Question

What role do you think discipline plays in developing a child’s self-esteem? What forms of discipline best serve the self-esteem of the child or adolescent?

Answer 1

I think it plays a huge role. Depending on how harsh (i.e. degrading, unflattering) the discipline, or how lax and uncaring, it affects how the child acts and feels about nemself.
Harsh discipline, from what I've seen, tends to wear out the self-esteem and make a child less likely to want to succeed, from the fear of doing it wrong and facing cruel consequences for a mistake, and also from the thought that no one really has expectations for nem to aspire to. However, I've also seen it make a child more likely to lash out violently, as nem will think it is appropriate due to being treated similarly, and, when ne gets older, nem will want the control that nem lost in being disciplined back, and rebelling is one of the easier ways to do get that.
Lax discipline can also make a child less willing to succeed because again, nem will think there are no expectations (or rules either, in this case, such as getting good grades or being grounded for not) and therefore not bothering trying to do better than being lazy will achieve. There is often no self-esteem because the child isn't taught the difference between low points in life and high, and by that I mean for example the difference between good grades and bad.
Both of these things are things that can either way, though. A child can either act or try their very best in trying to get a better reaction from parents, and its up to what the child's external environment mostly on which way this happens, i.e. a child that sees from teachers and friends that being a better person is possible would be more willing to try this than a child that has never seen this and thinks the only way to live is to slack off and suffer through life.
"Mild" discipline has so many types, maybe more so than the two extremes mentioned above. There's religion-based, pride-based, ancestry-based, etc. I suppose these can also be related to the extreme cases, but I would think in general it's a little harder to separate there. Again, it's up to so many factors how these affect the self-esteem, it probably wouldn't be reasonable to try to cover them. You also get into what differing opinions on the levels of discipline, what is right/wrong, parenting/abuse. Personally, I believe discipline that holds a child to a set of reasonable standards and allows for rewards and punishments of meeting or ignoring these standards is the best way to go. Always teach a child /why/ they should or shouldn't do something, that way they understand that the rules and consequences aren't because of silly parents or stupid people... they're there to better the child and keep nem safe while still allowing development and learning. Facilitate the child's understanding, not their restraints.