Study on Structural Relation of Family Functioning and Self Esteem with Academic Achievement in Female High School Students

Family can affect adolescent's motivational orientation toward its own goals. Drop off academic failure, and escape from school are some of the occurrences that have gained the attention of educational-cultural system. Therefore the present study is aimed to analyze the structural relation between family functioning and self esteem variables and academic achievements in female adolescents. In a Ex Post Facto (causative-comparative) study which was conducted on female high school students of Isfahan in 2009, 360 students were selected randomly using multi-stage clustering method. Samples were divided into two groups of "having continuous academic achievements" and "having academic failure". Then they were inquired using Ellis Pope's self esteem scale and Family Assessment Device. At the end the relation of main research variables (family functioning) and other background variables, like parents' educational status, birth rank, number of siblings, educational degree …, with each dimension of self esteem were analyzed in each group by multi-group regression model of hidden variables.
Results showed that family functioning had a meaningful relation with every aspect of self esteem (educational, social, familial, and physical) in both groups (p=0.02) this effect showed poor family functioning's relation with low self that in the group with academic failure esteem. Also there was a meaningful relation between parent's educational status and education, familial and social aspects (p<0.001) and also physical aspect (p 0.05) of self esteem. Among other variables, age of the student, birth rank and number of kids in the family also had meaningful relation with self esteem at the level of 0.01. Based on the results of this study, it could be found that the adolescent with sufficient family support have more chances and features for autonomy, self expression, self awareness and achievement seeking which these psychological traits have an effect on individual educational motivation and functioning.