Parental Encouragement, Occupation, Education and Family Size

Parental Encouragement, Occupation, Education and Family Size: Artifactual or Independent
Determinants of Adolescent Educational Expectations?

Author(s): Richard A. Rehberg and David L. Westby
Source: Social Forces, Vol. 45, No. 3 (Mar., 1967), pp. 362-374
Published by: Oxford University Press
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362
SOCIAL FORCES
to be highly correlated and significantly correlated, in general, with bigotry in the populations studied. Furthermore only selected
aspects of religiosity were found to be related
to bigotry, with the exception of the southern

urban population where a more general pattern
of significant positive correlation between religiosity and bigotry was discovered.
PARENTAL ENCOURAGEMENT, OCCUPATION,

EDUCATION AND FAMILY SIZE:ARTIFACTUAL OR
INDEPENDENT DETERMINANTS OF ADOLESCENT
EDUCATIONAL EXPECTATIONS?*
RICHARD A. REHBERG
DAVID L. WESTBY
State University of New York at Binghamton
The Pennsylvania State University
ABSTRACT
Studies of adolescent career orientations provide consistent support for the propositions
that educational expectations vary positively with the level of parental occupation and education, the frequency of parental educational encouragement, and negatively with family size.
Since each of these four variables is intercorrelatedit is possible that one or more of the zeroorder associations may be totally or partially artifactual in nature. The use of Rosenberg's
test factor standardizationtechnique to generate third-order partials on survey data collected
from 2,852 urban high school sophomore males indicates that this is not the case. From the
analysis a provisional causal model is constructed. The roles of parental encouragement and
of family size in the model receive particular attention.
INTRODUCTION
rom the more than 200 studies' of the

determinants of the educational career
orientations of high school age adolescents strong empirical support has emerged
for the following four generalizations:
The proportion of adolescents expressing an
expectation to enroll in a four-year college or
university varies:
F
1. Positively with the occupational level of the

father.2
Kuvlesky and George W. Ohlendorf, A Bibliography of Literature on Educational Orientations of

Youth (College Station, Texas: Department of
Agricultural Economics and Sociology, Departmental Information Report No. 65-6).
2 See, for example: C. Norman Alexander, Jr.,
and Ernest Q. Campbell,"Peer Influences on Adolescent Aspirations and Attainments,"American So* This is a revised version of a paper read at the ciological Review, 29 (August 1964), pp. 568-575;
annual meeting of the American Educational Re- GeraldD. Bell, "Processes in the Formation of Adosearch Association in February 1966. The collec- lescent Aspirations," Social Forces, 42 (December
tion of data for this analysis was made possible by 1963), pp. 179-186; Archie 0. Haller and William
an institutional grant from the office of the vice- Sewell, "Farm Residence and Levels of Educational
president for research of The Pennsylvania State and OccupationalAspiration,"American Jouirnalof
University. Data analysis was made possible by Sociology) 62 (January 1957), pp. 407-411; Robert
a research grant from the United States Office of E. Herriott, "Some Social Determinants of EduEducation, Department of Health, Education, and cational Aspiration," Harvard Educational Reziew
Welfare under the provisions of the Cooperative (1963); pp. 157-177; August B. Hollingshead,
Research Program, and a subsequent grant from Elmtownes Youth (New York: John Wiley &
the center for the Advanced Study of Educational Sons, 1949); Joseph A. Kahl, "Educational and
Administration, University of Oregon, Eugene, OccupationalAspirations of 'Common-Man'Boys,"
Harvard Educational Review (Summer 1953),
Oregon.
1For an extensive bibliography on the educa- pp. 186-208; S. M. Lipset and R. Bendix, Social
tional orientation of adolescents see William P. Mobility in Industrial Society (Berkeley: Univer-

ADOLESCENT EDUCATIONAL EXPECTATIONS

2. Positively with the educational level of the
parent.3
3. Positively with the intensity of parental educational pressure, stress, or encouragement.4
4. Negatively with size of family.5
The fact that these variables are all intercorrelated, however, poses a crucial problem
of interpretation. That problem is: are these
four predictor variables independently associated with educational expectations, or is one
or more of the zero-order associations an artifact of the common relation of educational expectations and any one of them to one or more
of the other three?
Consider, for example, the negative relationship between educational or occupational career orientations and family size reported by
Halsey and Gardner,6 Lipset and Bendix,7 and
sity of CaliforniaPress, 1960); Leonard Reissman,
"Levels of Aspiration and Social Class," American
Sociological Review, 18 (June 1953), pp. 233-242;
William Sewell et al., "Social Status and Educational and Occupational Aspiration,)' American
Sociological Review, 22 (February 1957), pp. 67-
73; William Sewell, "Communityof Residence and

College Plans," American Sociological
Review, 29
(February 1964), pp. 24-38; Richard Stephenson,

"Mobility Orientation and Stratification of 1,000
Ninth
Graders," American
Sociological
Review,
22 (April 1957), pp. 204-212; and others.

3 See, for example, Robert A. Ellis and W. Clayton Lane, "Structural Supports for Upward Mobility," American Sociological Review, 28 (October
1963), pp. 743-756; Irving Krauss, "Sources of

Educational Aspirations Among Working Class
Youth," American Sociological
Review,
29 (De-
cember 1964), pp. 867-879.

