Age, Race, and Gender Differences in Child and Adolescent Self-Concept: Evidence from a Behavioral-Acquisition, Context-Dependent Model

Age, race, and gender differences were examined in global and domain-specific self-concepts among 2,188 American children and adolescents between the ages of 10 and 18 years. Although a few statistically significant effects of age, race, and gender on global and domain-specific self-concepts were found, the differences appeared to be of little qualitative or clinical significance. Self-concept appears to be a construct that is influenced very little by demographic characteristics of an individual. However, further investigations of multidimensional self-concept (especially longitudinal) are necessary to provide additional support for the claim that global and domain-specific self-concepts are minimally influenced by important human conditions such as age, race, and gender.