Child vocational development: A review and reconsideration

Journal of Vocational Behavior 66 (2005) 385–419 www.elsevier.com/locate/jvb

Invited article

Child vocational development: A review and reconsideration Paul J. Hartunga,*, Erik J. Porfelib, Fred W. Vondracekb a

Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine, USA b Pennsylvania State University, USA Received 12 May 2004 Available online 11 September 2004

Abstract Childhood marks the dawn of human development. To organize, integrate, and advance knowledge about vocational development during this age period from a life-span perspective, we conducted a comprehensive review of the empirical vocational development literature that addresses early-to-late childhood. The review considers career exploration, career awareness, vocational expectations and aspirations, vocational interests, and career maturity/adaptability. By conducting the review, we sought to consolidate knowledge and identify avenues for further research concerned with vocational development in childhood and across the life span. Linking knowledge of child vocational development with what is known about adolescent and adult vocational development and conducting research that embeds vocational development within the fabric of a life-span developmental framework could move the field of vocational psychology from a disjointed perspective on career as studied in isolated age groups and toward an integrated life-span conceptualization. Ó 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Keywords: Child development; Child vocational development; Children and work; Life-span development; Life-course development; Developmental career psychology; Career theory; Career exploration; Career awareness; Vocational interests; Vocational expectations and aspirations; Career maturity; Career adaptability

*

Corresponding author. Fax: 1 330 325 5901. E-mail address: [email protected] (P.J. Hartung).

0001-8791/$ - see front matter Ó 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jvb.2004.05.006

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1. Introduction A sizeable literature has accumulated to examine aspects of childrenÕs vocational development and behavior despite the fact that the prevailing public view, and that held by much of the scientific community, separates career planning and vocational development from childhood (Vondracek, 2001a). This literature has burgeoned particularly since the mid-twentieth century when theorists such as Ginzberg, Ginsburg, Axelrad, and Herma (1951), Havighurst (1951, 1964), Roe (1956), and Super (1957) more explicitly conceptualized childhood as an important formative period for vocational development. We aim to consolidate this literature in a cohesive and cogent statement that reflects the current state of knowledge about vocational development during childhood. We begin by situating vocational development within the broader contexts of life-span and life-course development and then set the parameters for our review of the empirical literature that deals with children and work. 1.1. Developmental perspectives on vocational development Consistent with contemporary life-span psychology (Baltes, Lindenberger, & Staudinger, 1998) and life-course sociology (Elder, 1998), developmental perspectives on career have long recognized that vocational development constitutes a lifelong process from infancy through childhood, adolescence, adulthood, and old age affected by both personal and contextual factors (Gottfredson, 1981; Super, 1957; Tiedeman & OÕHara, 1963; Vondracek, Lerner, & Schulenberg, 1986). Developmental psychology has focused tremendous attention on studying and synthesizing knowledge about child development, however, the vocational development of children has been inadequately addressed (Vondracek, 2001a). We know much more about the vocational development and vocational behavior of adolescents (cf. Blustein, 1997; Savickas, 1997) and adults (cf. Lea & Leibowitz, 1992; Vondracek & Kawasaki, 1995). These age periods have been the predominant research foci because they proffer ‘‘the most visible benchmarks in the transformation of the nonworker into the mature occupant of an occupational role’’ (Goldstein & Oldham, 1979, p. 4). The extant vocational literature reflects societyÕs desire to separate children wholly from work and labor in the spirit of letting children be children, free from the responsibilities and concerns ascribed to later age periods; a phenomenon described as the cultural moratorium of childhood (Zinnecker, 1995). It also reflects a prevailing bias to study adolescent and adult vocational behavior and development that, in effect, fails to adequately consider and make linkages to childhood dimensions of life-span vocational development (Vondracek, 2001a). Ironically, whereas human development theory and scientific inquiry have overemphasized child-based, growth-oriented accounts of development (Elder, 1998), vocational psychology has overemphasized adolescence and early-to-middle adulthood. Scanning the subject indexes of several leading vocational psychology textbooks, we could find few references to vocational development during childhood, although