4 See, for example, David T. Bordua, "Educational Aspirations and Parental Stress on College,"
Social Forces, 39 (March 1960), pp. 262-269; Jo-
363
others. Assuming that occupation, parental

education, and parental encouragement each
make a positive and an independent contribution to educational expectations, might not the
inverse association of educational expectations
and family size be an artifact of the tendency
of those lower on the occupational ladder, those
less well educated (both of whom tend not to
frequently encourage their children to go to
college), to have larger families? Should such
be the case, then controls for occupation, parental education, and parental educational encouragement should significantly reduce or even
eliminate the inverse relationship between educational expectations and family size.
Or consider the almost universally reported
positive relationship between educational expectations and occupational level. Could it not
be that this variable makes much less of an
independent contribution to the dependent variable than is often assumed? That is, might
not much of the zero-order relationship be
attributed to the tendency of those with the
more prestigeful occupations to be better educated, to more frequently encourage their children to go to college, and to have smaller
families, than those with the less prestigeful
occupations? Some support for at least part
of this interpretation comes from Bordua's
multivariate study of college plans in which he
concludes on the basis of partial correlation
analysis that:
the social status differences [as measured by occupation] in college plans are considerably but not
entirely accounted for by the associated differences
in parental stress on college whereas the reverse is
not true.8
In the analyses which follow a series of thirdorder partials are used to evaluate the associaYork: Rinehart & Co., 1962); Richard L. Simp- tion of each of the four predictor variables
son, "Parental Influence,Anticipatory Socialization, with the dependent variable. If the original
and Social Mobility," Amnerican Sociological Rezero-order association completely disappears we
view, 27 (August 1962), pp. 517-522.
shall conclude that the bivariate relationship is
:5 See, for example, A. H. Halsey and L. Gardner, "Selectionfor Secondary Schools and Achieve- an artifact of the relationship of educational exment in Four Grammar Schools," British Journal pectations with one or more of the other predictor variables which is (are) in turn related
of Sociology (1953), pp. 60-75; Lipset and Bendix,
op. cit., F. M. Martin, "An Inquiry into Parents' to the particular independent variable under
Preferences in Secondary Education," in David V. analysis. If the association of the predictor
Glass (ed.), Social Mobility in Britain (London:
variable with the dependent variable is reduced
Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1954), pp. 160-174.
but not eliminated we shall conclude that the
seph A. Kahl, The American Class Structure (New
6 Halsey and Gardner, op. cit.

and Bendix, op. cit.
7 Lipset
8 Bordua, op. cit.

364
SOCIAL FORCES
predictor variable is independently associated

with educational expectations but that some of
its zero-order relation is accounted for by its
intercorrelation with one or more of the remaining three.
While deferring further theoretical considerations until the data have been presented, we
propose the following hypothesis, derivedl from
previous research:
1. The proportion of adolescents expressing
an intention to enroll in a four year college or
university varies:
A. Positively with the occupational level of
the father.
B. Positively with the educational level of
the parents.
C. Positively with the frequency of parental educational encouragement.
D. Negatively with the size of the family.
The hypothesis which we are testing in this
paper is that:
2. Each of these four associations persists
when all three of the other predictor variables
are statistically controlled.
Witlh respect to the interrelationships between the four predictor variables, the relevant
literature9 suggests that occupational level is
positively associated with parental educational
levels, family size is negatively associated with
both occupational and parental educational
levels, ancl that parental encouragement is
positively associated with occupational and parental educational levels and negatively associatedl with family size.
RESEARCH DESIGN
A precoded questionnaire was administered

in 1963 to the 6,000 students enrolled as sopho9 Regarding the: (1) occupation-education relationship, see, for example, Joseph A. Kahl, The
Amierican Class Structure (New York: Holt,
Rinehart, & Winston, 1962), p. 66; (2) parental
encouragement-parental
education and occupation
relationship, see Bordua, op. cit., esp. table 7, p. 268,
and Richard A. Rehberg, Adolescent Career Plans
and the Imizpact of Chronic Economic Distress
Upont Adolescent Educational and Occupational Expectation and Aspirations (University Park: The
Pennsylvania State University, 1965), Cooperative Research Project Number S-119, pp. 140-155;
anid (3) parental encouragement-family
size relationsliip, see ibid., p. 144.
mores in all public and parochial secondary

schools in six middle-sized (population 50,000
to 100,000) Pennsylvania cities. The following
analyses are based on the data from 94 percent
of all male students surveyed (N = 2852).10
To measure occupational level the Hollingshead seven-category occupational scale"l was
used, each respondent being scored according
to the occupation of his father. To ensure
statistically stable cell - entries these seven
categories have been dichotomized into WhiteCollar (categories 1-4) and Blue-Collar (categories 5-7) for all third-order partials. Parental educational level was measured with the
Hollingshead seven-category educational scale,12
each respondent being scored according to the
education of his father. This scale has been
trichotomized for all third-order partials into
13 or more years (categories 1-3), 12 years
(category 4), and 11 or less years (category
5-7) of education. Although the authors would
have preferred to use education of the mother
as well as education of the father as an indicator of parental educational level, the additional
number of classifications would have seriously
impaired the stability of the cell entries.
Parental educational encouragement was measured by asking the respondent to indicate how
often each parent urges him to continue his
education beyond high school. Four response
categories were provided: (1) Never, (2)
Sometimes, (3) Often, and (4) Constantly.13
10 The criterion for accepting a questionnaire for
analysis was that the respondent provide the occupation of the head of the household. This datum
was adequate for 2,852 or 94 percent of the 3,047
questionnaires administered to the male sample.
11 August B. Hollingshead, The Tzwo Factor Index of Social Position (New Haven: Yale University, 1957), mimeo.
12 Ibid.
13 The item read: Which ONE of the following
statements is most true about continuing your education beyond high school?
1.
My father never urges me to continue my
education.
2.
My father sonmetinmesurges me to continue my education.
3.
My father often urges me to continue my
education.
4.
My father constantly urges me to continue
my education.
A similar item was presented later in the questionnaire eliciting a response for the mother.

