Persons Who Most Impress the Young Senegalese

Abstract

We asked some 1090 students to tell us who had most impressed them in life and for what reasons so as to evaluate a few of their reference values through their partial identification to the proposed persons. Persons belonging to their family circle got the highest score (24.3%), then' persons endowed with many religious and moral qualities (15%). Next come political or historic characters (14.4%), men gifted with many intellectual and artistic qualities (11.8%), friends (10.2%), sports-stars (8.4%), and finally the persons doing a special job (teacher, etc., 9.3%). The main reasons for their choices are competence, know how and intelligence of the chosen person (16%), his role as an adviser (11%), a dynamic worker (9%), and (for a religious figure) his miraculous powers (6%). The mother figure (chosen by 8.2% of our subjects) and the father figure (6.3%) were chosen mainly for the advice they provided (50%). The influence of sex, housing, socio-economic status of fathers and age was also discussed.