A Study on Altruism and Interest in Literature at Higher Secondary Level

The present study is an attempt to look for the relationship between altruism and interest in literature of Higher Secondary students. Sample consists of 800 students (age 17+) from rural and urban H.S schools of Birbhum district, West Bengal. The Scale of Altruism as well as the Interest in Literature Scale, the first adopted by the investigators and the second developed by the investigators, were used to assess the Altruism and Interest in Literature of the students respectively. The result divulged the fact that the girl students are more altruistic and have more interest in literature than those of the boy students. The study also reveals that there exists significant relationship between altruism and interest in literature. It is strengthened by another finding that the group with low level of altruism shows lower interest in literature than the group with high level of altruism. The constructed regression equation reveals that interest in literature can be used as the predictor of altruism.