ADOLESCENT
TABLE 1. EDUCATIONAL
EDUCATIONAL
EXPECTATIONS,
EXPECTATIONS
BY OCCUPATION OF FATIHERa
365
(in percentages)
Educational Expectations (in years)

Occupation of Father
Higher Executives, Proprietors of Large Concerns, and
Major Professionals................................
Business Managers, Proprietors of Medium-Sized Businesses,
....................
and Lesser Professionals ........
Administrative Personnel, Small Independent Businesses,
and Minor Professionals
Clerical and Sales Workers, Technicians, and Owners of
Little Businesses...................................
Skilled Manual Employees .............................
Machine Operators and Semiskilled Employees ...........
Unskilled Employees ..................................
16+
14
12
11-
84
10
100
(109)
72
15
10
100
(165)
56
21
21
100
(401)
47
30
22
20
22
25
25
21
29
43
48
51
1
2
4
6
1
0
2
2
100
100
101
100
(558)
(835)
(530)
(254)
100
(2852)
N.R. Total
Sum
gamma= .5020b
Totals ..........
39
22
36
&Occupationof father is classified according to the occupational category system of HolliDgshead's Two Factor Index of BSocialPosition. See August B
Hollingshead The Two Factor Index of Social Pos ition (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1957), nimeo.
and Blue-Collar and with Gependent variable contaiDing levels 16+, 14,
variable d iLbotonizedinto White-Collar
bgammacomputedwithindependent
12 and 11-butwith the"No Responses"excluded.
Ordinal ratings of 1-4 were assigned for each

parent and summed for both parents thus resulting in a scale range of two (lowest frequency) to eight (highest frequency). A factor
of one was subtracted from the summated rating, yielding a scale range from one to seven.
For all third-order partials parental encouragement has been dichotomized into low frequency
(1-4) and high frequency (5-7).
Family size was measured by having the respondent indicate the number of his siblings.
For all third-order partials family size has been
dichotomized into small family (one-three children) and large family (four or more children).
"Realistic" educational expectations, as distinguished from "idealistic" educational aspirations, were measured with this item :14
CONSIDERING
your abilities, grades, financial
resources, etc., how far do you actually EXPECT
to go in school?
14 Educational aspirations, the idealistic dimension of an educational career orientation were

tapped with this item: "SUPPOSING you had the
necessary abilities, grades, money, etc., how far
would you really LIKE TO gO in school ?' The
same seven response alternatives were offered for
the aspiration item that were offered for the expectation item. The authors are most grateful to
Harold F. Goldsmith, currently with the Community Projects Section of NIMH for his suggestions
and advice on the conceptual and operational formation of the aspiration and expectation items. A
comparison of the proportion of the class of 1965
(males) who, as sophomores, stated that they actually expected to attend a four-year college (39%)
with the proportion of seniors from the class of
Table 1 presents the association between

educational expectations and father's occupational level. At the base of the percentage display is the value of gamma,15 a measure of the
degree of association appropriate for nonparametric data and which provides an estimate of
the proportional reduction in the error of esti-
10th or 11th grade

Graduate from high school
Trade, technical, or business school
Nursing school
Two years of college
Four years of college
Graduate or professional school.
Response categories "6 and 7" are scored as
16 or more years, "3, 4, 5" as 14 years, "2" as
12 years, and "1" as 11 or less years of education.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
ZERO ORDER ASSOCIATIONS: PREDICTOR AND

DEPENDENT VARIABLES
1964 (males) who, six months following graduation were actually attending college (35%o) indicated that the item was eliciting rather valid responses.
15 Leo A. Goodman and William H. Kruskal,
"Measures of Association for Cross Classifications,"
Journal of the American Statistical Association

(September 1954), pp. 732-764.

SOCIAL FORCES
366
TABLE 2. EDUCATIONALEXPECTATIONS,BY EDUCATION OF FATIIERa
(in percentages)
EducationalExpectations(in years)
Sum
11- N. R. Total
Educationof Father
16+
14
12
Graduateor ProfessionalTraining.......................
..............
StandardCollegeor UniversityGraduation
PartialCollegeTraining(includestechnicalschools,etc.)...
................................
High SchoolGraduates
PartialHigh School...................................
JuniorHigh School....................................
Less than SevenYearsof School........................
Not Reported........................................
79
65
61
43
26
27
24
21
9
18
22
23
24
23
23
21
2
1
8
1
1
15
1
0
15
0
1
33
1
46
3
2
47
1
1
4
47
7
47
3
gamma=.4270b
Totals..
39
22
36
99
100
99
100
100
100
99
99
( 95)
100
(2852)
(188)
(280)
(942)
(600)
(340)
(158)
(249)
sEducationof fatheris classifiedaccordingto the educationalcategorysystemof Hollingshead'sTwoFactorIndex(ibid.)

