Young Women's Work-family Orientations and Educational Outcomes in Emerging Adulthood

• In Event: 381 - Section on the Sociology of the Family Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 14. Work-Family and Children: Session II

Abstract

Highlighting questions of educational and occupational pathways among young women, the primary aim of this paper is to examine the links between young women’s work-family orientations to educational outcomes in the transition to adulthood. In contrast with studies that often assess the effect of educational expectations on educational outcomes while controlling for other contextual factors, I have conducted in my previous work a series of latent class analyses to detail how young women combine various attitudes, expectations, and identities about family, education, and work. After testing for the best-fitting model and comparing the conditional probabilities of each latent class, I have found four latent classes of unique schematic perspectives about work and family, which I refer to as young women’s work-family orientations. Using the probabilities of belonging to these latent classes, the present study will assess the extent to which possessing certain work-family orientations is associated with actual educational outcomes in the level of educational attainment among women in emerging adulthood. Using a series of time-varying regression analyses with the Relationship Dynamics and Social Life survey data, this paper aims to explore the links between culture and action by examining how certain combinations of schemas about work and family are associated with actual educational outcomes among young women.

Author

• Bo Hyeong (Jane) Lee, Univ. North Carollina Chapel Hill