Impact of Homes and Hostels on Morality and Achievement Motivation of Adolescents.

Adolescence, a time for the most fascinating and complex transitions in the life span; a time of accelerated growth and change second only to infancy. Its beginning is associated with biological, physical, behavioural and social transformations. They feel misunderstood and unadopted with regard to the adult world. The present study aims at studying the impact of homes and hostels on Achievement Motivation and Morality of adolescents. Achievement motivation has been defined as learned motive, unconscious in nature, resulting from reward or punishment of specific behavior and Moral behavior means behavior in conformity with the moral code of the social group. Truly moral behavior is something which is carried out in a voluntary way; it is conduct which is regulated from within. Moral behavior is accompanied by a feeling of personal responsibility for one's acts. The child has to learn what is "good" and what is "bad"; what is "right" and what is "wrong". Parents start imbibing both these traits in the child since the day the child is born. Thus the home environment plays a very important role in the development of these traits. But adolescents spend less time with family and more with their peer groups. Thus, their thoughts and actions are influenced by their peers as well. Therefore the present study tries to explore the impact that homes and hostels have on morality and achievement motivation of an adolescent. Achievement Motivation Scale (Dr. Shah Beena, 1986) and Moral Judgment Test (Dr. Meera Varma, 1967) have been used in the study. The data was collected from adolescents (age range: 16-22yrs) of Punjabi University. Statistical analysis was done on the data collected and finally the results were interpreted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]