THE SELF-CONCEPTIONS OF MALAYSIAN ADOLESCENTS - ASSESSMENT AND CROSS-CULTURAL COMPARISONS

A Malay translation of the Self-Description Questionnaire-1 was admini stered to 137 male and 163 female Malaysian public high school student s aged 14 to 15 years. The SDQ-1 scales were found to have an adequate internal consistency reliability, with a median alpha of .81. Factor analysis supported the expected underlying hierarchical model. Compari son of scale scores with like aged Australians from the norming sample of Marsh (1988) indicated that the Australians and the males from bot h countries tended to report higher self-ratings regarding their physi cal abilities and appearance. These findings are similar to previous c omparisons of the self-esteem of children from Australian and a number of Asian countries which may be due to an underlying cultural differe nce regarding masculinity and feminity.