Sukces w świadomości młodzieży studiującej
The Notion of Success in University Students’ Awareness

Summary/Abstract: The problem area of this contribution includes the notion of success and its linguistic expressions. As an inseparable element of modern culture, success is, thus, taken to be an individually-perceived social construct, that is, it is contextualised as an individual’s system of values in his/her relationship with society. In this article, success is presented as illustrated by the conceptualisations and expressions of students of the Humanities at the Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin. The questionnaire aimed to elicit information on (subjective and objective) factors conditioning the achievement of success, as well as some of its corresponding signs and characteristics, and involved examining the expressions that happen to be associated with the term success. Finally, the subjects were asked to construe their own working definitions of success. As it turns out, success-related associations correspond to the expected model of prosperity and well-being in all of their dimensions, including materialistic and prestige-related via emotional/identificatory (happy family life, satisfaction at work, agreeable social contacts) to self-fulfilling. Success is, then, conceptualised as activity, achievement, fulfilment, effect, emotion and conviction. The students take success to be, firstly, the result of hard work and the attainment of the targets that one has set oneself. What is interesting is the fact that none of the students’ definitions defines success in terms of a lucky coincidence of events, although this interpretation was identified in their associations.

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