2019_01_11_ICS_villacis-nieto

Do virtues and the Education of character influence the construction of the future professional? This has been asked by Jorge Luis Villacís Nieto, student of the third promotion of the Master's Degree in research in Social Sciences (MICS) of the University of Navarra. The student will investigate during his work Final Year Master's Degree whether young people who acquire virtues have greater resources to build their vocational identity and, thus, achieve success in their future profession.

"Growth in these character strengths could be associated with a group of psychological resources that facilitate the construction of vocational identity," she says. Before starting her programs of study of Master's Degree, Villacís studied psychology at the University of Guayaquil and worked as advisor in high schools in Ecuador, where she witnessed firsthand the difficulties that adolescents finishing high school diploma had when choosing university programs. "For some of these students, securing a place in a higher programs of study center seemed impossible, not for lack of ability, but for lack of motivation," she laments.

Faced with phenomena such as the NINI generation (neither study, nor work), Villacís proposes a change in the educational system to "open a new possibility of choice for young people, one related to virtues and the future".

This research is framed in the work of End of Degree that student is doing at the University of Navarra thanks to a scholarship of the Social Trends Institute. At the MICS Villacís has acquired knowledge about social theory, quantitative analysis of data, design of research projects, as well as broadening his training in Education and Psychology. All this has helped him in the development of his research.

"The University of Navarra achieves a realistic and interdisciplinary approach in its research projects, with a holistic understanding of the human person and society," he says. He considers these essential elements to rise to reach a solid knowledge and creative solutions to contemporary problems.

• Read the full interview on the Social Trends Institute website.