Tests · self-esteem
Self-Esteem Test (Rosenberg Scale)
This short test helps you see how you treat yourself: whether you feel steady and supported inside, or you tend to pick at yourself and discount your own strengths. Ten familiar thoughts about yourself add up to a bigger picture, making it easier to see where your self-esteem is holding you up and where it's wearing you down. The result is a starting point for gently strengthening how you relate to yourself, one step at a time.
- 10 questions
- Rosenberg, 1965
- About this test
About the RSES
How favorably you rate your own worth overall, based on ten statements about yourself.
- Asks about
- Your general feelings about yourself; the published instructions give no time window
- Answers
- Four choices, from strongly agree to strongly disagree
- Developed by
- Morris Rosenberg, 1965
Where it comes from
The Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale comes from the sociologist Morris Rosenberg. He published it in his 1965 book Society and the Adolescent Self-Image (Princeton University Press). The University of Maryland, where he taught until his death in 1992, says the scale was developed on 5,024 high school juniors and seniors from 10 randomly selected schools in New York State.
The university's notes describe self-esteem as a positive or negative orientation toward yourself, an overall evaluation of your worth. Rosenberg designed the scale as a Guttman scale. Researchers now commonly score it as a Likert scale, which means adding up points for each of the ten answers. The university points readers to chapter 2 of the book for the construct validity work.
What the research found
The University of Maryland reports test-retest correlations of .82 to .88 and Cronbach's alpha values of .77 to .88 across samples, citing earlier reviews by Blascovich and Tomaka (1993) and Rosenberg (1986). Studies have found both a one-factor structure and a two-factor one, with self-confidence and self-deprecation as the two parts.
Sinclair and colleagues (2010) collected norms from 503 US adults and found that scores differed by age, race and ethnicity, education, employment, income and marital status. Schmitt and Allik (2005) gave the scale in 28 languages to 16,998 people in 53 nations. Its factor structure was largely the same across nations, but the negatively worded items were read differently from place to place, so the authors say direct comparisons between countries may have limited value.
The university says there are no discrete cut-off points for high and low self-esteem and advises checking norms for a population like yours. The familiar 15 to 25 "normal" range appears on a Norton college psychology web page that cites no study. A Finnish study of 2,070 15-year-olds compared scores with depressive symptoms and social anxiety. It suggested 25 points as the cut-off for low self-esteem, although the abstract we read doesn't say which score range the authors used, so that number can't be mapped onto a 0 to 30 scale.
How scoring works
| Score | Label | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| 0 to 14 | Lower self-esteem | A common convention, not an official cut-off. A Norton psychology web page calls scores below 15 low; the scale's maintainers at the University of Maryland say no cut-offs exist. |
| 15 to 25 | Self-esteem in the typical range | The same convention calls 15 to 25 the normal range. The page that states it cites no study. |
| 26 to 30 | High self-esteem | An extension of that convention, which Shirley Ryan AbilityLab's measures database lists as 25 to 30. It doesn't come from Rosenberg. |
None of these cut-offs come from Rosenberg or the University of Maryland, whose FAQ says no discrete cut-off points exist. They spread from one textbook web page and are repeated without a cited study.
What it can't tell you
The scale rates global self-esteem by self-report. It doesn't say where your self-esteem comes from, and a low score can go along with depression or social anxiety, and this scale can't tell you whether you have either. Rosenberg built it on teenagers in one US state in the 1960s. Adults and people in other countries have answered it since, but groups differ, so a score is best read against people like you.
Answers reflect how you see yourself on the day you take it. Nothing in the scale measures how you behave or how other people see you.
How to use your result
Treat your score as a snapshot of how you rate yourself today. The university's notes describe self-esteem as generally stable in adults, so don't expect big swings from week to week. If you retake the test, leave a few weeks between tries.
A low score doesn't diagnose anything. If you've felt worthless for weeks, or your mood is affecting sleep, work or relationships, talk with a doctor or therapist and bring your result. If you're thinking about suicide or hurting yourself, call or text 988. Our guide to building self-esteem and the self-compassion test, which asks how you treat yourself when things go wrong, cover related ground.
More on this topic: How to build self-esteem, Self-compassion test, Your inner critic, Depression test (PHQ-9).
Your answers
Your answers are scored in your browser. If you sign in and choose to save a result, we store the score and its label, not your individual answers. Without an account, nothing is saved.
Sources 9
- University of Maryland Sociology, Using the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale: The ten items (shown as an image), scoring, the 5,024-student original sample, reliability ranges, and the public domain notice (also an image). The department says it can't advise on the scale's use.
- University of Maryland Sociology, Rosenberg Scale FAQ: States that no discrete cut-off points exist. Last modified 2021, and its permission wording is older than the public domain notice.
- University of Maryland Sociology, Self Esteem: What Is it?: The department's definition of self-esteem and its note that self-esteem is generally stable in adults.
- Princeton University Press, Society and the Adolescent Self-Image: Confirms the book, the author and the publisher (original copyright 1965). The book itself wasn't opened.
- Norton college psychology web page, Rosenberg's Self-Esteem Scale (archived copy, 2016): The source of the 15 to 25 normal range and the below-15 low range. No study is cited. The live page has been retired; archived copies from 2013 to 2019 carry the same text.
- Shirley Ryan AbilityLab, Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale: Lists 0 to 15 low, 15 to 25 normal and 25 to 30 high, and points to the Norton page as its source. A secondary source.
- Sinclair et al., Evaluation & the Health Professions, 2010 (PubMed): Abstract only. 503 US adults, normative data, score differences across demographic groups.
- Schmitt and Allik, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2005 (PubMed): Abstract only. 16,998 participants in 53 nations, 28 languages, invariance of factor structure, wording effects.
- Isomaa et al., Health Education & Behavior, 2013 (PubMed): Abstract only. 2,070 Finnish 15-year-olds, a suggested cut-off of 25 points for low self-esteem. The abstract doesn't give the scoring range.