Psychology

Most researchers recognize the importance of competence and self-worth in developing positive behavior and achieving success in personal and professional life. Empirical studies show that if individuals consider themselves as worthwhile, capable, and competent human beings, they will most probably be able to achieve happiness, satisfaction, and lead productive and successful lives. At the same time, if individuals feel little or no self-worth and are incompetent, in most cases their lives will be associated with self-doubt, unhappiness, social apathy, and unsuccessful outcomes in all their activities. Without competence and self-worth, any solid personal growth and development are almost impossible. By using research findings in the field of psychology, this paper will consider self-worth as a balance of competence and self-esteem and focus on self-worth as a basic human need for successful and productive life. In the end, proposal for future research will be made.

Body
As research shows, both children and adults with high self-esteem are accountable for their actions and decisions and have strong ability to exercise control over their feelings, emotions, and reactions (Aberson 1999). Moreover, such people perceive themselves realistically, are aware of and admit their strengths and weaknesses, are proud of their achievements, and are not frustrated by the successes of other people. People with low self-esteem can hardly love others. Actually, as Robert Louis Stevenson wrote, he who loves himself, not in idle vanity, but with a plentitude of knowledge, is the best equipped of all to love his neighbors (cited in Owens, 1995, p. 1). People with low self-esteem shrink from developing and asserting themselves because of doubtfulness, uncertainness, and embarrassment. To function productively and healthy both at home and at work, people must have self-worth and competence.

In general, competence and self-worth refers to the extent to which people respect or value themselves. Self-worth derives from a persons point of view, feelings, judgments, or considerations of how capable, important, useful, successful, and worthy he or she is. Competence is directly related to self-worth. According to Tafarodis study (1995), general success or overall competence is what constitutes self-worth (322). Particularly, self-worth is determined in terms of action, which is successful or competent.

There can be little doubt that self-worth is an essential human need that occupies a central place in the personal and professional achievements of the personality. For instance, Maslow (1968) identified self-esteem as one of the main developmental issues that all people face in their lives. Actually, so basic is this need to successful life that it is often referred to as a D or deficiency need, which meansthat it is an essential part of personal development, something all people need and must deal with at all stages of their lives. Even though such a description of self-worth may be criticized as being too theoretical, there is a large body of empirical studies that identify self-esteem as one of the three most important types of need-based human experiences (Sheldon, Elliot, Kim  Kasser, 2001, pp. 325-339).

Sheldon, Elliot, Kim and Kasser have found that understanding self-worth as an essential and basic aspect of personal development provides self-worth with large psychological significance in at least two ways. First, it implies that self-worth has huge motivational power for learning and development. In particular, self-worth drives personal behavior in a way that forces people to master lifes challenges so that they may feel valued and respected by themselves and by friends, neighbors, and colleagues.

Being unable to satisfy this need means that behavior is driven in another, wrong direction, one that is not conducive to successful life and will cause many problems in the future. If this is the case, the individual probably will make effort to compensate for a lack of self-worth. This, depending on how large the deficiency is, may result in many types of negative social and personal behaviors ranging from relatively mild mental disorders to a number of pathological conditions in adults.

Second, self-worth and competence are also straightforwardly tied to one of the most significant and characteristic aspects of humanistic psychology personal development and the process of establishing oneself as a whole person, able to develop ones abilities and to understand oneself, that is self-actualization. Rogers (1961), for example, considered that self-worth is a necessary condition for a person to become fully functioning in his or her personal and professional life. According to Rogers (1961), individuals with feeling of worthiness usually show a positive degree of both competence and self-esteem. For instance, the author would expect people who experience a high degree of worthiness to feel good about themselves most of the time, to be very open to new knowledge, practical experiences, feelings, to be pleasant to be with close people, and continuing similarly. Individuals who are also high in competence, that is characteristic of self-worth, would have all the necessary skills and abilities that are needed to achieve success in life.

As was said in the beginning of this paper, the connection between self-worth, competence, and behavior is often talked about in terms of human needs. Thus, Gecas pointed out that, The motivation to maintain and enhance a positive conception of one-self has been thought to be pervasive, even universal (1982, p. 20). Interestingly, Sheldon, Elliot, Kim, and Kasser examined ten most frequently mentioned needs in the psychological literature. In their study, they asked people to identify experiences that were satisfying for them to see if any of the needs were more important than others in their lives. Findings demonstrated that, self-esteem,relatedness, and autonomy emerged in a three-way tie at the top of the list (p. 329).  Gecas also refers to self-worth as motivation, which can be understood in two ways. Gecas said, As aspects of the self-esteem motive, self-enhancement emphasizes growth,expansion, and increasing ones self-esteem, while self-maintenance focuses on not losing what one has. The two engender different behavioral strategies (1982, p. 21). The researcher understands self-worth in relation to a need for personal growth and development or self-actualization. Gecas sees self-esteem here as an important growth motive.

The similar motivational picture of self-worth can also be found in humanistic studies of Maslow and Rogers who definitely understood self-worth as an essential human need. Maslow and Rogers also see self-esteem as impelling the individual toward taking risks and using all possible possibilities as a way of making competence and worthiness more strong instead of just making efforts to maintain it. Self-worth is driven by the need to enrich our abilities and knowledge, that, when properly done, is enjoyable and very rewarding process and results in an increase in competence and worthiness. As such, self-worth becomes directly connected to continuous life learning. As a result, instead of just moving passively or taking the easy way out, self-worth constantly encourages an individual toward the future in a more creative and actualizing way, creating a solid ground for great achievements and success. If In this process, a person faces some difficulties, self-worth provides people with necessary power to maintain a sense of worth that is very stabilizing. Such power makes possible for the individual to take quick and effective measures to cope with the problems or to suffer through the situation comparatively undamaged.

Conclusion
The purpose of this paper was to develop a sense of the major findings in the field of self-worth and competence, particularly how they relate to success in human life. The findings of the paper help create a reasonably accurate picture of what is generally known about self-wrath as a need for productive and successful life. In addition, this discussion can also act as the building blocks for the following study of self-worth and competence. The further question that should be examined in terms of self-worth and competence is how many aspects of human behavior and other factors effect self-worth levels in children and adults.