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A review of studies which investigated drawings of the ideal man and the occupational aspirations of boys (ages 11-18 years) from several countries indicated that becoming a professional athlete was a popular but unrealistic aspiration for many adolescent boys. Boys who were athletes and nonathletes from diverse ethnic groups and nationalities dreamed of becoming professional athletes. In two additional studies in the United States of America, adolescents were asked why they thought boys most often selected professional athlete as a possible future occupation. Adolescents perceived professional athletes as rich, famous, and glorified. Enhancement of status and financial gain were ranked as more important than the desire to play sports.

Six hundred young adolescents (11 to 16 years old) from 4 countries (Guatemala, Iceland, Mexico, and the United States) ranked the importance of 10 qualities of the opposite-sex ideal person. Those from the United States responded in an individualistic fashion; they ranked being fun, being sexy, and having considerable money as important for the ideal. Those from Guatemala responded in a collectivistic fashion; they ranked liking children as important, but being fun and good looking as unimportant. Adolescents from Mexico and Iceland reported patterns of values not clearly associated with either collectivism or individualism.

Adolescent girls (N = 118) from diverse social backgrounds in Sri Lanka described their views of womanhood. Qualities of the ideal woman considered most important were kindness and honesty, liking children, intelligence, and having a good job. Although the traditional role of the Sri Lankan woman is that of homemaker, most girls in the study (55%) drew the ideal woman working outside the home, often as a teacher or a doctor. Nevertheless, adolescent girls emphasized traditional qualities of the woman at both work and home as self-sacrificing and serving others.