Self-determination or Adaptation?

Abstract

As a result of general social changes, the population of Eastern Europe is compelled to enter a new reality, going through social shock and modification of behavior models. Different groups react to the change of social situation in different ways, and the reaction of population becomes, in its turn, a factor of social changes. Transformational behavior can be observed, in particular, in the analysis of orientations and social behavior of young people in the educational sphere.
The author of the article gives the empirical data, collected during a 35 year study of social problems of the youth and education. Thus, there is an opportunity to analyze some processes in their dynamics and to reveal changes, which occurred in the last decades. The article touches upon the following problems: the youth's decision- making about getting this or that level of general education; awareness of inequality in choosing a strategy of behavior in the educational sphere; «ecological niches» in the sphere of education for different social groups; strategies of decision-making about entering the university; compromise between studying and «not studying» for students;
stability of life tendencies of the youth from different social groups. The author shows the differences in the reactions to the social situation in the groups possessing significant social resources and the groups having «poorer» set of resources.
The difference here is expressed in the following: to which extent social behavior is determined by environment and to which extent it is identified by the members of the group themselves. We observed the prevalence of adaptation in some groups: they are compelled to or prefer to submit to circumstances, to accept them. Other groups have a different reaction to challenges of environment: they «control» circumstances to a greater extent, they actively resist them or, moreover, use them in their own interests, i.e. we can observe here clear prevalence of the self-determination.
In each analyzed example of social behavior in the conditions of changing situation we can discover both features of adaptive behavior and the behavior, which can be called self-determination. It is fair for all the cases, regardless of the type of social groups, from families of directors to families of peasants, it applies to pupils, as a whole, senior pupils, in particular, school leavers, their parents or students. However, the higher the position of the group in social hierarchy — the more features of self- determination we observe, and the lower this position — the more features of adaptive behavior are observed. It can be clearly seen in the social composition of pupils in schools, personal plans of senior pupils concerning their future, potential of different groups in the educational sphere, life tendencies of people coming from different strata of society. The groups, which possess substantial social resources (for example, people from the families of directors, the youth from big cities) overcome objective difficulties, including those difficulties, which are not connected with the changes of social situation, and also use circumstances effectively for the achievement of more prestigious positions, in particular, in the educational sphere. At the same time, the groups possessing a «poorer» set of resources (rural youth, people from the families, which are not in privileged position and so on) are pushed aside to spheres with less potential for building up career. That is the result of the competition between «strong» and «weak» groups. One can assume that it is peculiar not only to the educational sphere, especially in the situation of changes.
Thus, the correlation between adaptation and self-determination is expressed in the difference of chances for various social groups to get knowledge and qualification, with unequal access to educational institutions, i.e. in the contradiction between the declared equality of rights to education and the existing social differentiation in the educational sphere. The importance and relevance of this problem (it can be regarded as a problem of societal character) may be shown in several interconnected aspects. It has to do with the problems of democracy and inequality, it is very significant for the use of intellectual potential of the society (and this is the crucial moment from the point of view of the modern tendencies of world development), it has a direct relation to the stability of society under reform. This problem is especially important for contemporary Russia both in terms of research and in practical terms.