The Predictive Role of Early Trauma Dimensions on Self-Esteem in 11 - 13- Year-Old Students: Controlling the Role of Maladaptive Schema

Self-esteem is a stable sense of personal worthiness. There is insufficient evidence from the available research to fully determine the relationship between self-esteem and early trauma. This is a correlational study aims to investigate the relationship between early traumas as a predictor of negative self-esteem by controlling the effect of maladaptive schemas in 11-13 year-old-student sample. 292 people (201 females, 91 males) with mean age of 12.33 were selected via multistage random sampling. Participants completed questionnaire on children’s depression inventory (CDI), childhood trauma questionnaire (CTQ), schema inventory for children (SIC) and provided demographic information. Analyzing data was done using correlation and stepwise regression methods. The results showed that emotional neglect and physical abuse are the best predictors of negative self-esteem. Additionally, the results revealed no evidence of maladaptive schemas mediating the relationship between early trauma and negative self-esteem. In general, the findings showed that emotional neglect and physical abuse are the best predictors of negative self-esteem in children and explain a considerable variance of survival index. Our findings also demonstrate that maladaptive schemas do not have any significant effect on the relationship between trauma and negative self-esteem.