Subjective perceptions of social success in adolescence

Abstract

The paper presents the results of an empirical study on the problem of social success. The relevance of the topic is caused by the necessity to organize the career guidance work and to provide psychological and pedagogical support in the process of personal formation of adolescents under the uncertainty and variability. The study was aimed to identify the peculiarities of the ideas of adolescents about the social success of a person in modern society and to study the level of evaluation of their own social success. The empirical study was conducted on the basis of secondary schools of Murmansk. The study involved 50 students of the 8–9 grades aged 14–15. The researchers used the “Successful Person” technique of G.R. Khuzeeva in the author’s modification, which included the construction of extra questions aimed to identify self-esteem of the respondents’ social success and the qualities, which help them to be successful. The study identified that teenagers associated social success with business qualities, such as purposefulness, hard work, and efficiency; they also understand the necessity of good education and well-developed communication skills to achieve success. The analysis of the results of the adolescents’ assessment of their own social success showed that 14 % of respondents rated their social success highly, 66 % of respondents rated their social success at an intermediate level and 20 % of respondents gave low ratings of their own social success. The obtained results formed the basis for the program of psychological and pedagogical support of adolescents in the process of professional and personal formation.