development literature (Myers, Willse, & Villalba, 2009) .

• A research reported that: women with physical disabilities in the intervention group showed significantly greater improvement on self-esteem (Hughes, Robinson, Taylor, Swedlund, & Nosek, 2004).

• Compared with boys with nonmarried parents, boys with married parents had higher overall self-esteem, Parental marital status had no effect on girls' self-esteem. Family functioning was a very strong predictor of self-esteem for both sexes. However, family relational factors were more important to girls' self-esteem (Mandara, & Murray, 2000).

• Men scored significantly higher than women on physical appearance, athletic, personal self and self-satisfaction self-esteem. Women scored higher than men on behavioral conduct and moral– ethical self-esteem (Gentile, Grabe, Dolan-Pascoe, Twenge, & Wells, 2009).

Intervention program:

Unconditional self-acceptance group

It’s a brief, educational, group approach

How does it work?

Group member selection:• Administer a self-concept

inventory to the student. • or the Piers-Harris Self

Concept Scale • or the Coopersmith Self-

Esteem Inventory.• 5-10 people

6 sessions:• Session 1: introduction• Session 2: goals• Session 3: assessment• Session 4: questioning• Session 5: REI• Session 6: ending

Session 1: Introduction

• Warm up introduce themselves to the group. Introduce group to them.• Group games: e.g. Me too.

Session 2: Goals

• Set goals with group members.name goals

Jim Believe in self as being lovable and capable

Kelly Develop a positive self-image.

Tom To speak up at every seminar that I attend and to accept myself if I say something stupid.

Lily To talk to ten people who I think don’t like me.

Belly To sing in public on two occasions and accept myself if I sing poorly.

Session 3: Assessment• Analyze a specific example of self-depreciation for each group member

using the ABC framework, in turn to talk about the experience briefly to the rest of the group.

• ABC framework: A stands for the activation events. B for the beliefs that the person holds about the event. C for the emotional and behavioral consequences of holding the belief. For example: • A=thinking that I have played poorly in front of my basketball colleagues

and they look down on me.• B= 1 I must not play poorly. 2 if they look down on me, it means that I am

an insignificant person.• C=ashamed

Session 4: Questioning

• The believes at B are the heart of self-acceptance problems. • Teach the skills of questioning beliefs. What would be the healthy

alternative belief? For example: B=

1, I don’t have to play well in front of my colleagues, but I’d prefer to do so.

2, If they look down on me, it wouldn’t prove that I am a insignificant person, but a fallible human being who could be think an insignificant person

B= 1, I must not play poorly.

2, If they look down on me, it means that I am an insignificant person

Session 5: REI• REI is rational-emotional imagery.

Steps:• Ask the student to identify a specific negative, activation at A, about which

he/she depreciated him/herself.• Ask the student to identify how he felt about this negative activating

event. Agree on an emotion which is clearly an unhealthy negative emotion.

• Ask the student to close his/her eyes and to vividly imagine the selected negative activation event.

• Ask the student to really experience his unhealthy negative emotion at C., while still imagining the same A.

• Ask the student to change his unhealthy negative emotional response to a healthy emotion while still imagining the same A.

• Practicing REI for 6 minutes twice per day.

Session 6: Ending

• Evaluation• Share the experience.• Continue practicing ABC questioning and REI.

reference

• Hughes, R. B., Robinson-Whelen, S., Taylor, H. B., Swedlund, N., & Nosek, M. A. (2004). Enhancing Self-Esteem in Women With Physical Disabilities. Rehabilitation Psychology, 49(4), 295-302. doi:10.1037/0090-5550.49.4.295

• Schmeichel, B. J., Gailliot, M. T., Filardo, E., McGregor, I., Gitter, S., & Baumeister, R. F. (2009). Terror management theory and self-esteem revisited: The roles of implicit and explicit self-esteem in mortality salience effects. Journal Of Personality And Social Psychology, 96(5), 1077-1087. doi:10.1037/a0015091

• Gentile, B., Grabe, S., Dolan-Pascoe, B., Twenge, J. M., Wells, B. E., & Maitino, A. (2009). Gender differences in domain-specific self-esteem: A meta-analysis. Review Of General Psychology, 13(1), 34-45. doi:10.1037/a0013689

• De Man, A. F., & Gutiérrez, B. (2002). The relationship between level of self-esteem and suicidal ideation with stability of self-esteem as moderator. Canadian Journal Of Behavioural Science/Revue Canadienne Des Sciences Du Comportement, 34(4), 235-238. doi:10.1037/h0087176

• Pyszczynski, T., Greenberg, J., Solomon, S., Arndt, J., & Schimel, J. (2004). Why Do People Need Self-Esteem? A Theoretical and Empirical Review. Psychological Bulletin, 130(3), 435-468. doi:10.1037/0033-2909.130.3.435

• Orth, U., & Robins R. W. (2009). Disentangling the Effects of Low Self-Esteem and Stressful Events on Depression: Findings From Three Longitudinal Studies. Journal of personality and social psychology, 307-321

• Harmon-Jones, E., Simon, L., Greenberg, J., Pyszczynski, T., Solomon, S., & McGregor, H. (1997). Terror management theory and self-esteem: Evidence that increased self-esteem reduced mortality salience effects. Journal Of Personality And Social Psychology, 72(1), 24-36. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.72.1.24

• Man, A.F., & Gutierrez, B. I. (2002). The Relationship Between Level of Self-Esteem and Suicidal Ideation With Stability of Self-Esteem as Moderator. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science, 2002, 34:4, 235-238

• Dryden, W. (2003). Managing low self-esteem . London ; Phiadelphia : Whurr Publishers, c2003.

• Dryden, W. (1998). Developing self-acceptance : a brief, educational, small group approach . Chichester, England ; New York, NY, USA : Wiley, c1998.

• Plummer, D. (2001). Helping children to build self-esteem : a photocopiable activities book / Deborah Plummer. London ; Philadelphia, PA : J. Kingsley Publishers, 2001.

• Knapp, S. K., & Jongsma, A. E. (2002). The school counseling and school social work. Hoboken, New Jersey, 2002

• Mandara, J., & Murray, C. B. (2000). Effects of parental marital status, income, and family functioning on African American adolescent self-esteem. Journal Of Family Psychology, 14(3), 475-490. doi:10.1037/0893-3200.14.3.475