Jordan Frye LACR 229 R.

Farnum From Childhood to Pushing Daisies Furstenbergs Growing Up is Harder to Do explores the idea that adulthood comes through later in life. Throughout history it seems as if marriage and other major events in a lifetime happen later in life. Evidence shows that ages continue to grow for these big events, but is it casual or just a correlation? A new age has come in, known as young adulthood these days. Childhood takes people through basics of humanity, with learning how to share and to not push other children. People then learned a trade and then went straight into their jobs with families, but now sociologists are looking at a stage between adolescence and adulthood. Furstenberg looked at what people considered their benchmarks of adulthood. The National Opinion Research Center interviewed 1,4000 Americans 18 and up about rating the benchmarks of life. 97% said finishing school and becoming financially independent from parents were the most important benchmark. 96% getting a full time job was most important. Being able to support a family was voted by 94%. 82% said leaving home was important. Marrying was at 55%, and becoming a parent was rated at 52%.

Furstenberg proceeds inductively to look into this subject. He used secondary analysis from previous research to support this theory. He looks at the 500 interviews from 1960 and then again in 2000. From this he gathered that people achieved accomplished the events that were considered adult at a younger age. In 1960 9% of men at 20 years of age accomplished what was considered benchmarks of life. 65% of men at 30 years have accomplished these benchmarks. 29% of women have completed these at 20 years of age, and 77% of 30year-old women have. In 2000, 2% of 20-year-old men have completed these benchmarks, and 31% of 30-year-old men have. 6% of 20-year-old women, and 46% of 30-year-old women have become adults. With these two examples, the independent variables are the time frames, and the dependent variable is the age that was considered adulthood. The first test determined what was considered the benchmarks of adulthood. In 1960, the values were different than they are today. For each time period, there were different considerations for what was considered adulthood. More recently, people felt they needed more preparation for adulthood (building credentials to get better jobs to support their future families that the age of adulthood is pushed back because they consider themselves not ready. Values of before the 60s were focused more on marriage and raising kids, so diving into parenthood came sooner, while post people are more

concerned with being able to support the families and take more time preparing for supporting a family. Finding the difference: Values of before the 60s were focused more on marriage and raising kids, so diving into parenthood came sooner, while post people are more concerned with being able to support the families and take more time preparing for supporting a family. The correlation is that as time goes on which allows adulthood to come later in life. This is not causality because the third variable is that the factors during early adulthood between adolescence and adulthood. Time does not cause adulthood to come later in life. There are more factors now and more difficulties to get to the status of being able to financially sustain a family rather than back in the day. The same benchmarks have shifted in importance, and in addition, the ones that have become more important have, with our market now, become more grueling to obtain.