A Rosenberg score is the sum of your answers to ten statements about how you see yourself as a whole, scored from 10 to 40 on this site, with a higher score meaning higher self-esteem. It measures global self-esteem, the general sense that you are a person of worth.
How the scale is built
Morris Rosenberg published the scale in 1965 in a study of several thousand adolescents, and it has been the standard measure of global self-esteem ever since (Rosenberg, 1965). Five of the ten statements are positive, such as I feel that I have a number of good qualities, and five are negative, such as At times I think I am no good at all. You agree or disagree with each on four points, the negative five are reversed, and the ten are added.
The ten statements measure one thing. Robins, Hendin and Trzesniewski (2001) found that the full scale and a single statement, I have high self-esteem, correlated strongly and related to other measures in the same way, which is what you would expect if the scale measures a single broad attitude towards oneself. Schmitt and Allik (2005) gave the scale to people in 53 nations and found that it worked similarly across them, and that average scores were above the scale’s midpoint in every nation: most people, almost everywhere, describe themselves favourably.
What a score does not mean
A score is not a diagnosis of anything. The scale is a research measure of how people see themselves, used across whole populations, and a low score describes an attitude, not a condition.
It is not a measure of confidence. The statements ask about worth and satisfaction with yourself, not whether you can do any particular thing well; a person can be very able and score low, or the reverse.
It is not a comparison with other people. No norms are published for the scale, so the site draws your score against the possible range and does not invent a percentile. One thing can be said: because average scores sit above the midpoint in every nation studied, a score at the arithmetic middle of the range is lower than most people’s, not average.
What it means for your results
Your marker sits on a strip from 10 to 40. Towards the top, you agree that you have good qualities and take a positive attitude towards yourself; towards the bottom, you agree that you wish you had more respect for yourself and at times feel you are no good at all. The scale moves with mood and events, so a score is a reading of now.
The self-esteem test takes two minutes, is scored on your device and shows your score on the strip. Take it again after six months and the site shows both attempts together.