[The facets of "touching", "staying" and "dating": social representations of relationships among adolescents].

This study aimed at describing and analyzing the different forms of interpersonal relationships among adolescents. Social representations approach was adopted as the theoretical-methodological reference. Subjects were 130 adolescent and data collection was accomplished with focal groups, in 19 encounters, from March to June 2004. A analysis was accomplished with software Alceste. Results revealed the distribution of the contents in six categories and the different forms of relationships were identified in class 1, by recognizing three types: "touching", "staying" and "dating". It is concluded that adolescents experiment a tension between the attractions exercised by freedom (touching/staying) and by affectivity (dating). It was also highlighted the social fluidity both adolescence, so that those, modifying the intensity/modality of relationships along short periods of time.