This study systematically investigated age differences in personality characteristics of advantaged and disadvantaged high school and college females. Two hundred and thirty three subjects (Ss) were randomly selected from an urban environment: 83 disadvantaged and 112 advantaged high school girls, and 38 disadvantaged college women. The test norms for the study instrument, Cattell's 16 Personality Factor Questionnaires, were based on a group of 86 advantaged college women. The disadvantaged group was 50 percent black and Puerto Rican, while the advantaged group was 75 percent White. Both disadvantaged and advantaged high school girls showed a pattern of group-dependence, self-assurance, expediency, and relatively little frustration, with the disadvantaged girls indicating greater emotional instability, less intelligence, lower ego strength, and tough-mindedness. Disadvantaged and advantaged college women seemed more sociable, assertive, conscientious, venturesome, sensitive, guild-prone, self-sufficient, tense, and controlled. The advantaged women demonstrated an even greater tendency toward intelligence and enthusiasm. (Author/JM)