Rural youth continuing to high school education and gender: Adana province

This study has been conducted in order to introduce the ideas of the rural youth at high school, about gender roles. The high school students? groups in the plains, mountains and threshold villages in the province of Adana have been included in the study.According to the results of the study, it was concluded that the families in the rural districts have more kids less means to provide a good education for their children. Women composed the majority of the illiterate members in the families. The most important reason why the siblings fail to continue with their education is economic deficiencies. The following conclusions have been reached: Male students are more active in out-of-house activities and female students are more often involved in indoor activities; among the spare time activities studying and reading are the foremost occupations; the types of books, news and magazines vary between the two groups. It was found that their hopes like ?being independent and self-confident? and ?being able to make their own decisions? in respect of which parents expect the most obedience, are quite low. Another conclusion was that the father model in the students? minds was unemotional; that the parents doesn?t have to give much importance to their physical appearance and that male students can do any social activity without the permission of parents, but female students have to take permission every time. It was also found that female students meet pressure in the matter of relationships with the opposite sex; the father is influential in the economic decisions and the mother is influential in social decisions; and that women are still at a disadvantage with respect to private and public spheres thought to appeal to both sexes. It was concluded hereby that in the rural high-school youth, working mothers cannot raise children better than those not working and the belief that young girls should work at positions more suitable for women. Another result was that most of the students adjusted already to the basic social sex roles imputed by the community to men and women; there were huge differences among the student opinions as regards the plains, mountains and the threshold region.