Contingencies of Self-worth in Early Adolescence: The Antecedent Role of Perceived Parenting Sofie Wouters, Sarah Doumen, Veerle Germeijs, Hilde Colpin and Karine Verschueren, KU Leuven Abstract Contingent self-esteem (i.e., the degree to which one’s self-esteem is dependent on meeting particular conditions) has been shown to predict a wide range of psychosocial and academic problems. This study extends previous research on contingent self- esteem by examining the predictive role of perceived parenting dimensions in a sample of early adolescents (N = 240; age range 11–15 years). Additionally, the effect of perceived parenting on contingent self-esteem is compared with its effect on global self-esteem. Our main findings showed that both responsiveness and psychological control were unique predictors of global self-esteem whereas only psychological control uniquely predicted contingent self-esteem. Although the effect of responsive- ness on global self-esteem was increased when combined with high levels of behavioral control, this effect did not depend on the level of psychological control.The effect of psychological control on contingent self-esteem, however, generally increased when combined with high levels of responsiveness. Keywords: contingent self-esteem; global self-esteem; parenting; adolescence Introduction Global self-esteem, defined as a person’s global perception of himself or herself (Harter, 2003; Shavelson, Hubner, & Stanton, 1976), is a developmental variable that has been linked to several outcomes (Greenier, Kernis, & Waschull, 1995). Low global self-esteem has been found to relate to depression, neuroticism, aggression, and school-related dropout (Baumeister, Campbell, Krueger, & Vohs, 2003; Donnellan, Trzesniewski, Robins, Moffitt, & Caspi, 2005; Lan & Lanthier, 2003; Manning, Bear, & Minke, 2006; Sun & Hui, 2007) whereas high global self-esteem has been found to predict success, life satisfaction, and psychological well-being (Crocker & Wolfe, 2001; Marsh, Craven, & McInerney, 2005), and also anger and aggression (Baumeister et al., 2003; Manning et al., 2006). These divergent findings encouraged researchers to Correspondence should be addressed to Sofie Wouters, School Psychology and Child and Adoles- cent Development, KU Leuven, Tiensestraat 102—Box 3717, 3000 Leuven, Belgium. Email: sofie.wouters@ppw.kuleuven.be Social Development Vol 22 No. 2 242–258 May 2013 doi: 10.1111/sode.12010 © Blackwell Publishing Ltd. 2012. Published by Blackwell Publishing, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA.