Dilemma of Youth: The Choice of Parents or Peers as a Frame of Reference for Behavior.

The manifest goals of this research were to: (a) devise a means of measuring the relative importance for youth of two potential types of referents-parents or peers and (b) obtain information on behavioral correlates of parent and peer orientations. Tests of relationship were made relative to parent or peer orientation and: the age-grade level, sex, the perceived source of need satisfaction, and the socioeconomic class of respondents. Ordinal type scales were used where applicable to gain measurements of the variables. Chi-square tests and rank-order correlations provided the measures of association between type of orientation and the independent variables. All the associations were found to be significant, except socioeconomic class. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]