into (1) Partialcollegetrainingor more,(2) Highschoolgraduates,and (3) Partialhigh
computedwith independentvariabletrichomotized
bgamma
schoolorless. The category"Not Reported"was excluded. The dependentvariablecontainedlevels 16+, 14, 12, and 11-bit with "No Responses'
excluded.
TABLE
3.
EDUCATIONALEXPECTATIONS, BY PARENTAL EDUCATIONAL ENCOURAGEMENT
(in percentages)
Frequencyof ParentalEncouragement
16+
14
12
11- N. R. Total
Sum
HighestFrequency:
7.........................
64
21
13
101
(619)
6 ..............................
5 .44 .........................
50
28
21
100
(313)
LowestFrequency:
Not Reported
4.30 .........................
3.16 .........................
2.10 .........................
1.........................
.......................
13
28
25
29
17
16
7
21
29
38
62
68
73
42
1
3
3
5
4
6
1
0
1
1
3
3
100
100
99
100
100
100
(721)
(354)
(414)
(152)
(157)
(122)
gamma=.6064a
Totals...............................................
39
22
36
100
(2852)
(frequency
levels
into HighEncouragement
(frequencylevels7, 6, and 5) andLowEncouragement
with independentvariabledichotomized
agamma
4, 3, 2 and 1) and with dependentvariablecontaininglevels 16+, 14, 12 and 11- but with the"No Responses"excludea.
TABLE
4.
EDUCATIONALEXPECTATIONS,BY SIZE OF FAMILY
(in percentages)
Family Size
One.....................................47
Two............................................
Three...............................................
Four................................................
Five...........................................
Six...........................................
Seven...........................................
Eight ............................................
Nine or more.........................................
16+
14
12
47
40
36
29
30
23
23
21
22
25
23
20
11
26
30
35
36
43
46
55
2
1
2
2
3
2
8
22
16
57
26
58
-].1 N. R. Total
1
1
1
1
1
1
2
99
100
100
100
99
99
99
99
100
Sum
(324)
(779)
(668)
(442)
(287)
(178)
(96)
(54)
(31)
gamma= .2568a
Totals ..............................
39
22
36
100
(2852)
into (1) Smallfamilysize consistingof 1, 2, and3 children(2) Largefamilysize consisting

computedwithindependentvariabledichotomized
agamma
of 4 or morechildren. The dependentvariablecontainedall levels exceptthe "No Response"category.

ADOLESCENT
EDUCATIONAL
mation.16 From an inspection of the table, it

can be seen that the proportion of respondents
expressing a college expectation varies positively with occupational level ranging from 20
percent for sons of unskilled workers to 84
percent for sons of major executives and professionals. The degree of association, .50, is
fairly high for sociological survey data.
The association between educational expectations and father's education is shown in Table
2. The relationship is positive, ranging from
24 percent expressing a college expectation
when the father has less than seven years of
schooling to 79 percent when the father has a
graduate education. And, the gamma of .43
indicates a fairly strong relationship.
Table 3 displays the relationship between
educational expectations and parental educational encouragement. The data range positively from 13 percent expressing an expectation at the lowest encouragement level to 64
percent at the highest encouragement level. Of
some interest is the gamma value of .61 indicating that of the four predictor variables
parental encouragement has the highest zeroorder correlation with educational expectations.
The association between educational expectations and family size is illustrated in Table 4.
The pattern indicates a generally negative relationship, ranging from 26 percent expressing a
college expectation for respondents from families of nine or more children to 47 percent for
respondents who are "only" children. Interestingly, no percentage difference appears between "only" children and children with one
sibling. The ganna value of -.26 reveals that
of the four independent variables, family size
has the weakest zero-order association with
educational expectations.
The data thus confirm Hypotheses 1 A-D
which assert that parental education, occupation, and parental encouragement are positively
associated, and family size negatively associated,
with educational expectations.
INTERCORRELATIONS
PREDICTOR
AMONG
THE
VARIABLES
Table 5 displays in percentage form the relationship of each predictor variable with the
16 For a discussion of measures of association
yielding proportional reduction in error estimates,
see Herbert L. Costner, "Criteria for Measures of
EXPECTATIONS
TABLE
5.
PENDENT
MARGINAL
367
RELATIONSHIPS
OF FOUR INDE-
VARIABLES ASSOCIATED WITH

EXPECTATIONS
EDUCATIONAL
(in percentages)
(A) Occupationand Educationof Father

Eduicationof Father(in years)
Occupation
White-Collar........
Blue-Collar
..........
13+
12
11-
Total
Na
38
9
39
34
33
57
100
100
(1152)
(1448)
gamma= .6229
(B) Occupationand ParentalEducationalEncouragement

ParentalEducationalEncouragement
Occupation
White-Collar
........
Blue-Collar
..........
High
Low
71
52
29
48
Total
100
100
gamna= .3797
(1191)
(1539)
(C) Occupationand Size of Family

Size of Family
Occupation
White-Collar
........
Blue-Collar
..........
Small Medium Large

1,2,3
4,5,6
7+
67
58
Total
4
100
8
100
gamma=-.1883
29
34
(1233)
(1618)
(D) FamilySizeand ParentalEducationalEncouragement

Size of Family
Small(1,2,3)........
Medium(4,5,6)......
Large(7.8,9+)......
High
Low
Total
66
54
39
34
46
61
100
100
100
(1683)
( 873)
(174)
gamma= -.2854
(E) Educationof Fatherand ParentalEducationalEncouragement

Educationof Father
(in years)
13+ .............
12.............
11- .............
High
Low
Total
75
63
54
25
37
46
100
100
100
gamma= .2816
( 553)
( 917)
(1050)
(F) Educationof Fatherand FamilySize

Size of Family
Educationof Father
Small Medium Large
(in years)
13+ .............
12.............
11- .............
64
66
59
32
30
32
Total
4
100
4
100
9
100
gamma=-.0546
N
( 563)
( 942)
(1098)
fromcalculation
aTotalN's willvarydue to exclusionof nonresponses
of gamma.
other. These intercorrelations are summarized

in the gamnma matrix of Table 6. As would
be expected, the highest association is between
Association," American Sociological Review, 30
(June 1965), pp. 341-352.

