Sibling Correlates of Young Adults' Status Attainment: Ethnic Group Differences

I used longitudinal data to examine relationships between sibling variables and young adults' status attainment at different levels, based on earlier measures of adolescents' educational and occupational aspirations. My analyses involved 21-year-old Australians from Anglo-Australian, Greek, and Southern Italian families. Regression surfaces were plotted from models that included terms to test for possible linear, interaction, and curvilinear associations among the variables. My study showed that the number of children in a family and birth order continue to be significantly associated with young adults' status attainment, even after incorporating the mediating influences of adolescents' aspirations. The investigation also suggested ethnic group differences among sibling variables, adolescents' aspirations, and young adults' status attainment.     

ETHNICITY,ABILITY, ASPIRATIONS AND SOCIAL STATUS ATTAINMENT

In this study longitudinal data were used to examine relationships among children's intellectual ability, adolescents' aspirations and young adults' social-status attainment. The sample included 21-year-old Australians from Anglo-Australian, Greek and Southern Italian families. Regression surfaces were constructed from hierarchical models that examined possible linear, interaction and curvilinear associations among the variables. Typically, the findings indicated that in each ethnic group adolescents' aspirations had moderate to strong associations with status attainment. For Anglo-Australian and Greek young adults the relationships between ability and attainment were, in general, mediated by adolescents' aspirations. In contrast, for Southern Italians, ability continued to be associated with the educational and occupational attainment of the young adults.     

Family human and social capital and young adults' educational attainment and occupational aspirations

The study examined relations between family human and social capital and the educational attainment and occupational aspirations of 420 Australian 20-yr.-olds. After taking into account the relations between human capital and the outcome scores, the findings indicated that family social capital had significant associations with the young adults' attainment and aspirations.     

Perceptions of family environments, educational and occupational outcomes: social-status differences

Regression surface analysis was used to examine relations between various family environment measures and young adults' educational and occupational outcomes. Data were collected from 330 Australians as part of a 10-year longitudinal study. The regression models included terms to account for possible linear, interaction, and curvilinear relationships. In general, the analysis suggests the proposition that parents' aspirations and adolescents' perceptions of parents' support for learning have differential linear and curvilinear associations with the educational and occupational outcomes of young adults from different social-status groups.     

Longitudinal Analysis of Select Influences on Adolescents' Occupational Aspirations

The National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 was used to investigate the longitudinal influence of select demographic and latent variables on the development of adolescents' occupational aspirations at three critical points in the career development process—early, mid-, and late adolescence. Linear structural equation (LISREL) analysis examined the contributions of family status, academic achievement, and social psychological variables. Occupational aspirations of adolescents were relatively stable across the 4-year time period. Further, earlier aspirations offered significant predictive power for subsequent ones. Structural coefficients for social demographic variables indicated that socioeconomic status (SES) had significant effects on adolescents' aspirations. In contrast, two latent variables, academic achievement and self-evaluation, initially represented only modest effects on aspirations which then decreased consistently over time.     

Self-verification as a mediator of mothers' self-fulfilling effects on adolescents' educational attainment

This research examined whether self-verification acts as a general mediational process of self-fulfilling prophecies. The authors tested this hypothesis by examining whether self-verification processes mediated self-fulfilling prophecy effects within a different context and with a different belief and a different outcome than has been used in prior research. Results of longitudinal data obtained from mothers and their adolescents (N=332) indicated that mothers' beliefs about their adolescents' educational outcomes had a significant indirect effect on adolescents' academic attainment through adolescents' educational aspirations. This effect, observed over a 6-year span, provided evidence that mothers' self-fulfilling effects occurred, in part, because mothers' false beliefs influenced their adolescents' own educational aspirations, which adolescents then self-verified through their educational attainment. The theoretical and applied implications of these findings are discussed.     

Career success: The role of teenage career aspirations,ambition value and gender in predicting adult social status and earnings

Links between family social background, teenage career aspirations, educational performance and adult social status attainment are well documented. Using a contextual developmental framework, this article extends previous research by examining the role of gender and teenage ambition value in shaping social status attainment and earnings in adulthood. Drawing on data from an 18-year British follow up study we tested a path model linking family background factors (such as family social status and parental aspirations) and individual agency factors in adolescence (in particular, career aspirations and ambition value) to social status attainment and earnings in adulthood. The findings suggest that ambition value is linked to adult earnings. That is, young people for whom it is important to get on in their job earn more money in adulthood than their less ambitious peers. The findings also confirm that teenage career aspirations are linked to adult social status attainment, and suggest that family background factors, teenage career aspirations and ambition value interact to influence social status attainment and earnings in adulthood. Gender differences are discussed.     

