Abstract

Background: The act of marginalization severely affects the mental health andif it is imposed during the developmental phasethen its effect is more devastating. One such group is orphans. Evidences suggest that orphans show low level of self-esteem and high level of distress and cognitive distortionsas compared to non-orphansand self-esteem seems to play an important role in overcoming from crucial situations.

Aim: The aim of this study was to assess and compare the levels of self-esteem, distress and cognitive distortions among orphans and non-orphans and to find out the relationships between these three variables. This study was also intended to find the moderation effect of self-esteem in distress and cognitive distortion relationship.

Methods: Total 140 adolescent participants(Mage= 14.95, SD= 1.7) were selected for this study by using randomized sampling technique, out of which70 were orphans oforphanage and 70 were non orphans of low socio-economic status. All the data were collected in Varanasi city of Uttar Pradesh (India). Hindi version of Battle’s SEIC, DASS-Hindi and CDS was used to assess the self-esteem, distress and cognitive distortions respectively. Mean, t-test, Pearson correlation and Moderation analysis was done to test the proposed hypotheses.

Result: The finding reveals that orphans show significant low level of self-esteem (t = 10.350, p < 0.01), significantly higher level of distress(t = -8.029, p < 0.01)and cognitive distortions (t= -5.420, p < 0.01) as compared tonon-orphans. Significant negative correlation was found between self-esteem and distress (r = -0.638) and self-esteems and cognitive distortions (r = -0.468) where as significant positive correlation was found between distress and cognitive distortions (r = 0.334). The interaction effect shows that self-esteem significantly moderates the effect of distress on cognitive distortions.

Conclusion: All the hypotheses were accepted. Significant differences were found between orphans and non-orphans on the level of self-esteem, distress and cognitive distortions. High self-esteem will lead towards low level of distress and cognitive distortions and vice-versa. Self-esteem moderates the effect of distress on cognitive distortions.

Key words: Marginalization, Orphans, Self-esteem, Distress, Cognitive distortion