The ideas of the theory social representations proposed by Moscovici and developed in the structural approach by Abric were used in the research in order to reveal the structure and content of students’ social representations of higher education in a modern society. The total sample size was 572 students: of which 197 were secondary school students (average age of 16.7), 189 were undergraduate students (average age of 20.8) and 186 were master students (average age of 29.3). The methodology of Vergès for the analysis of the structure of social representations was used. We tested the hypothesis that the structure of social representations of higher education has general and specific features correlated to the age and educational level of students. It was found that the social representations of schoolchildren, undergraduate students and master’s students differ in a number of elements and content characteristics. Generally social representations of students with different education levels had similar characteristics. Students of secondary schools expanded the core performance, in contrast to students of universities, presumably because of their fewer social experiences, providing large “distance” to higher education as an “object”.

Objective of the study was to identify the structure and content of the social representations of higher education of students from families with different socio-economic status. Background. The higher education is the most important area of human life. It’s connected not only with the wellbeing and social success, but also with the social inequality. The family’s socio-economic status is one of the factors of such inequality in access to the higher education. The social representations of higher education’ specificity studying is a resource for understanding the differences in the assessment of its value, goals and results by students from families with different socio-economic status. Study design. The research is based on the structural approach of the theory of social representations. Three steps were carried out: (a) the students families’ socio-economic status was determined; (b) the structure of social representations of higher education of students from families of each status category was revealed; (c) students evaluated the significance and valence of the structure of social representations’ elements. Participants. The total sample size was 332 students (average age of 21.7): of which 112 were secondary school students (average age of 16.6), 105 were undergraduate students (average age of 20) and 115 were master students (average age of 28.3). Measurements. The methodology of P. Vergès for the analysis the social representations was used. Respondents were asked to evaluate associations in accordance with their perceived significance and emotional attitude (valence). The questionnaire was used to determine the respondents’ socio-economic status. Results. The structure of social representations of higher education of students from families with different socio-economic status was identified and described. The differences in the content of social representations of higher education were found. Conclusions. The cores of social representations of higher education differ according to the number of elements and in their content characteristics for students from families with different socio-economic status. It’s revealed differences in the significance and emotional rating of representations’ core elements

The current article represents the results of the study of the students’ social representations of higher education analyzing their (social representations) structure and content. The total sample size is 358 Moscow secondary school and undergraduate students (average age ~ 18.3). The aim of the research is to identify the structure and content of the students’ social representations of higher education, taking into account their intragroup position in the study group. We used the method of free associations (by P. Verges) to reveal the structure of social representations and a complex of socio-psychological methods (methodological procedure for definition of informal intragroup power structure in the contact community, sociometry, referentometry) to determine the students’ integral intragroup status. The obtained associations were subjected to prototypic (rank-frequency) analysis. The results of the research show that the cores of the social representations of higher education of the students of different intragroup status categories differ according to the number of elements and their content characteristics. It was revealed that the social representations of the undergraduate students of different status categories seemed to be more consistent in comparison to secondary school students due to the smaller “distance” to higher education as an “object”. We also revealed the differences in the significance and emotional rating of representations core elements depending on the student status categories.