Career success: The role of teenage career aspirations,ambition value and gender in predicting adult social status and earnings

Links between family social background, teenage career aspirations, educational performance and adult social status attainment are well documented. Using a contextual developmental framework, this article extends previous research by examining the role of gender and teenage ambition value in shaping social status attainment and earnings in adulthood. Drawing on data from an 18-year British follow up study we tested a path model linking family background factors (such as family social status and parental aspirations) and individual agency factors in adolescence (in particular, career aspirations and ambition value) to social status attainment and earnings in adulthood. The findings suggest that ambition value is linked to adult earnings. That is, young people for whom it is important to get on in their job earn more money in adulthood than their less ambitious peers. The findings also confirm that teenage career aspirations are linked to adult social status attainment, and suggest that family background factors, teenage career aspirations and ambition value interact to influence social status attainment and earnings in adulthood. Gender differences are discussed.     

Correlations among family environment, academic achievement, and academic attainment in a large sample of young Australian adults

In a set of interrelated Australian and Spanish investigations in 2001-2004, relationships were examined among intellectual ability, family environment, and academic achievement. This follow-up study used longitudinal data from young Australian adults (4,397 men, 4,703 women; M age = 20.2 yr., SD = 0.4), to investigate relationships among earlier academic achievement, family influences, and academic attainment. From multiple regression and commonality analyses the findings indicated that earlier achievement and family influences were important as separate variables in explaining differences in later academic attainment (18.6% and 14.8%, respectively, for men; 14.5% and 11.5%, respectively, for women). In addition, earlier achievement and family influences reinforced each other to account for additional shared variance (9.1% for men, 6.3% for women) in young Australian adults' academic attainment.     

Peer network drinking predicts increased alcohol use from adolescence to early adulthood after controlling for genetic and shared environmental selection

Research consistently links adolescents' and young adults' drinking with their peers' alcohol intake. In interpreting this correlation, 2 essential questions are often overlooked. First, which peers are more important, best friends or broader social networks? Second, do peers cause increased drinking, or do young people select friends whose drinking habits match their own? The present study combines social network analyses with family (twin and sibling) designs to answer these questions via data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. Analysis of peer nomination data from 134 schools (n = 82,629) and 1,846 twin and sibling pairs shows that peer network substance use predicts changes in drinking from adolescence into young adult life even after controlling for genetic and shared environmental selection, as well as best friend substance use. This effect was particularly strong for high-intensity friendships. Although the peer-adolescent drinking correlation is partially explained by selection, the present finding offers powerful evidence that peers also cause increased drinking. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).     

Suicide acceptability is related to suicide planning in U.S. adolescents and young adults

The association between adolescents' and young adults' attitudes toward suicide and their own suicidality across five racial-ethnic classifications was studied in a nationally representative sample of 3,301 youth ages 14 to 22 years from the National Annenberg Risk Survey of Youth. Results indicate that adolescents and young adults who most strongly believe that it is acceptable to end one's life are more than fourteen times more likely to make a plan to kill themselves as those who do not have such beliefs (p < .001). Future behavioral prevention and intervention research should take into consideration adolescents' and young adults' approval of suicide as a risk factor for taking their own lives.     

Gender differences in motivational pathways to college for middle class African American youths

Using a sample of predominantly middle-class African American adolescents and parents (N = 424), the authors tested a path model linking parental expectations for children's future educational attainment, youths' motivation during Grade 11, and youths' subsequent on-time postsecondary educational progress. Parents' expectations were positively related to adolescents' educational attainment aspirations, attainment expectations, utility values (i.e., beliefs about the usefulness of education), and perceptions of racial barriers to upward mobility. Relationships between parents' expectations and youths' aspirations and expectations were mediated by youths' perceptions of parents' expectations. For boys, but not girls, Grade 11 educational expectations and utility values each uniquely predicted college attendance 1 year after high school graduation. In addition, boys' perceptions of racial barriers were negatively related to subsequent postsecondary progress through their influence on values. Findings underscore the importance of academic achievement motivation as a developmental resource for African American boys and suggest that boys are especially likely to benefit from interventions promoting positive motivational beliefs.     

Environmental and individual predictors of Australian young adults' interest in new ideas

Relations were examined among family social status, learning environments, individual characteristics, and young adults' interest in new ideas. Data were collected from 19-yr.-old Australians (4,609 females and 4,174 males), as part of a longitudinal investigation. Multiple regression analysis indicated that the predictors combined to have a small association with young adults' interest in new ideas.     

