This study examines the impact of race and gender on self-esteem among youth. Comparisons of the different groups on private (satisfaction with self) and public (intelligence) domain aspects of self-esteem indicate that patterns differ across race and gender. In general, minorities tend to have lower levels of self-esteem than whites on public domain traits, but this pattern does not hold for private domain traits, with blacks and Chicanos having levels greater than those of whites. The impact of gender also differs across the groups, with black, Native American, and Asian women having higher levels of self-esteem on public domain traits than their male counterparts.
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