SOCIAL FORCES
368
TABLE
6.
GAMMA
MATRIX
OF INTERCORRELATIONS
Education of Father ...............

Parental Encouragement ......
.....
Family Size .......................
Educational Expectation ...........
TABLE
AMONG THE FOUR PREDICTOR VARIABLES
Occupation
Education of
Father
Parental
Encouragement
Family
Size
0.623
0.380
{.185
0.502
0.282
-0.055
0.427
-0.285
0.606
-0.257
7. STANDARDIZED AND ZERO-ORDER PERCENTAGE DISTRIBUTIONS: EDUCATIONAL EXPECTATIONS,

BY OCCUPATION, EDUCATION OF FATHER, SIZE OF FAMILY, AND PARENTAL EDUCATIONAL
ENCOURAGEMENT (in percentages)
16+
Occupation
White-Collar
Blue-Collar
Educ. of Father
13+ Years
12 Years
11- Years
Family Size
Small
Large
Parental Encouragement
High
Low
Standardized
12
11- Total
14
(Ed. F., F.S., & PEE Stdzd.)a

29
2
49
20
100
2
30
26
41
99
gamma= .2795
(Occup., F.S., & PEE Stdzd.)
24
1
101
53
23
24
34
1
100
41
42
3
31
24
100
gamma= .2496
(Occup., Ed. F., & PEE Stdzd.)
2
42
22
99
33
35
39
23
3
100
gamma=-.1311
(Occup., Ed. F., & F.S. Stdzd.)
2
24
101
50
25
24
3
100
20
53
gamma= .4976
Zero-Order
12
11- Total
16+
14
57
26
22
1
20
24
46
3
gamma= .5020
100
99
(1223)
(1599)
66
43
26
14
1
19
1
33
23
3
24
47
gamma .4270
100
100
100
45
31
32
22
1
4
43
23
gamma=- .2568
100
101
(1749)
(1064)
53
19
22
24
1
4
20
57
gamma= .6064
100
100
(1639)
(1065)
555)
(937)
(1086)
aEd.F..=Educationof Father,F.S.=Family Size, PEE=ParentalEducationalEncouragement,

Occup.=Occupation.
occupation and education of the father, gamma

-.62
Of some surprise to the authors are the
rather low associations between family size and
occupation (-.19) and between family size and
Of importance,
education of the father (-.06).
however, are the moderately strong associations
between occupation and parental encouragement (.38), family size and parental encourand parental education and
agement (-.29),
parental encouragement (.28).
THIRD-ORDER ASSOCIATIONS
We now present a series of third-order partials for a test of Hypothesis 2; namely, that all
zero-order associations persist even though
three test factors are statistically controlled.
Inasmuch as many of the variables are measured ordinally and are distributed nonnormally, the statistical techniques used to calculate the various zero-and-n-order degrees of
association should be nonparametric in nature.
Consequently, Rosenberg's test factor stan-
dardization17 technique is used to generate the

required net n-order partial tables and the
Goodman-Kruskal gamma18 is used to calculate
the corresponding net n-order measures of association.
Table 7 displays the appropriate zero and
third-order associations, with each relationship
portrayed by both percentages and gamma
coefficients.
The first association in Table 7 is between
educational expectations and occupation. A
control for education of father, family size, and
parental encouragement reduces the strength of
association of educational expectations with
occupation from a zero-order gamma of .50 to
a third-order gamma of .28. The magnitude of
this third-order net coefficient is sufficiently
large, we would suggest, to warrant the conclu17 Morris Rosenberg, "Test Factor Standardization as a Method of Interpretation," Social
Forces, 41 (October 1962), pp. 53-61.
18 Goodman and Kruskal, op. cit.

ADOLESCENT
EDUCATIONAL
EXPECTATIONS
369
8. PERCENT OF RESPONDENTS REPORTING EDUCATIONAL EXPECTATIONS TO FOUR OR MORE

YEARS OF COLLEGE, OCCUPATIONAL EXPECTATIONS TO MINOR OR MAJOR PROFESSIONAL' OR
ADMINISTRATIVE
POSITIONS, BY F1REQUENCY OF PARENTAL ENCOURAGEMENT
AND
TABLE
HOLLINGSHEAD
SES
Intensity of Parental Encouragementb

