The ideal man and woman according to university students.(Report)

The present study determined if the ideal man has changed over the years and who and what the ideal woman is. We asked students at Cameron University to rate the importance of character traits that define the ideal man and woman. Subjects also provided examples of famous people exemplifying the ideal, good, average, and inferior man and woman. We found that men and woman consider Jesus Christ and Martin Luther King Jr. ideal men based on characteristics such as love, caring, and leadership abilities. The most frequently cited ideal women were Mother Theresa and Oprah Winfrey. The most frequently cited inferior men were Adolf Hitler and Bill Clinton. The most frequently cited inferior women were Martha Stewart and Pamela Anderson. These results suggest that the individuals exemplifying the ideal and inferior man have not changed significantly in the past two decades.

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Keen and Zur (1989), using a free response survey, determined that both men and women frequently listed Jesus Christ, Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. as ideal men due to characteristics of caring and leadership. The most frequently cited inferior man for both genders was Adolf Hitler due primarily to violent tendencies and immoral behavior. The present study decided to determine if the ideal man has changed and who the ideal woman is. We were also interested in determining the characteristics of ideal and inferior woman chosen. We asked subjects at Cameron University to rate the importance of character traits that define the ideal man and woman they chose.

Method

Participants and Procedure