Social Success As A Psychological Phenomenon

Abstract

The article discusses the specificity of adolescents’ perception of social success and presents its role in personal development. Being shaped from the early age period and throughout the whole life, social success affects the quality of life and peculiarities of a person’s self-efficacy. It is proved that the increased interest in studying social success is facilitated by the growing attention to the problem of personal changes, an increase in the environmental “challenges” faced by human abilities, as well as the need for a quick response to changes in society. The authors pay special attention to the analysis of social success as one of the main indicators of person’s self-fulfillment in conditions modern society, a category of personality psychology that broadens knowledge about the phenomenology of mental properties formation and development. The study involved 75 respondents (1st and 2nd year students with majors in psychological and pedagogical education). The purpose of the empirical study was to identify the basic features of social success image, as well as the study of young people’s subjective assessment of socially successful individuals. To solve the tasks set, we used the “Successful person” methodology and the author's questionnaire “Psychological portrait of a successful person”. The results of the study show that in adolescence, the image of social success is dominated by a humanistic orientation (benevolence, responsiveness, the ability to sacrifice). The authors proved the predominance of moral standards and rules, high intelligence, critical thinking and perseverance in the psychological portrait of a socially successful person.