Sociala
Status
I and II
III
IV
V
Averages
Type of
Expectation
High
Moderate
Low
Avge.
Educational
Occupational
Educational
Occupational
Educational
Occupational
Educational
Occupational
83
79
68
68
48
52
31
38
70
67
49
51
25
35
21
29
65
65
21
32
12
22
6
10
79
76
58
59
35
41
20
26
Educational
Occupational
54
56
31
38
13
21
40
44
aSocialStatushasbeenmeasuredin Tables8, 9, and 10 withthe Hollingsbead(1957)TwoFactorIndexof SocialPosition. Thisscorecombines,in

weightedfashion,the occupationand the educationof the father,in effectinvokinga controlfor paternaleducation,
bHighEncouragement=Father
and MotherConstantlyor Often Urge. ModerateEncouragement=Father
Constantlyor Often Urges,Mother
Sometimesor NeverUrges,or vice versa.
Low Encouragement=Father
and MotherSometimesor NeverUrge.
sion that occupation does exert an independent

effect on educational expectations.
Reference to the intercorrelations in Table 5
suggests that this difference can be attributed
primarily to the tendency of those fathers with
the more prestigeful occupations to be better
educated (gamma: occupation and education
=.62); secondarily to the tendency of higherstatus parents to more frequently encourage
their sons to pursue a post high school education (gamma: occupation and parental encouragement .38), and, finally, to the fact that the
better educated also more frequently encourage
their sons to go beyond high school than do
the less well educated (gamma: paternal education and parental encouragement = .28).
Relatively little of the difference between the
zero- and third-order coefficients would seem
due to family size inasmuch as this variable
correlates only weakly with occupation, i.e.,
gamma =-.19
The second association in Table 7 is that
between educational expectations and paternal
education. While this association is approximately halved by the three test factors (respective gammas of .43 and .25), we would suggest
that paternal education still retains its position
as an independent predictor of the dependent
variable. The intercorrelation gammas in Table
5 indicate that much of the difference between
the zero- and third-order associations results
from better educated fathers occupying higher
occupational positions (gamma: occupation and

paternal education = .62), while some of the
difference is probably due to the tendency of
the better educated parents to more frequently
encourage their children to go beyond high
school than the less well educated parents
(gamma: paternal education and parental encouragement = .28). Contributing also to this
difference is the positive association between
occupation and parental encouragement (gamnma = .38). The almost negligible association
between paternal education and family size,
-.06, suggests that almost none of the difference is a function of the negative association
of paternal education with family size.
The two more interesting partials are those
of family size and parental educational encouragement. While controls for occupation, education of father, and parental encouragement
reduce the zero-order association from -.26 to
-.13, we would suggest that the magnitude of
the third-order gamma is sufficient to establish
family size as a determinant of adolescent educational expectations. Reference to the intercorrelations in Table 5 reveals that this reduction in association can be traced first to the
pattern of parents in smaller famifies exerting
more encouragement (gamma: family size and
and secondly
parental encouragement = -.29)
to the negative relationship between family
size and occupation (gamma = -.19).
Finally, the minimum reduction in the asso-

SOCIAL FORCES
370
FIGURE
1.
ADOLESCENT EDUCATIONAL
ciation of educational expectations with parental encouragement from .61 to .50 suggests that
of the four predictor variables, parental educational encouragement makes the largest contribution to the explanation of the variance in
adolescent educational expectations.
In brief, Table 7 demonstrates that although
the four independent variables are intercorrelated, none of the zero-order associations can
be attributed entirely to the fact of their intercorrelation, thus confirming Hypothesis 2 that
each zero-order association persists when the
three other appropriate variables are statistically controlled.
EXPECTATIONS:
A PROVISIONAL
MODEL
DISCUSSION
This demonstration that each of the four

predictor variables remains independently correlated with the dependent variable at the
third-order level of association raises the question of their possible interrelations. Accordingly, in the remainder of this paper we shall
make some observations that attempt to treat
these factors in terms of their causal eff ects.
In so doing we remain aware of the well-known
difficulties in such inferences. Technically,
causal propositions can never be implied in
mere statistical correlations, but must rely upon

ADOLESCENT
EDUCATIONAL
EXPECTATIONS
371
prestigeful occupation than do adolescents from

