Life Goals of American College Freshmen
In samples of 6,289 male and 6,143 female college freshmen, 35 items pertaining to life goals were intercorrelated. With unity in the diagonal, a principal components analysis was earned out, extracting all factors with an eigenvalue greater than 1.00. Final solutions were derived through the varimax procedure, and the similarity of the two rotated matrices assessed. Seven factors common to the two sexes were titled: Prestige, Personal Happiness, Humanistic-Cultural, Religious, Scientific, Artistic, and Hedonistic. An Altruistic factor was obtained for females only, and an Athletic Success factor for males only. Implications for predicting vocational success and for counseling are considered.