Neighbourhood, school and family determinants of children's aspirations in primary school

Children from the poor families seem to grow up earlier: An examination of how family economy stress links to career exploration

Career exploration, a critical antecedent to college students' career choices and employment, offers essential guidance for their career development. However, existing research has not explored how changes in family economic stress impact career exploration. Drawing on social cognitive career theory, this study aims to deepen our understanding of the complex interplay between family economic stress and career exploration among vocational school students. We tested our hypotheses using three-time lagged data collected from 600 vocational school students studying in mainland China. As expected, family economic stress positively predicts career exploration via love of money. Additionally, both students' effective part-time behavior and teacher support were found to positively moderate the indirect relationship between family economic stress and career exploration through love of money. We attempt to highlight the broader implications of understanding the nuanced ways in which economic background shapes career exploration. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Unravelling adolescent girls' aspirations in Nepal: Status and associations with individual-, household-, and community-level characteristics

BACKGROUND

Adolescents' aspirations have potential to influence their present and future well-being. Limited knowledge exists on adolescent girls' aspirations and their determinants, particularly in low-income contexts.

METHODS AND FINDINGS

Using cross-sectional data, collected in 2018 in Nepal, within the Suaahara II Adolescent Panel Survey, (n = 840), adolescent girls' aspirations in several domains-education, occupation, marriage, fertility, health, and nutrition-were described. Regression models were estimated to explore associations between individual, household and community characteristics and these aspirations for all adolescents and separately for younger (10-14 years) and older (15-19 years) girls. Age, school attendance, and self-efficacy, as well as household wealth, caste/ethnicity, size, and agro-ecological zone of residence were significantly associated with aspirations, although effect sizes and significance varied by aspiration domain and age group.

CONCLUSIONS

Findings underscore the curtailing effect of poverty on aspirations and the dynamic nature of aspirations. Initiatives to foster girls' aspirations must address both individual and contextual factors.

Dream Jobs and Employment Realities: How Adolescents’ Career Aspirations Compare to Labor Demands and Automation Risks

Despite a rapidly changing labor market, little is known about how youth’s career goals correspond to projections about the future of work. This research examined the career aspirations of 3,367 adolescents (age 13–18 years) from 42 U.S. states. We conducted a large-scale coding effort using the Occupational Information Network (O*NET) to compile the vocational interests, educational requirements, and automation risk levels of career aspirations. Results revealed that most adolescents aspired to careers with low potential for automation. However, there were large discrepancies between the sample’s aspirations and the types of jobs available when the sample entered the workforce. Almost 50% of adolescents aspired to either an investigative or artistic career, which together account for only 8% of the U.S. labor market. There were also notable trends across age and gender, such that aspirations were more gendered among younger adolescents, whereas older adolescents appeared less influenced by gender stereotypes. Overall, findings indicate important discrepancies between young people’s dream jobs and employment realities. We discuss how lofty career aspirations can have both positive and negative effects, and we present implications for career theories and workforce development initiatives aimed at promoting a more dynamic future workforce.

The relationship between household chaos and child, parent, and family outcomes: a systematic scoping review

BACKGROUND

Household chaos, represented by the level of disorganisation or environmental confusion in the home, has been associated with a range of adverse child and family outcomes. This review aims to (1) identify how household chaos is measured, (2) chart study details of household chaos literature, and (3) map the existing literature with respect to the relationship between household chaos and child, parent, and family outcomes. We expect that this review will highlight the need to consider the importance of household chaos in child well-being research, particularly in those families where children may be more vulnerable to the adverse effects of household chaos.

METHODS

We searched five electronic databases (last updated September 1st 2018) in addition to Google Scholar, and identified publications via a 3-stage screening process, which was conducted by two researchers. Published studies were included if they investigated the association between household chaos and child, parent, or family outcomes. Research that investigated household chaos as a mediator or moderator, or that investigated how the relationship between household chaos and the outcome of interest was mediated or moderated, were also included.

RESULTS

One hundred twelve studies in 111 publications were included. The majority were conducted in the United States (n = 71), and used either cross-sectional (n = 60) or longitudinal (n = 49) study designs. Outcomes of interest were categorised into seven categories: (1) cognitive and academic (n = 16), (2) socio-emotional and behavioural (n = 60), (3) communication (n = 6), (4) parenting, family, and household functioning (n = 21), (5) parent outcomes (n = 6), (6) hormone (n = 8), and (7) physical health and health behaviours (n = 19). There was consistent evidence for significant correlations between household chaos and adverse outcomes across all seven categories in diverse populations with respect to age, disease status, and socio-economic status (SES).

CONCLUSION

There is consistent evidence for associations between household chaos and a number of adverse child, parent, and family-level outcomes. Household chaos may also help describe variations in outcomes between low SES and child development.

Assessing the spatial scale of context effects: The example of neighbourhoods' educational composition and its relevance for individual aspirations

The neighbourhood environment has repeatedly proven to be a relevant context for central aspects of individuals' lives, such as educational attainment. The conventional approach of measuring neighbourhood characteristics within disjunct geographical units fixed at a particular scale is less suitable for representing the characteristics of individual action spaces in everyday activities and for detecting scale-dependent relationships. We, therefore, adapted an ego-centred context approach by aggregating contextual characteristics within (approximately) circular areas around individual respondents' places of residence (ego-hoods). We also used an analytical framework that considers the quality of hierarchical context effects. This allowed us to derive conclusions about the spatial reference of micro-level mechanisms from the scale of context effects observed as a macro-micro relationship. We linked contextual indicators to individual-level data from the German Socio-Economic Panel. Comparing ego-hoods of different ranges, we confirmed the expectation of distance decay in the relevance of neighbours for individual educational aspirations.