Social Representations of Aids among rural and urban youngsters on the state of Minas Gerais

Abstract

This article analyzes the representations of rural and urban youngsters on the subject of aids. It aims to verify if the intensification of the interaction between country and city that provides increasing access to both spaces results in a symbolic homogeneity on some aspects of the disease. The technological progress and the physical mobility advance promote this approach, which provides information to rural youngsters that put them in situations of consonance of attitudes and vulnerabilities in comparison with the urban youngsters. The research used data based on the sample of 131 students from the Curso Técnico em Agropecuária of the federal institute IF Sudeste de Minas Gerais – Campus Barbacena – amongst whom 40 residents in rural areas. The results reveal that the youngsters assume they are aware of aids, but their responses to the questionnaire betray a state of high vulnerability to the disease. The analysis is guided by the social representation theories and shows that stereotypes about diseases remain instilled in the symbolic countryside, collaborating to the convergence of opinions and conducts.