CHUNG ET AL 281,N=295)=163.636.RMSEA=050.90%CI[046.072 28,CF Expected GPA d the 4 lope.indicating that increa es in GPA were 二 VotPgrade-point average. this question we fit a which a latent variable indicated This reported that thei 97. ad h egatively associated ndic d ase in mean scores on the RSE.However, enuated increase.over the 4 years of college (see Table 4 for not coespond with changes in the actual Co examine whether expected GPA redicts self-esteem ived clt-esteen change as c of the the self This 066 211,C12 83.T sslopeoyocadour asting d in Moc icted the se traje ntly of actual GPA heir RSe scale Moreover,the em inte lege witl unr ated nge,sugg o the actually r decline in self-e lves even more self-esteemthe re rea h ie del 4a:see Figu did not atten over th not just the firs Perceived Change in Self-Esteem section.we examined cha res on the Discussion exan esteem in a sample of young men and women followed longi CollASEc GPA intercept GPA slope Variable B SEB BB SEB B ally receiv chg-e em change The GPA intercept and slope were then allowed to covary with the self-esteem variables. This conditional model yielded good fit, 2 (81, N
295)
163.636, RMSEA
.050, 90% CI [.046, .072], pclosefit
.128, CFI
.986, TLI
.984. A significant association was found between the GPA slope and the 4-year self-esteem slope, indicating that increases in GPA were associated with in￾creases in self-esteem (see Table 3 for estimates). We next examined whether individuals who enter college ex￾pecting to receive high grades maintain their self-esteem, or ex￾perience a drop in self-esteem when they fail to meet their expec￾tations.3 To address this question, we fit a conditional model (Model 3) in which a latent variable indicated by the three ex￾pected GPA items was entered as a predictor of the self-esteem variables. This conditional model yielded good fit, 2 (32, N
295)
70.443, RMSEA
.064, 90% CI [.044, .084], pclosefit
.123, CFI
.976, TLI
.973. Expected GPA had a significant effect on the self-esteem intercept, indicating that students who entered college with high expectations for academic achievement tended to have high levels of self-esteem. Expected GPA was also negatively associated with the 4-year slope, indicating that stu￾dents who entered college with high expectations for academic achievement experienced a drop in self-esteem, or at least an attenuated increase, over the 4 years of college (see Table 4 for estimates). To examine whether expected GPA predicts self-esteem inde￾pendently of actual GPA, we next fit a conditional model (Model 4) in which both expected and actual GPA were entered as pre￾dictors of self-esteem. This conditional model yielded good fit, 2 (118, N
295)
224.123, RMSEA
.055, 90% CI [.044, .066], pclosefit
.211, CFI
.983, TLI
.981. All of the effects observed in Models 1 and 2 replicated in Model 3, and no new effects emerged (see Table 5 for estimates). Thus, expected GPA predicted the self-esteem trajectory independently of actual GPA. This suggests that individuals who entered college with unrealis￾tically positive expectations about their grades— unrealistic rela￾tive to the grades they actually received— declined in self-esteem relative to those who entered college with more realistic appraisals of their academic future. Inclusion of the demographic covariates (Model 4a; see Figure 4) did not attenuate the significant effects of actual and expected GPA on the self-esteem intercept and self￾esteem slope variables (see Table 5 for estimates). Perceived Change in Self-Esteem In the previous section, we examined changes in scores on the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale over a 4-year period. In this section, we examine participants’ subjective impressions of how they changed during college. 67% of our participants reported that their self-esteem had increased (score of 4 or 5), 21% reported that their self-esteem had stayed the same (score of 3), and only 12% reported that their self-esteem had declined (score of 1 or 2). Thus, the majority of participants believed their self-esteem improved during their 4 years in college, which is consistent with the observed increase in mean scores on the RSE. However, it is possible that these aggregate trends are consistent, yet at the individual level participants’ perceptions of how they changed do not correspond with changes in the actual scores. To examine the correspondence between perceived and actual change, we fit a conditional model (Model 5) where we entered perceived self-esteem change as a covariate of the self-esteem trajectory, regressing perceived self-esteem change onto the self￾esteem intercept, first-semester slope, and 4-year slope (see Figure 5). The 4-year slope was positively associated with perceived changes in self-esteem (see Table 6), suggesting that individuals who thought they had increased (or decreased) in self-esteem did tend to actually increase (or decrease) in self-esteem, based on their RSE scale scores. Moreover, the self-esteem intercept was positively associated with perceived change, suggesting that indi￾viduals with higher initial levels of self-esteem tended to perceive themselves as gaining even more self-esteem as they progressed through college. The first-semester slope was not associated with perceived change, which is not surprising given that perceived change was assessed over the entire 4-year period, not just the first semester. The inclusion of demographic variables on perceived self-esteem change was not significant, indicating that the sex, race, and SES of the participant did not influence perceptions of self-esteem change (see Table 6 for coefficients).4 Discussion The present research examined stability and change in self￾esteem in a sample of young men and women followed longi- 3 On average, the participants in our study “realistically” expected to attain a GPA of 3.43 (SD
0.33), yet the mean GPA at the end of the fourth year was 3.07 (SD
0.47), .36 grade points lower (d
.90). Overall, 72% of participants expected to receive higher grades than they actually received. 4 One interesting question is whether grades are associated with per￾ceived change in self-esteem. We fit a model correlating GPA with perceived self-esteem change and found that GPA is not associated with perceived change in self-esteem. Thus, based on our data, changes in GPA are only associated with changes in “actual” self-esteem, but not with perceived self-esteem change. Table 3 Model 2: Effects of College GPA on Self-Esteem-Trajectory Variable GPA intercept GPA slope B SE B B SE B Self-esteem intercept .02 .03 .05 .00 .01 .05 Self-esteem slope: First semester .02 .02 .09 .00 .00 .01 Self-esteem slope: 4 years .00 .01 .06 .00 .00 .17
Note. GPA
grade-point average.
p  .05. Table 4 Model 3: Effects of Expected GPA on Self-Esteem-Trajectory Variable Expected GPA B SE B Self-esteem intercept .52 .19 .18
Self-esteem slope: First semester .06 .11 .05 Self-esteem slope: Four years .11 .05 .20
Note. GPA
grade-point average.
p  .05. This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. 8 CHUNG ET AL.