Success and failure are largely self-defined in terms of personal standards. The higher the self-standards, the more likely will given attainments be viewed as failures, regardless of what others might think.

Persons who have a strong sense of efficacy deploy their attention and effort to the demands of the situation and are spurred by obstacles to greater effort.

For many activities, people cannot rely solely on themselves in evaluating their ability level because such judgments require inferences from probabilistic indicants of talent about which they may have limited knowledge. Self-appraisals are, therefore, partly based on the opinions of others who presumably possess evaluative competence

One cannot afford to be a realist.

Freedom [should not be] conceived negatively as exemption from social influences or situational constraints. Rather...positively as the exercise of self-influence to bring about desired results.

There are countless studies on the negative spillover of job pressures on family life, but few on how job satisfaction enhances the quality of family life.

Self-appraisals are influenced by evaluative reactions of others.