An assessment of the relationship of irrational beliefs with self-esteem and social anxiety among adolescents aged between 11- 15 years

The purpose of this study is to focus on the possible relationships between Self-esteem, social anxiety and irrational beliefs by analyzing it through related predictive hypotheses. The sample of this study composed of 151 participants who study at secondary school aged between 11-15 years. The following scales were used to assess social anxiety, self-esteem, and irrational belief levels of participant: The Social Anxiety Scale for the adolescents, the Coopersmith Self-Esteem Inventory (CSEI), the Social Anxiety Scale for the Adolescents (SAS), and the Socio demographic Features and Data Form were used to assess respectively the variables of the irrational beliefs of participants. In the analysis process of the main hypotheses Multiple regression analysis was carried out, moreover, Mann Whitney U and Kruskal Wallis H test techniques were also conducted for descriptive hypotheses. Results indicated that self-esteem was found to have a significant predictive effect on irrational beliefs (p <.05), the predictive effect of the level of social anxiety on irrational beliefs and the joint effect of social anxiety and self-esteem on irrational belief was not significant. In the next step of current work that examines descriptive hypotheses, focused on the possible effects of socio demographic characteristics on irrational beliefs, self-esteem, and social anxiety levels of participants. Results demonstrated that , age, gender and parental marital status has significant effects on irrational belief levels, mother's educational level and parental marital status has significant effects on social anxiety levels, gender and parental educational level has significant effects on self-esteem levels of participants (p<.05). No other significant relationship was found. Key words: Adolescence, İrrational Beliefs, Social Anxiety, Self-esteem, Socio-demographic Characteristics.