How adolescents perceive their relationships

In order to determine how adolescents perceive their relationships, a set of eight drawings representing one, two or three characters, whose sex and relationships where not clearly defined, were shown to 403 Parisian adolescents (227 girls and 176 boys) aged 15 to 19. The majority of data converge for all subjects, regardless of the sex, curriculum or socioeconomic factors. The subjects consistently identify more mixed-sex dyads and triads than same-sex in all pictures. This predominance does not imply that the adolescents perceived all relationships as having a romantic connotation. Some data seem consistent with the traditional sex role stereotypes. The subjects' responses do not seem to reflect the reality of their own peer relationships.