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we easily found substantial references to adolescent and adult vocational development. Not surprisingly, scans of computer databases (ERIC and PsychInfo) revealed a similar finding of disproportionately fewer references to child than to either adolescent or adult vocational development. Moreover, a comprehensive content analysis of Journal of Vocational Behavior topics that specified ‘‘career development in adolescence’’ and ‘‘career behavior in adulthood’’ within the cluster ‘‘Career development: Life-span perspectives,’’ included no such explicit reference to child vocational development (Fitzgerald & Rounds, 1989, p. 112). Given these circumstances, a distinct need exists to (a) synthesize and clearly articulate the current state of empirical knowledge about the vocational development and behavior of children, (b) link this knowledge to that of later age periods, and (c) identify areas for future research that situates childhood within the scope of life-span vocational development. 1.2. Format of the review Consistent with contemporary developmental vocational psychology (Vondracek, 2001a, 2001b), we take the perspective that childhood represents an integral age period of human development in manifold contexts. Early childhood encompasses the age period between 37 and 72 months (Santrock, 2002). Middle childhood begins as the child transitions to compulsory education at the age of 5–7 years, and extends through the transition to middle school (Cohler, 1982). Tremendous debate about when adolescence begins, centering on a variety of biological, cognitive, and social factors, makes delineating the end of childhood more contentious than the onset. After fully considering these issues and the widely regarded aforementioned guidelines, we decided for the present review to define childhood in chronological terms as the period spanning 3–14 years old. Mindful of these childhood age parameters, we entered keywords associated with children and work, child development, and child career/vocational/occupational development in computer searches of ERIC, Sociological Abstracts, and PsychInfo databases. These computer-based searches coupled with a review of the reference lists of located articles yielded a total of nearly 200 articles, monographs, and chapters. We reviewed the abstracts of the articles and collected and sorted them according to dominant themes and streams in the literature that addresses child vocational behavior and development. This content analysis led us to organize the review along the following five dimensions: career exploration, career awareness, vocational expectations and aspirations, vocational interests, and career maturity/adaptability. As theory suggests, however, these dimensions represent parts of a larger process, termed vocational development; hence, they may occur simultaneously or sequentially and may be more or less independent from one another. Given the potential for conceptual and temporal overlap, the same literature and even the same citations may be relevant to two or more sections. In these cases, we err on the side of comprehensiveness by relating the content of a particular citation to each of the relevant dimensions at the risk of being somewhat redundant.

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2. Career exploration 2.1. Developmental progress Consistent with theoretical, age-graded predictions about childrenÕs capabilities to explore, the predominant research trend has been to examine what and to what extent children understand the world-of-work rather than how they come to learn this information (Dorr & Lesser, 1980; Goldstein & Oldham, 1979). School, family, and other contextual variables have been employed to predict what and how much children know about paid work (Fadale, 1973; Goldstein & Oldham, 1979; Jordan, 1976; Trice, McClellan, & Hughes, 1992). Few studies have examined how factors such as interests, values, and motivation interact with contextual factors to yield occupational awareness during childhood. Little research has attempted to determine, for example, whether or not and to what extent preadolescent children employ the more sophisticated form of exploration involving the union of inner and outer world factors or when the shift to this form of exploration occurs. Employing JordaanÕs (1963) dimensions, the process or mechanism by which children shift from fortuitous, random, and vocationally irrelevant exploration to intended, systematic, and vocationally relevant exploration has received little attention. This deficit seems understandable, if not appropriate, given that children are thought incapable of engaging in dynamic career exploration, which involves both exploring the worldof-work and examining self in relation to the occupational world (Muenster, 1982; Vondracek, 1993). The little research that does exist suggests many children in the range of 10–12 years of age do engage in dynamic career exploration, using their interests and aptitudes to guide how and what they learn and the goals they formulate in relation to the world-of-work. The few studies that have attempted to identify and examine dynamic exploration in preadolescent children reveal that they often use their personal interests, beliefs, and values to explore the world-of-work and to develop their initial, tentative occupational goals. When 1st-, 3rd-, 5th-, and 7th-grade children were asked to describe the job-search process, the emphasis of their responses shifted from citing the mechanics of finding a job in the earlier grades (e.g., looking at help wanted signs, in classified ads, or asking friends and relatives) to the process of matching personal interests and abilities to current job opportunities during the 5th and 7th grades (Goldstein & Oldham, 1979). This form of exploration has even been observed in children as young as the 3rd and 4th grade (Nelson, 1978; Trice, Hughes, Odom, Woods, & McClellan, 1995). Contrary to established career theory, a sizeable proportion of grade-school children are capable of employing their emerging understanding of interests and abilities to engage in both a cognitive and physical exploration of the world-of-work and to state career aspirations. The transition to extra-familial paid work settings is a gradual process that begins during the primary school years (Goldstein & Oldham, 1979). Initial work commitments tend to begin during the elementary school years and appear to be 62 h per week. Seventh grade marks a watershed year in the transition to paid extra-familial work and by extension could be considered a turning point in vocational exploratory

