This mood is familiar and I don't deserve to feel better anyway: mechanisms underlying self-esteem differences in motivation to repair sad moods.

Why are people with low self-esteem (LSE) less motivated than people with high self-esteem (HSE) to improve sad moods? The present research examined whether feelings of personal deservingness contribute to this difference. Four experiments with undergraduate participants involved a sad mood induction, a manipulation of personal deservingness, or both. Results suggested that (a) LSEs feel less deserving of positive outcomes and of positive moods than do HSEs, (b) feelings of personal deservingness can vary with the situation, and be lowered through reminders of social rejection and personal flaws, and (c) feeling relatively undeserving dampens LSEs', but not HSEs', motivation to repair sad moods.

Basic personality dispositions, self-esteem, and personal goals: an approach-avoidance analysis.

This research examined the hypothesis that self-esteem negatively predicts avoidance (relative to approach) personal goals, as well as the hypothesis that self-esteem mediates the link between indicators of approach and avoidance temperament and avoidance (relative to approach) personal goals. Study 1 established that self-esteem is indeed negatively related to avoidance (relative to approach) goals, even with social desirability concerns controlled. In Study 2, self-esteem was found to mediate the relation between Neuroticism (conceptualized as an indicator of avoidance temperament) and avoidance (relative to approach) personal goals.

Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory: self-esteem differences in the experience and anticipation of success.

Successes--defined broadly as meeting important standards or receiving positive evaluations--are widely assumed to be enjoyed equally by people with high self-esteem (HSEs) and low self-esteem (LSEs). Three studies examined the contradictory hypothesis that HSEs react more favorably to success than do LSEs and that success brings about certain unfavorable consequences for LSEs. Undergraduate participants reacted to a laboratory-manipulated success (Studies 1 and 2) or imagined highly positive events in the future (Study 3).

Savoring versus dampening: self-esteem differences in regulating positive affect.

Five studies examined the hypotheses that when people experience positive affect, those low in self-esteem are especially likely to dampen that affect, whereas those high in self-esteem are especially likely to savor it. Undergraduate participants' memories for a positive event (Study 1) and their reported reactions to a success (Study 2) supported the dampening prediction. Results also suggest that dampening was associated with worse mood the day after a success (Study 2), that positive and negative affect regulation are distinct, that self-esteem is associated with affect regulation even when Neuroticism and Extraversion are controlled (Studies 3 and 4), and that self-esteem may be especially important for certain types of positive events and positive affect regulation (Study 5).

Do people with low self-esteem really want to feel better? Self-esteem differences in motivation to repair negative moods.

This research examined the hypothesis that people with low self-esteem (LSE) are less motivated than people with high self-esteem (HSE) to repair their negative moods. In Study 1, participants completed diaries in response to either a success or a failure in their everyday lives. Participants described what they intended to do next and the reasons behind those plans.