lower-status backgrounds.21
Values and goals, whatever their source,
can be manifested in the socialization of children in a number of ways. One such important
manifestation suggested by these data takes the
form of parental educational encouragement.
This variable, we suspect, constitutes one of
the primary behavioral manifestations of a
general parental value orientation toward education, achievement, and social mobility. That
this value orientation is general, i.e., that it
extends beyond the sphere of an educational
career as such, is implied in the data of Table
8 wherein it can be seen that the frequency of
parental encouragement is positively associated
not only with the educational expectations of
the adolescent but with his occupational expectations as well. Parental encouragement
thus functions as one of the mechanisms which
link the social structure to the individual. It
is a vehicle whereby the parents translate their
achievement and mobility values into a role expectation comprehensible to the adolescent, i.e.,
the expectation that he is to continue his education beyond high school. And, as the data
suggest, the more frequently such an expectation is expressed, the more likely is the adolescent to internalize it as his own.
The strong association of parental encouragement with educational expectations provides
additional support for those theories that assign primacy to direct family socialization over
anticipatory peer socialization in the formation
and maintenance of adolescent career orientations. In this vein it has been demonstrated
by Kahl22 and others that lower-status adolescents are more likely to pursue a post high
19See, for example, Alex Inkeles, "Industrial school education if their parents urge them to
Man: The Relation of Status to Experience, Per- do so. Our data suggest that a somewhat
ception, and Value." The American Journal of
stronger statement may be in order: parental
Sociology, 66 (July 1960), pp. 1-31, and Melvin L.
encouragement comes close to being a necessary
Kohn, "Class and Parental Values," The American Journal of Sociology, 69 (January 1963), pp. condition for the continuation of education beyond the high school level in all strata and not
337-351.
just in the lower classes.
20 See, for example, Herbert H. Hyman, "The
Value Systems of Different Classes: A Social Psy(New York: Columbia University, Teachers Colchological Contributionto the Analysis of Strati- lege Press 1963), pp. 191-215.
21 For an interesting and provocative discussion
fication," in Reinhard Bendix and Seymour Martin Lipset (eds.), Class, Status, and Power (Glen- of this "ladder"argument, see Suzanna Keller and
coe, Illinois: The Free Press, 1953), pp. 426-442, Marisa Zavalloni, "Ambition and Social Class: A
and Richard A. Cloward and James A. Jones, Respecification,"Social Forces, 43 (October 1964),
"Educational Attitudes and Participation," in A. pp. 58-70.
22 Kahl, op. cit., p. 285.
Harry Passow (ed.), Educationin Depressed Areas
arguments that independently establish unvarying temporal sequence. Our discussion attempts, in some degree, to approach this ideal.
First, since increasingly higher levels of education are becoming necessary for most occupations it seems reasonable to treat paternal
education principally as a determinant of occupation. Occupations are acquired in great degree as consequences of given levels of education. The next variable in the sequence is
parental educational encouragement, with its
frequency being partially determined, as the
intercorrelation gammas of Tables 5 and 6
suggest, by parental education and occupation.
The educational level of an individual is one
of the prime determinants of his occupational
level, while both education and occupation are
major determinants of the family social status
level. Concomitant with the acquisition of an
education and of an occupation, and the closely
related social class identification, is the ongoing
process of socialization which results in the
internalization of social values and goals relevant to the potential achievement and social
mobility of the offspring. The substance of
these values and goals, research has shown, is
greatly influenced by the level of education,
occupation, and status which the parents attain.19 Parents who are better educated, who
hold the more prestigeful occupations, i.e.,
those who are in the middle and upper social
strata, generally display more positive values
toward education, achievement, and social mobility, and usually set higher career goals for
their children.20 Furthermore, adolescents from
middle-status families need traverse less "social
distance" to secure a college education and a

372
SOCIAL FORCES
TABLE
9.
PERCENT OF RESPONDENTS REPORTING SPECIFIED INTENSITIES

OF PARENTAL EDUCATIONAL
ENCOURAGEMENT, BY HOLLINGSHEAD SOCIAL STATUS AND SIZE OF FAMILY
Frequency of Parental Encouragementb

Hollingsheada Social Status
Familyc Size
Small
Medium
Large
I and II ..........................
Averages
Small
Medium
Large
III..........................
Averages
IV ..............
...........
Small
Medium
Large
Averages
Small
Medium
Large
V ...........................
Averages
Small
Medium
Large
All SES ..........................
Averages
High
Moderate
Low
Total
73
76
77
14
15
14
14
9
9
101
100
100
81
89
44
75
14
11
100
214
72
64
58
18
19
25
10
17
17
100
100
100
249
207
102
66
20
14
100
558
64
55
45
17
21
22
19
24
33
100
100
100
500
546
283
56
20
24
100
1329
50
41
35
26
22
23
24
37
42
100
100
100
208
229
191
42
23
35
100
628
64
55
46
18
20
22
18
24
32
100
99
100
1038
1071
620
57
20
23
100
2729
sHoUingshead, 1957.
bEncouragement measured as in Table 8.
oFamily Size: Small= 1 or 2 children
Medium=3 or 4 children
Large=5 or more children.
We must note that there is at least one other

plausible interpretation of the encouragement
data; namely, that the frequency of parental
encouragement varies positively with the intellectual potential of the child. It may be that
children thought by their parents to be of
higher intelligence are more often the objects
of parental encouragement to continue their
education beyond high school. To the extent
that this interpretation has empirical substance,
the lack of college expectations among those
respondents reporting low encouragement may
well be more a function of intelligence than of
encouragement. Clearly the resolution of this
important question lies in the analysis of the
expectation-encouragement relationship for each
status level with intelligence controlled, an
analysis which regretably is beyondl the scope
of this paper.
These relationships between paternal education, occupation, parental encouragement and
adolescent educational expectations are presented in schematic form in Figure 1. The

tenability of the causal relations discussed above
are supported by the observation of Blalock23
and others that in any causal sequence of
variables the zero-order correlations of the dependent variable with the predictor variables
vary inversely with the "temporal", distance of
the particular predictor variable from the dependent variable. The zero-ordler gam)mas of
these three predictor variables with educational
expectations are consistent with this observation, i.e., educational expectations with: (1)
paternal education= .43, (2) occupation = .50,
and with parental educational encouragement
.61.
It is clear that, on this assumption, the model
is not adequate to encompass the variable of
23 Hubert Blalock, Causal Inference in NonExperimental Research (Chapel Hill: The Uni-
versity of North Carolina Press, 1961).