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behavior. By 7th grade approximately 75% of children reported some regular or recurrent extra-familial paid work experience (e.g., child care, yard work, or other manual labor), 33% reported working for an organization, 36% reported a work commitment of at least 7 h per week, and 25% could report multiple types of work experiences (Goldstein & Oldham, 1979). Goldstein and OldhamÕs (1979) findings are consistent with other studies examining early adolescent work experiences. Entwisle, Alexander, Olson, and Ross (1999), employing a sample of inner city children (55% African American and 45% Caucasian), found that 69 and 78% of their 13- and 14-year-old participants, respectively, worked in an extra-familial work setting for pay during the summer. Csikszentmihalyi and Schneider (2000) examined a cross-sectional sample of 6th-, 8th-, 10th-, and 12th-grade students and a ‘‘learn-do’’ scale to determine the extent to which children were learning and doing activities related to the occupation they wished to pursue in adulthood. They found a consistent positive association between age and their occupational learn-do scale, with older adolescents learning and doing more than younger children, and the most rapid increase in the learn-do scale occurring between the 8th and 10th grade. Clearly, a developmental trend in this research suggests a shift from thinking and learning about work to learning about and doing work activities characterizes the transition from late childhood to early adolescence. 2.2. Gender and sex-role influences Preadolescent girls, relative to male age mates, appear to aspire to a more restricted range of occupations and engage in less career exploration during the primary school years (McMahon & Patton, 1997). The causes of these differences are not clear, but social-structural features that foster sex-based socialization differences may be at work (Dorr & Lesser, 1980). Regardless of the cause, preadolescent girls appear to lag behind boys in terms of critical aspects of career development. In contrast, girls tend to exhibit greater career decidedness at an earlier age, but this may be due to premature occupational foreclosure prompted by fewer identified options relative to boys (Dorr & Lesser, 1980). The research does not present a clear picture and the potential consequences of these sex differences call for more research. 2.3. Contextual factors Most theory and research implicates the family as the primary context of vocational development. The family, and particularly parental figures, appears to be a much stronger influence on a childÕs vocational development than their peer network or the school (Schulenberg, Vondracek, & Crouter, 1984). A body of research addressing the impact of the media on children suggests, too, that television provides a powerful context for career development that deserves more attention. Media (mainly printed and video material) appear to impact childrenÕs goals and understanding of their career development and children engage in selective learning based on their personal characteristics (King & Multon, 1996). Cartoon watching has been found to relate inversely to 6- to 10-year-old childrenÕs positive perceptions

