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Viewing Adolescents' Career Futures Through the Lenses of Socioeconomic Status and Social Class
Author(s) -
Eshelman Alec J.,
Rottinghaus Patrick J.
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
the career development quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.846
H-Index - 53
eISSN - 2161-0045
pISSN - 0889-4019
DOI - 10.1002/cdq.12031
Subject(s) - socioeconomic status , social class , psychology , social status , scale (ratio) , occupational prestige , class (philosophy) , developmental psychology , social psychology , futures contract , sociology , demography , social science , geography , political science , population , cartography , artificial intelligence , computer science , financial economics , law , economics
This study examined socioeconomic status (SES) and perceived social class as predictors of educational and occupational aspirations and expectations in a sample of 100 high school students from 2 midwestern high schools. SES was measured using caregivers' occupation and education, and subjective social status was assessed using the MacArthur Scale of Subjective Social Status–Youth Version (Goodman et al., [Goodman, E., 2001] SES and perceived social class made independent contributions to educational aspirations, whereas SES made an independent contribution to occupational aspirations and expectations. The authors discuss the importance of SES and social class in career development theory and research and provide practical implications based on the present findings. Overall, this study highlights the importance of measuring SES and social class as distinct constructs and the need for future work to identify the unique impacts of these variables.