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| Title: | Work Attitudes and Life Goals of Zambian Youth |
| Author: | Osei-Hwedie, Kwaku |
| Year: | 1991 |
| Periodical: | Journal of Social Development in Africa (ISSN 1012-1080) |
| Volume: | 6 |
| Issue: | 1 |
| Pages: | 63-73 |
| Language: | English |
| Notes: | biblio. refs., ills. |
| Geographic terms: | Zambia Central Africa |
| Subjects: | youth values work attitudes Labor and Employment Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) sociology attitudes Young workers Social values |
| Abstract: | This paper focuses on work attitudes and life goals of youth in Zambia. Based on information from interviews conducted with a cross-sectional multistage sample of 1101 male and female adolescents, the author investigates whether the youth have their own goals or accept societal ones, what they consider to be important means to success, and whether these are in line with societal prescriptions and norms, and their feelings about work and their general occupational preferences. He discusses the findings in terms of Merton's (1968) anomie theory, in which Merton identifies five responses - conformity, innovation, ritualism, retreatism and rebellion - that people make to the demands of social situations, institutionalized opportunities and goals. In terms of conformity, Zambian youth seem to have accepted both the cultural goals and the institutionalized means of achieving these goals. A degree of innovation among the less educated (primary school and below) was identified, i.e. while they accepted socially approved goals they also accepted both socially approved and disapproved means of achieving them. From the data, Zambian youth did not show ritualism, retreatism or rebellion as ways of adjusting to their circumstances of living. Bibliogr. |