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of scientific professions (Potts & Martinez, 1994). Fortunately, however, children as early as 2nd and 5th grade are capable of distinguishing between documentary and fictional televised material and selectively shaping their beliefs about real-world occupations (Huston, Wright, Fitch, Wroblewski, & Piemyat, 1997). Across 54 popular elementary school readers examined to determine their treatment of the world-of-work, 197 different occupations were discussed (Tennyson & Monnens, 1963). The readers predominantly emphasized professional/managerial and service occupations and deemphasized skilled, clerical, and sales occupations. Professional and managerial occupations appeared with greater frequency in the intermediate grades relative to the primary grades. Heintz (1987) examined the pictorial and textual portrayal of women in the work setting in 14 childrenÕs books awarded the Caldecott medal. Across the books, the male to female ratio was 2:1. Men were portrayed in occupational roles far more than women, and men were portrayed in 29 different occupations relative to 10 occupations for the women. Findings such as these are notable and consistent with other research of this period (Williams, Vernon, Williams, & Malecha, 1987). 2.4. Summary The weight of the findings supports several fundamental aspects of exploration. First, children employ intrapersonal and interpersonal strategies to explore the world-of-work and to develop early vocational aspirations and goals. Second, children demonstrate a developmental shift in their exploratory behavior wherein more generalized exploration gives way to conscious, concerted, and goal- and affective-directed exploration of the world-of-work and careers, thus supporting the traditional view of adolescence as a time of more focused career exploration. In social-structural terms, the transition from primary to middle school appears to be associated with a shift from vocational to career exploration, a process that begins as an orientation to the world-of-work and becomes an examination of the self within the world-of-work coupled with overt behavior in support of this process. Third, although preadolescent children appear less goal directed in their vocational exploration, they clearly explore the world-of-work much earlier than theorists and researchers have typically assumed and this process of exploration yields vocational interests, values, and aspirations that serve as starting parameters for adolescent vocational development. Thinking in terms of GottfredsonÕs (1981) theory, perhaps a childÕs vocational exploration circumscribes his or her adolescent career exploration along dimensions such as sex, SES, parental education, and community standards.

3. Career awareness 3.1. Developmental progress Career awareness follows a developmental course that begins in early childhood (Dorr & Lesser, 1980; Fadale, 1973, 1975). Several writers have thus advocated

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for programs in the elementary schools to foster career awareness. They have described conceptual models (Magnuson & Starr, 2000; Muenster, 1982), empirical findings (Reid & Stephens, 1985; Weinger, 1998), curricular methods (Weinger, 1998; Wise, Charner, & Randour, 1978; Yawkey & Aronin, 1974), and assessment procedures (Fadale, 1973, 1975) to advance this program research and development. Knowledge about occupations and about self-in-occupations have been found to be well developed by age 10 or 11 (McGee & Stockard, 1991) and to increase with age (Dorr & Lesser, 1980; Gunn, 1964; Hill, 1969; Nelson, 1963). Investigations often use cross-sectional designs, however, restricting conclusions about actual developmental progress. Children of about 8 years of age base their perceptions of adult work on a rather loose integration of fantasies or assumptions as well as actual observations of adults working (Hill, 1969). This loose integration typically gives way by about age 11 to a more realistic understanding of adult work, including gains in knowledge about job salaries and training requirements. Around age 14, views of adult work become more emotionally overlaid as children develop awareness of potential negative aspects of work such as dissatisfaction, schedule demands, and role strain; compare the world-of-work to their own abilities; and grow increasingly aware that entering the work role and making educational and vocational decisions loom as increasingly proximal developmental tasks for them (Nelson, 1963). 3.2. Gender and sex-role influences Numerous studies have examined gender differences in and sex-role influences on childrenÕs career awareness relative to what they know and how they feel about occupations. Many studies concern childrenÕs gender-stereotyped beliefs and knowledge about occupations, often reporting high degrees of sex-typing along traditional occupational gender lines (Barnhart, 1983; Cann & Garnett, 1984; McMahon & Patton, 1997; Schlossberg & Goodman, 1972; Tibbetts, 1975). Such differences have been reported cross-culturally (Trice, 2000). Children, and girls especially, develop a belief that they cannot pursue particular occupations because they perceive them as inappropriate for their gender (Dorr & Lesser, 1980; Looft, 1971; McMahon & Patton, 1997). Boys tend to have greater job knowledge than girls (McMahon & Patton, 1997). Some investigations, however, have found few or no significant gender differences in attitudes about what constitutes suitable occupational roles for women and men (Gregg & Dobson, 1980; McGee & Stockard, 1991). In some cases, boys and girls hold favorable attitudes toward occupations considered non-traditional for their sex (Gorrell & Shaw, 1988; Griffin & Holder, 1987). Boys have been found to hold more stereotyped perceptions of occupations, believing that many more occupations are suited to men than to women (Garrett, Ein, & Tremaine, 1977; Gorrell & Shaw, 1988). Boys generally perceive opportunities in the world-of-work as wide ranging, whereas girls perceive them as limited (Reid & Stephens, 1985). Changing gender roles necessitate research to update these findings. Sex-role socialization shapes childrenÕs gender schemas, which have been shown to surface in sex-biased questions asked of workers in occupations non-traditional for their sex (Bailey & Nihlen, 1989; Nihlen & Bailey, 1988).