Family Background,Social and Academic Capital,and Adolescents' Aspirations: A Mediational Analysis

In this study a mediational model was constructed to examine relationships between refined measures of childhood and adolescent social capital and the aspirations of adolescents with varying academic capital and from differing social status and ethnic backgrounds. Longitudinal data were collected from 460 16-year-old Australians and their parents from Anglo-Australian, Greek, and Southern Italian groups. Using partial least squares path modeling the findings suggest: (a) family background, childhood social and academic capital, and adolescents' social capital combine to have medium to large associations with adolescents' aspirations, and that the associations are larger for educational aspirations than for occupational aspirations and stronger for males than for females; (b) the mediational model is more successful in explaining family background differences in educational aspirations than variations in occupational aspirations; and (c) after taking into account social and academic capital, Greek males continue to have higher occupational aspirations than do Anglo-Australian and Southern Italian males, and sons of fathers with high social status continue to have higher occupational aspirations than do other male adolescents. The investigation indicates that within encompassing family backgrounds, differences in educational outcomes should be examined in relation to children's and parents' perceptions of social and cultural capital and to variations in children's academic capital.     

Family contexts, individualism-collectivism, and adolescents' aspirations for their futures

Relations were examined among family contexts, parents' individualistic-collectivistic value orientations, and adolescents' aspirations. Data were collected from 456 Australian families using two surveys when the subjects were 11 and 16 years old, respectively. Findings indicated that family ethnicity had large associations with parents' individualistic-collectivistic value orientations, but that these orientations were not associated with adolescents' aspirations, after taking into account differences in family contexts.     

Educational and career aspirations of secondary school students in Grenada following the American intervention

This paper reports a study of educational and occupational aspirations of secondary school students in Grenada following the 1983 American intervention. Questionnaire data were obtained from 729 students attending 7 of the island's 18 secondary schools. A status attainment model containing parental and family characteristics was tested. It was discovered that Grenadian students have exceptionally and unrealistically high aspirations. Although the opportunity structure in Grenada is very limited compared to that in the United States, the island's students have higher levels of aspirations. The status attainment model was not very useful in explaining either educational or occupational aspirations, as the levels of explained variance were less than 5%. The implications of high aspirations and low opportunities for the future of Grenada are discussed.     

Adolescent family experiences and educational attainment during early adulthood

In this study, the authors investigated the degree to which a family investment model would help account for the association between family of origin socioeconomic characteristics and the later educational attainment of 451 young adults (age 26) from 2-parent families. Parents' educational level, occupational prestige, and family income in 1989 each had a statistically significant direct relationship with youths' educational attainment in 2002. Consistent with the theoretical model guiding the study, parents' educational level and family income also demonstrated statistically significant indirect effects on later educational attainment through their associations with growth trajectories for supportive parenting, sibling relations, and adolescent academic engagement. Supportive parenting and sibling relations were linked to later educational attainment through their association with adolescent academic engagement. Academic engagement during adolescence was associated with educational attainment in young adulthood. These basic processes operated similarly regardless of youths' gender, target youths' age relative to a near-age sibling, gender composition of the sibling dyad, or gender of parent.     

Status and familial orientations of rural Mexican-American youth: Integration and conflict within aspirational frames of reference

Studies regarding status aspirations among Mexican-American youth have presumed that life goals are integrated and congruent. In the present paper, after reviewing cultural and structural explanations of low Mexican-American attainment, an alternative line of inquiry is suggested which questions these assumptions and specifies types of conflicts that may arise among occupational, educational, and familial orientations. Using data from a survey of South Texas high school students, the prevalence of such conflicts are observed by sex, and implications for future attainment patterns are discussed.     

Sibling dilution hypothesis: a regression surface analysis.

This study examined relationships between sibship size (the number of children in a family), birth order, and measures of academic performance, academic self-concept, and educational aspirations at different levels of family educational resources. As part of a national longitudinal study of Australian secondary school students data were collected from 2,530 boys and 2,450 girls in Years 9 and 10. Regression surfaces were constructed from models that included terms to account for linear, interaction, and curvilinear associations among the variables. Analysis suggests the general propositions (a) family educational resources have significant associations with children's school-related outcomes at different levels of sibling variables, the relationships for girls being curvilinear, and (b) sibling variables continue to have small significant associations with affective and cognitive outcomes, after taking into account variations in family educational resources. That is, the investigation provides only partial support for the sibling dilution hypothesis.     

The stability of status orientations among young,white, rural women from three southern states

This paper reports the results of a panel study of young, white, rural women from Georgia, South Carolina, and Texas (N = 138). The study was primarily concerned with how social origin variables affected early educational and occupational orientations and how early states of these orientations affected the orientations themselves at a later point in time. The results indicated that mother's education had a greater effect than father's education, but in either case the effect is mediated by intervening influences such as early aspirations and expectations. These young women held very traditional status orientations (with 60% projecting the occupations of beautician, nurse, stenographer, or school teacher), and their orientations were quite stable between their sophomore and senior years in high school. Since there has been so little work reported on the status attainment process for women, and rural women in particular, this study does offer a limited insight into this phenomenon.