CHUNG ET AL To the this issue,we encourage researchers to examine a variety of -day college student samples and other emerging adul the de to which the anged,add SVS ic error to the rception proc Additionally,although we believe that the self-esteem drop ho transiti sequent in and show a cor line belief that he or she has s of data colle in the present study. udy did not find links he esp eem) c achievement and the drop in self-esteem occurring durin stud wheth perceived ting that at this time Th nged.Thi ormative factors might play arole.For mple, beliefs about (20 in the Big Five nded to entails a number o ange in scores on th NEO and fails suppor ct s ing th fish i Costa Mcc rae.1989:He t al 2000 Add rating from one's parents,the ight he se difficult life c of self-worth.Howe ived chane n showed a predicte deathat the ciatio they get used to an row to appr ample who believed that their self-esteem had eventually find a social niche that provides them with a sense of itably ble (r 18),and nces that extend b d th. rall nd of th res of self nd personality. xcept that th sel and p racy,et al.,2001) nt the way they cha nge.Thus,further the Limitations and Future Directions changis needed.of normative change and individ tcvelopnrcntalrajctoricS ces in self in particular that leads to o the self-esteem trajectory observed in the ransitioning from nce to emerging adulthood with th during which data were collected (1992-1996)may have had a maturational chan es or broader social ontextual factors (es anges in social rol are not unique to or dependent on th sex.soc mic status,and race,I endin more plausibly ex ereas th precipitous,but highly normative drop in teem that occurre Such perceptions may reflect stereotypes that some individuals have about how the college experience, or the transition to adult￾hood more generally, influences self-esteem development. To the extent that these stereotypes are differentially held, people will differ in the degree to which they overestimate how much they have changed, adding systematic error to the perception process. A related possibility is that changes in social roles and social context produce changes in behavioral patterns. For example, an individual who transitions from being a math major to a sociology major may experience a shift in the level of sociability among his or her peer group and show a corresponding belief that he or she has changed in extraversion. Such shift in the “ecology of the self” (Hormuth, 1990) may contribute to a shift in identity (and correspondingly a shift in perceived self-esteem). The current study also sought to examine whether perceived changes in self-esteem correspond to actual changes in self-esteem scores. Our results show that people who actually did increase (or decrease) in self-esteem were more likely to perceive themselves as having increased (or decreased) in self-esteem, suggesting that people had some insight into how their self-esteem changed. This finding is consistent with the finding of Robins et al. (2005) that people’s beliefs about change in the Big Five corresponded to actual change in scores on the NEO-FFI scales, and fails to support the claim that people have little insight into the way their person￾ality changes (Costa & McCrae, 1989; Herbst et al., 2000). Addi￾tionally, the frequent and often intense self-reflection that charac￾terizes emerging adulthood might be one reason why we found such a large correspondence between perceived and actual change (
.56). Of note, perceived changes in self-esteem showed a predicted pattern of associations with perceived changes in personality (as￾sessed using the same 1–5 rating scale at Year 4). In the present sample, individuals who believed that their self-esteem had im￾proved during college tended to perceive themselves as having become less neurotic (r
.38) and more extraverted (r
.41), agreeable (r
.25), conscientious (r
.18), and open to new experiences (r
.30; all ps  .05). These correlations generally map onto the direction and magnitude of the relations found between measures of self-esteem and personality, except that the relation with neuroticism is somewhat weaker and the relation with openness somewhat stronger than is typically found (Robins, Tracy, et al., 2001). Limitations and Future Directions The present study has several limitations. First, our sample comes from a single, highly selective university, which may limit the generalizability of the results. That is, it may be something about the college experience at University of California, Berkeley in particular that leads to the self-esteem trajectory observed in the present study; it is possible that at less competitive universities, or at smaller universities that provide more academic and social support, students are less likely to experience a large drop in self-esteem during the first semester. Similarly, the time period during which data were collected (1992–1996) may have had a unique influence on the trajectory of self-esteem found in the current study. However, we found that this trajectory was robust across sex, socioeconomic status, and race, lending support for the turning point hypothesis, and suggesting that the effects of the transition into college on self-esteem are not specific to those at elite universities or to a specific time period. To further address this issue, we encourage researchers to examine a variety of present-day college student samples and other emerging adult samples. Additionally, although we believe that the self-esteem drop occurs only during the initial transition to college, the design of the present study does not allow us to rule out the possibility that self-esteem also drops, and then rebounds, in subsequent years. Future studies can shed light on this issue by incorporating three waves of data collection in every year of college, not just Year 1 as in the present study. Furthermore, the present study did not find links between aca￾demic achievement and the drop in self-esteem occurring during the first semester of college, suggesting that academic achievement and expectations for academic achievement did not influence self￾esteem at this time. What else might predict this decrease? The fact that the first semester drop held for the vast majority of students (about six out of seven experienced a decline in self-esteem) suggests that normative factors might play a role. For example, it may be that self-esteem declines during the first semester because the major life transition of entering college entails a number of related experiences that adversely affect self-esteem including the feeling that one is no longer a big fish in a little pond, the difficulty of separating from one’s parents, the need to establish a new peer group and initiate romantic relationships in a novel environment, and so on. Collectively these difficult life changes might damage, at least temporarily, most people’s sense of self-worth. However, by the end of the first year, many of these issues have worked themselves out—students adapt to the idea that they are no longer the smartest kid in the class, they get used to and grow to appre￾ciate the independence they now have from their parents, and eventually find a social niche that provides them with a sense of belonging. The college experience inevitably involves a diverse range of experiences that extend beyond the academic domain–increased independence from one’s family, romantic beginnings and end￾ings, the establishment of life-long friendships, and shifting life goals. Amidst all these changing life circumstances, self-esteem exhibits impressive levels of continuity. Nonetheless, the degree of continuity is far from perfect, and people tend to have some insight into the way they change. Thus, further inquiry into the anteced￾ents, concomitants, and consequences of different patterns of change is needed, both in terms of normative change and individ￾ual developmental trajectories. Moreover, future studies may wish to examine similarities and differences in self-esteem trajectories and their correlates in high school graduates who attend college and those who do not. The present study confounds the normative maturational experience of transitioning from adolescence to emerging adulthood with the relatively common, but far from ubiquitous experience of going to college. Although we have interpreted the self-esteem trajectory identified in the present research as shaped by the college experi￾ence, it is possible that the changes we observed were due to maturational changes or broader social-contextual factors (e.g., changes in social roles) that are not unique to or dependent on the college experience. The long-term, 4-year increase in self-esteem seems more plausibly explained by such factors, whereas the precipitous, but highly normative drop in self-esteem that occurred 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. 12 CHUNG ET AL.