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Children as young as 4 and 5 years old do not yet differentiate between career orientation and family orientation (Seligman, Weinstock, & Owings, 1988). Girls as young as 6th grade have been found to be a more heterogeneous group in terms of orientation to work, family, and other life roles, whereas boys of this age tend to be more homogeneous in their singular orientation toward work and career (Curry, Trew, Turner, & Hunter, 1994). Such differences may owe to girlsÕ perceptions of a job as a temporary, transitional activity between school and marriage and motherhood (McMahon & Patton, 1997). Age differences in occupational sex-typing have been examined with mixed results. For example, compared to 6th-graders, a group of 3rd-grade students indicated three times as many occupations were suitable for both men and women (Hageman & Gladding, 1983). Both groups also agreed, however, that men remain more suitable for some traditionally male-dominated occupations such as truck driver and engineer. Sixth-grade girls in the study also aspired to non-traditional jobs for women more so than did 3rd-grade girls, prompting Hageman and Gladding (1983) to theorize that as career awareness increases with age, girls feel freer to explore career options. Other studies have found less rigid gender stereotypes toward occupations among older children (Carter & Patterson, 1982; Garrett et al., 1977; Meyer, 1980; Nelson, 1978). Children ascribe higher status to jobs traditionally viewed as masculine than they do to those viewed as traditionally feminine, with this attitude emerging in early childhood and increasing in middle childhood (Liben, Bigler, & Krogh, 2001). A few studies provide evidence for the sex-typing effects of television or print media on childrenÕs knowledge of and beliefs about occupations (Heintz, 1987; Huston et al., 1997; Potts & Martinez, 1994). Several investigations have examined ways to reduce occupational gender-typing among children. One such study examined whether 64 kindergarten-age children (33 boys, 31 girls) of varying cognitive ability could form more flexible attitudes about what constitutes appropriate work for women (Barclay, 1974). Results indicated that career education interventions had a small but significant effect on reducing occupational sex-stereotyping among children, and girls especially, such that after the interventions they perceived women in a greater variety of occupational roles. Other studies have found modeling to be an effective intervention for increasing childrenÕs awareness of a broader range of occupational possibilities for women and men and reducing their occupational sex-role stereotyping (Bailey & Nihlen, 1990; Garrett et al., 1977; Miller, 1986; Tibbetts, 1975; Tozzo & Golub, 1990). The effects of reading about sex-typed careers presented by successful role models of the non-traditional sex for the career was examined among 208 Hispanic 9th-graders (Haas & Sullivan, 1991). Results indicated significantly less sex-stereotyped posttreatment attitudes toward the careers depicted in the written descriptions for two treatment groups compared to students in a control group. Students in a Hispanic role-model group showed significantly less sex-stereotyped attitudes toward careers they did not read about than did either of the other two groups. Making career information culturally relevant can equalize minority access to career opportunities (Rodriguez, 1994). From their own research and review of the literature, Liben et al. (2001) concluded that effective amelioration of occupational gender stereotyp-

