A STUDY OF CHILDREN'S IDEALS. 



89 



1. Acquaintances. 



2. Historical characters, past or contemporary. 



3. Characters from literature. 



The comparative importance of each source at different ages is 

 shown in Chart I. 



As might be expected, the younger children pay little attention to 

 the outside world. At seven years of age forty-seven per cent of the 

 children find their ideals in father or mother, in neighbor or friend, 

 thirty-nine per cent in literature, and fourteen per cent in history. 



History 



Chart No. 1. — Sources of Ideals. 

 Literature Acquaintances 



But this relation changes with great rapidity, the two former ele- 

 ments steadily growing less important, until, at the age of sixteen, 

 eighty per cent of the children's ideals are historical characters, 

 twelve per cent characters from literature, and only eight per cent 

 are acquaintances. 



All this indicates strongly the expansion of the child's personal- 

 ity. The world of a young child, centering at first, so psychologists 

 tell us, about his mouth, does not grow much larger than the circle 

 of his own immediate desires and needs before the age of seven. 

 Those characters, either real or imaginary, to whom he feels his per- 

 sonal relation therefore furnish his ideals. But he soon begins to 

 feel his integration with the outside world. He reaches out beyond 

 his own little circle, endeavoring to form some bond with the larger 

 world. He is growing into the social consciousness, which makes 

 him akin to all those who have felt and hoped and acted as he feels 

 and hopes and desires to act. The characters of literature become 

 secondary to the authors who created them. The great men of all 



