A Retrospective Analysis of Family Support, Science Values, and Cost in High School Among Latina Undergraduate Science Students (Poster 2)

• In Event: Promising Scholarship in Education Research: Dissertation Fellows and Their Research

Abstract

Exploring and documenting the experiences of Latinas is necessary to understand the intersectional experiences of a marginalized population within science. Latinxs comprised 9% of all science and engineering occupations in 2017, with Latinas making up 5% of those occupations (Khan et al., 2020). In the few studies on Latinx family support, scholars highlight the supporting roles that parents and family members play in helping adolescents navigate school-related and college-related challenges, including giving consejos (i.e, advice) and emotional support (Soto-Lara & Simpkins, 2020). Although many studies note how parent support, sibling support, and overall family support are positively related to adolescents’ motivational beliefs (Hsieh et al., 2019; Simpkins et al., 2020), less is known about what parents and siblings do similarly or differently in supporting Latinas and their science motivation. Drawing from semi-structured interviews with Latina women (6 Mexican, 3 Latina/x, 2 Hispanic, 3 other) who were majoring in a biological or physical science, the current study aims to bridge the gap between the two separate literatures on parent and older sibling academic support and explore the following research questions: (1) What were the similar and unique perceived supports from parents and older siblings that Latinas viewed as most essential for their intrinsic and utility values development in science in high school? and (2) In what ways, if any, does family support differ by family higher education experience and adolescent familism values?

Author

• Kayla Puente, University of California - Irvine