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ing must include direct interventions that can address the fact that ‘‘children with highly stereotyped attitudes are likely to distort incoming counterstereotypic information to make it stereotype-consistent, thus reinforcing rather than reducing stereotypes’’ (p. 358). 3.3. Contextual influences 3.3.1. SES Socioeconomic status (SES) has long been considered an antecedent of vocational awareness and vocational choice (Miller & Form, 1964). Although children as young as 1st grade perceive class-related differences (Tudor, 1971), the ability to articulate a definition of social class may not appear until the 7th grade or later (Gunn, 1964). Children of lower SES hold more conservative attitudes about the types of work men and women can do (Hageman & Gladding, 1983). They also report more favorable attitudes overall toward occupations, yet less occupational knowledge in general than do children of higher SES (Nelson, 1963). ChildrenÕs social class awareness influences their comprehension of the world-of-work such that they develop beliefs about appropriate jobs as being those that match their perceived social status (Miller, 1986). Further, children who live in poverty perceive fewer future job opportunities for themselves than for children who are not poor (Weinger, 1998). Awareness of differences in occupational prestige prompts children to ascribe higher status rankings to professional- and managerial-level jobs (Lehman & Witty, 1931a) and this appears to occur sooner among boys than among girls (Simmons, 1962). Elementary reading texts may promote such rankings because they tend to emphasize professional, managerial, and service occupations disproportionately more than jobs in skilled trades, clerical work, and sales (Tennyson & Monnens, 1963). A cross-sectional study of elementary through high-school age boys indicated that a perceived occupational status hierarchy begins to emerge during 3rd grade (Gunn, 1964). 3.3.2. Family Parental background, modeling, and family experiences have been implicated widely in childrenÕs career awareness development, extending to occupational sextyping, prestige rankings, and world-of-work knowledge levels and attitudes (Miller, 1989; Reid & Stephens, 1985; Seligman et al., 1988). ChildrenÕs career awareness appears to be primarily influenced by fathers until about age 5 years when a transition begins toward motherÕs influence growing more important (Seligman, Weinstock, & Heflin, 1991). By the age of 10 years, children typically know a good deal about their parentsÕ jobs and careers (Seligman et al., 1991). A prospective longitudinal study involving 180 children followed from birth to age 7 examined various home and family variables as predictors of occupational knowledge of 1st-graders (Jordan, 1976). Variables included maternal intelligence, parentsÕ levels of education, parentsÕ attitudes toward education, birth order, characteristics of the home environment, and socioeconomic level of the home. Social class, followed by ethnicity, accounted for the most variance, with children from upper SES levels more knowledgeable about occupations based on a picture test. A recent

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follow-up report of this longitudinal research supported the earlier findings (Jordan & Pope, 2001). Parents encourage children to adopt gender-stereotypic occupational goals (Birk & Blimline, 1984). Parents also convey attitudes that can minimize, neglect, or disregard the importance of childhood as a crucial period of career knowledge and attitude formation. Consequently, Birk and Blimline joined others in advocating for career education programs to remedy this situation. 3.4. Psychological correlates Cognitive ability has been linked to greater knowledge about and less stereotypic attitudes toward occupations. Kindergarten-age children of a higher, concrete operational cognitive level knew about more occupations than did children of a lower, preoperational level of cognitive development (Barclay, 1974). Self-esteem has been linked to traditional career attitudes such that girls with higher self-esteem hold more non-traditional attitudes toward women and work (e.g., multiple roles for women), whereas boys with higher self-esteem hold more traditional attitudes about occupational roles for women and men (Hughes, Martinek, & Fitzgerald, 1985). Intellectual level has been found to correlate positively with occupational knowledge (Nelson, 1963). 3.5. Summary Overall, the research on career awareness suggests that children as young as 3–5 years of age possess rudimentary knowledge about occupations, comprehend the existing occupational status hierarchy, and hold distinct attitudes about the suitability of particular occupations for them, albeit often based on stereotyped perceptions and limited information.

4. Vocational expectations and aspirations 4.1. Developmental progress With increasing age, childrenÕs aspirations and expectations become more consistent with their abilities, values, and interests and take account of the barriers and opportunities in their environment. Because only a few studies use a longitudinal design, most of the research in this area confounds age and cohort by relying on crosssectional age differences. 4.1.1. Stability and change ChildrenÕs career aspirations have been shown to exhibit considerable stability across a given school year (Trice, 1991; Trice & King, 1991). Moreover, research conducted many decades ago has shown that the stability of childrenÕs aspirations increases with age and that they may be influenced by the popularity/prestige of

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the occupation, with more popular occupations exhibiting more stability across age groups (Lehman & Witty, 1929, 1931a, 1931b, 1931c, 1936). Career aspirations shift from fantasy- to reality-based occupations during the primary school years and many children experience the shift prior to and during the transition to primary school (Lehman & Witty, 1936; Trice, 1991; Trice & King, 1991; Vondracek & Kirchner, 1974). Aside from some variability in the estimated prevalence of fantasybased occupational aspirations by age, the literature generally supports an inverse association between advancing age and the prevalence of expressed fantasy-based aspirations (Jepsen, 1984; Nelson, 1978). This trend may not, however, hold for both sexes. Boys generally report fewer and girls report more fantasy-based occupational aspirations with increasing age—a generally increasing proportion from the 2nd (10%) to the 12th (20%) grade (Helwig, 1998b, 2001, 2004). The diversity or range of career aspirations may increase with age as well (Nelson, 1978; Sandberg, Ehrhardt, Ince, & Meyer-Bahlburg, 1991). Examining the data of several studies cited here, the diversity of career aspirations increased by about 40% comparing middle-childhood cohorts to late-childhood and early-adolescent cohorts. Of course, these findings confound the cohort and age variables and must, therefore, be treated with caution. Moreover, some research has either reported no change with age or the reverse trend (Arap-Maritim, 1984; Miller & Stanford, 1987; Trice, 1991). A rare longitudinal study examined potential race and SES differences in boysÕ occupational aspirations and expectations during the 2nd, 4th, 6th, and 8th grades (Cook et al., 1996). Consistent with expectations, the boys tended to aspire to more prestigious occupations than they realistically expected to pursue. Realism about aspirations and expectations did, however, increase with age. African American boys (n = 110) from a financially impoverished context aspired to less prestigious occupations than did their more affluent Caucasian peers. As these African American children grew older, the gap increased between their aspirations and what they expected to achieve. Interestingly, the impact of age and SES on occupational expectations was mediated by contextual variables such as residing with both parents, having role models, and anticipating educational obstacles. In contrast, aspirations were mediated only by whether or not a child resided with both parents. Contextual variables may have a greater influence on expectations than aspirations because expectations represent personal estimates of an occupational future tempered by perceived resources and constraints present within the person and environment, whereas aspirations are relatively independent of these estimates. 4.2. Gender and sex-role influence 4.2.1. Gender stereotypes Research in the United States (Boynton, 1936; Csikszentmihalyi & Schneider, 2000; Gregg & Dobson, 1980; Looft, 1971), Ireland (Hammond & Dingley, 1989), and Kenya (Arap-Maritim, 1984) suggests that social forces contribute to predictable sex differences in childrenÕs career aspirations. Early social factors and personal preferences related to sex and gender also influence childrenÕs later career aspirations

