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Parent–Child Discrepancies in Educational Expectations: Differential Effects of Actual Versus Perceived Discrepancies
Author(s) -
Wang Yijie,
Benner Aprile D.
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
child development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.103
H-Index - 257
eISSN - 1467-8624
pISSN - 0009-3920
DOI - 10.1111/cdev.12171
Subject(s) - psychology , developmental psychology , perception , longitudinal study , educational attainment , social psychology , statistics , mathematics , neuroscience , economics , economic growth
This study explored how discrepancies between parents' and adolescents' educational expectations influenced adolescents' achievement using a nationally representative, longitudinal sample of 14,041 students (14 years old at baseline). Actual discrepancies (i.e., those between parents' and adolescents' actual educational expectations) and perceived discrepancies (i.e., those between adolescents' perceptions of their parents' educational expectations and adolescents' own) were examined. Achievement was higher when parents actually held higher expectations than adolescents held or when adolescents perceived that their parents' expectations were lower than their own. In contrast, achievement was lower when parents actually held lower expectations than adolescents held or when adolescents believed that their parents' expectations exceeded their own. Implications for identifying adolescents at risk and promoting adaptive parent–child educational expectations are discussed.