ADOLESCENT
EDUCATIONAL
EXPECTATIONS
373
TABLE 10. PERCENT OF RESPONDENTS REPORTING EDUCATIONAL EXPECTATIONS TO FOUR OR MORE

YEARS OF COLLEGE, BY HOLLINGSHEAD SOCIAL STATUS, SIZE OF FAMILY, AND PARENTAL
EDUCATIONAL ENCOURAGEMENT
Frequency of Parental Encouragementb

Hollingsheada Social Status
Familyc Size
I and II ..................
Small
Medium
Large
Averages
Small
Medium
Large
III..
Averages
Small
Medium
Large
IV ....................
Averages
V ................
...
Small
Medium
Large
Averages
All SES ..................
Small
Medium
Large
Averages
High
Moderate
Low
Average
86
85
71
82
77
33
64
75
50
83
83
64
67/81
74/89
28/44
83
70
65
79
169/214
70
68
61
57
55
27
23
20
18
63
57
45
157/249
119/207
46/102
68
49
20
58
322/558
54
47
36
27
27
21
18
11
8
42
34
23
212/500
186/546
65/283
48
25
12
35
463/1329
42
23
25
25
22
14
10
4
5
30
16
14
62/208
36/229
27/191
31
21
20
125/628
59
53
43
37
34
20
19
12
8
48
39
27
498/1038
415/1071
166/620
54
31
13
39
1079/2729
aHollingshead, 1957.
bEncouragement measured as in Tables 8 and 9.
oFamily Size measured as in Table 9.
family size since its zero-order association with

educational expectations of -.26 would place
it antecedent to paternal education and occupation, a theoretically untenable position. Provisionally, we conjecture that: (1) family size
is a partial consequent of paternal education and
occupation, (2) family size bears only a weak
intrinsic relationship to the dependent variable,
and (3) the consequences of family size on
level of expectation both precede and follow
parental encouragement in the causal sequence.
That is, we speculate that: (a) as family size
increases the frequency with which parents
encourage the aclolescent to continue his education beyond high school decreases; and that
for reasons not yet well understood, (b) as
family size increases the effectiveness of any
given frequency of parental encouragement decreases. Tables 9 and 10 portray empirical
data consistent with these interpretations. At
the base of Table 9 it can be seen that while
64 percent of the respondents from small families report a high frequency of encouragement,
only 46 percent of the respondents from large
families report the same frequency. The pattern for low encouragement is just the reverse.
When this relationship is examined with a control for social status the same pattern is evident in all strata except the upper middle (I
and II), indicating a degree of statistical interaction that merits additional study. Thus, as
stated, the larger the family the lower the
frequency of encouragement.
In Table 10 are the data relevant to the
proposition that as family size increases the
effectiveness of a given frequency of parental
encouragement decreases. At the base of the
table it can be seen that high encouragement
is most effective when exerted in small-size
families (59 percent of the respondents reporting college expectations) and least effective
when exerted in large-size families (43 percent

374
SOCIAL FORCES
of the respondents reporting college expectations). As the remainder of the table illustrates,
this relationship is not removed by a control
for social status.
SUMMARY
With data collected from 2,852 male sophomores in six middle-sized Pennsylvania cities,
this paper has analyzed the relationship to
adolescent educational expectations of father's
education, occupation, parental educational encouragement, and family size. Using Rosenberg's test factor standardization technique of
nonparametric tabular partial analysis, it was
concluded that each of these four predictor
variables remains independently associated
with the dependent variable when the appropriate other three are statistically controlled.
On the basis of this analysis of partials, a
provisional model of causal sequence was constructed. The model posits that the father's
education is a partial determinant of his occupation and hence of the social status of the
family, that paternal education and occupation
influence adolescent educational expectancies
both through parental encouragement and independently of it, and that the larger the family
the greater the reduction not only in the frequency which the parents encourage their children to continue their education beyond high
school but also in the effectiveness of any given
frequency level of parental educational encouragement as well.
CLASS POSITION AND SUCCESS STEREOTYPESIN

GREEK AND AMERICAN CULTURES*
CONSTANTINA
SAFILIOS-ROTHSCHILD
The Merrill-Palmer Institute

ABSTRACT
The present paper examines cultural beliefs about success, reflected in stereotypes about
social classes, and their influence upon the degree of correspondence between objective class
position and subjective class identification. The formulated hypothesis stating that the greatest
degree of discrepancy between objective and subjective class position will tend to be found in
the social classes most affected by unfavorable cultural stereotypes was supported by data
available in two contrasting cultural milieus: the United States and Greece. The greatest
degree of discrepancy is found in the American lower class and the Greek upper class which
are most affected by corresponding negative stereotypes.
A
lthough it is relatively easy to assess
people's social status and assign them

to "constructed" social classes, the
meaningfulness of such an operation may be
questionable, despite the fact that it can provide
us with a clear and well-organized picture of
the "objective" class structure.1 Some of the
* Data from this article were taken from a study
of "Family, Social Class, and Mental Illness in
Urban Greece," supported in part by the Foundatiolls' Fund for Research in Psychiatry, and by a
Mental Health Grant MH 11438-01. This is a revised version of a paper read at the Yugoslavian
Sociological Association meetings, February 1966.
1 Gordon argues that only objective classes provide a reliable and "accurate" picture of the class
pertinent questions that have been raised are:

Are people conscious of objective social classes
and do they identify with them?2 And if so,
what is the correspondence between objectively
structure. See Milton M. Gordon, Social Class in
American Sociology (Durham: Duke University
Press, 1958), pp. 197-202. On the other extreme,
Centers reserves the term "social class" only for
subjective class identifications while he refers to
obj ectively determined socioeconomic groups as
"strata." See Richard Centers, The Psychology
of Social Classes (New York: Russell & Russell,
1961), p. 27.
2 Centers could be considered the foremost supporter of this question. Centers, op. cit.


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Parental Encouragement, Occupation, Education and Family Size: Artifactual or Independent

Determinants of Adolescent Educational Expectations?

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to bigotry, with the exception of the southern