The primary research questions dealt with whether parents consider different personality characteristics of importance for boys and girls. Data were collected by conducting a telephone survey of a random sample of parents in the city of Denton with children under the age of eighteen living in the household. Respondents were asked whether they considered the personality characteristics of responsibility, strict obedience, being respectful of the opinions of others, showing good manners, being independent, and having loyalty to a religion not important, somewhat important, or very important for boys and girls. Of the respondents fifty-nine were fathers and one hundred and twenty-one were mothers. The analysis of the data revealed that mothers and fathers have similar attitudes concerning the importance of these personality characteristics.

The purpose and scope of this paper is to discuss the emergence of the individual in the eleventh and twelfth centuries in light of the societal changes occurring at the time, and to establish the fact that this beginning of individualism can be seen particularly in the arts of the time. The evidence presented gives rise to the supposition that the society of the eleventh and twelfth centuries can be defined as humanistic, given that humanism implies a concern with and a concentration upon life on earth as opposed to life in heaven.