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and choices (Archer, 1989; Goldstein & Oldham, 1979; Lapan & Jingeleski, 1992; Stockard & McGee, 1990). The predominant finding is that boys aspire and expect to pursue male-dominated occupations and girls aspire and expect to pursue femaledominated occupations (e.g., Barclay, 1974; Brook, Whiteman, Peisach, & Deutsch, 1974; Edelbrock & Sugawara, 1978; Fagot & Littman, 1976; Franken, 1983; Griffin & Holder, 1987; Menger, 1932; Sellers, Satcher, & Comas, 1999; Siegel, 1973). Children as young as 4 years of age report occupational preferences along sex-based distinctions (Trice & Rush, 1995). 4.2.2. Occupational distinctions ChildrenÕs occupational aspirations become more focused on prestigious occupations with increasing age both in Caucasian and minority samples (Bobo, Hildreth, & Durodoye, 1998; Brook et al., 1974; Cook et al., 1996). Eighth-grade children possess a functional awareness of prestige- and sex-based occupational distinctions that guide their aspirations (Lapan & Jingeleski, 1992). Controlling for math achievement, 8th-grade boys reported greater expectations in science careers. Increased assertiveness, a variable on which boys and girls did not differ, predicted an interest in occupations that the students rated as more masculine (e.g., Realistic occupations). Increased emotional expressiveness, a variable on which girls scored significantly higher than boys, predicted an interest in occupations that the students tended to rate as feminine and as less prestigious (e.g., Social and Conventional occupations). The nature of work associated with childrenÕs aspirations varies by sex and age. Using longitudinal data, Helwig (1998a) examined childrenÕs career aspirations in 2nd, 4th, and 6th grade, classified by emphasis on data, people, and things. Across all three grade-levels, boysÕ aspirations emphasized things, whereas girlsÕ aspirations emphasized people. Additionally, 4th- and 6th-grade girlsÕ aspirations involved more complex data functions than did boysÕ. With advancing age, children aspired increasingly to occupations emphasizing things and people. Helwig concluded that children develop with age an affinity for socially valued professions. Perceived importance of an occupation, income level, and sex of 4th-grade children were used in a multivariate regression model to predict childrenÕs willingness to pursue a particular profession (Stockard & McGee, 1990). Sex was clearly the most influential predictor of childrenÕs preferences for 21 occupations. First- and 2nd-grade children were asked to provide an aspiration and then an expectation, suggesting that the order of the questions could assess the childÕs relative confidence in their aspiration (Looft, 1971). Of the 33 boys in the study, approximately 70% changed their response across the two questions, whereas 42% of the 33 girls changed their response. Looft concluded that boys were less confident in their ability to fulfill their career aspirations. Replicating LooftÕs study over a decade later to explore for potential historical changes, Adams and Hicken (1984) found the reverse relationship, with boys demonstrating more consistency between their aspirations and expectations. Moreover, girls had broadened their career aspirations toward more prestigious careers relative to LooftÕs (1971) sample and those girls who aspired to professional occupations were more likely to lower their expectations

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than were boys who aspired to similar occupations. Adams and Hicken (1984) concluded that the career aspirations of girls from younger cohorts were more prestigious than those from older cohorts and that this change has led to younger female cohorts experiencing more uncertainty about their ability to fulfill their higher career aspirations. Adding another facet to this trend, evidence suggests that boys aspire to a greater diversity of occupations yet girls aspire to more cross-sex occupations (that also tend to be more prestigious) during childhood, and even more so during adolescence (Sandberg et al., 1991). When posed with the aspiration question (‘‘what do you want to be when you grow up?’’) and expectation question (‘‘what job do you expect to have when you grow up?’’) questions, adolescent girls tended to shift their expectation toward more female-dominated occupations. Boys did not exhibit the same trend toward more male-dominated occupations. In summary, younger female cohorts, relative to older female cohorts, aspire to more prestigious occupations. These occupations tend to be occupied by men, have higher educational requirements, require greater time and energy commitments, and involve greater competition and selectivity. As a consequence, the gap between the prestige of girlsÕ occupational aspirations, on the one hand, and their expectations, on the other, appears to be getting larger relative to their male peers and older female cohorts. These sex-based and historically based differences may be a reflection of the challenges and perceived sex barriers associated with prestigious occupations. 4.2.3. Sex and diversity of occupations In general, boys report more diverse occupational aspirations (Adams & Hicken, 1984; Arap-Maritim, 1984; Boynton, 1936; Franken, 1983; Gray, 1944; Looft, 1971; Siegel, 1973; Vondracek & Kirchner, 1974). Some studies confirm this finding, but only for certain ages (Miller & Stanford, 1987; