Correspondence between subjective characteristics and objective criteria of personal maturity of university students

The category of «personal maturity» is increasingly in the focus of scientific research including the ones implemented using experimental psychosemantic methods. The purpose of this work is to study the correspondence between of subjective characteristics and objective criteria of personal maturity of students. The main hypothesis of the study is based on the assumption that subjective ideas of students about the level of their own personal maturity do not coincide with its actual, objectively manifested level. While studying subjective ideas of students about the level of their own personal maturity, a specialized semantic differential technique was developed. The creation of research tools of this type is carried out in several stages, including identifying of evaluation objects, identifying of evaluation scales, testing of a specialized semantic differential. Empirical data obtained through application of a specialized semantic differential was processed by means of exploratory factor analysis. As a result, two factors «Subjective Position» and «Positive Attitude» were identified. Subjective characteristics of personal maturity are reflected through the position of the object «My present Self» in the semantic space of these factors. Ideas about personal maturity in students who perceive themselves as personally mature and immature are generally identical as evidenced by a similar pattern of the location of most evaluated objects, however, the position of the object «My present Self» is different which allows us to distinguish two contrasting groups of respondents. According to the psychodiagnostic evaluation, students who perceive themselves as personally immature demonstrate a higher level of personal maturity: they are more responsible, independent, autonomous, etc. The presented algorithm for developing a specialized semantic differential technique can be useful for researchers studying unconscious, latent, poorly instrumented psychological phenomena.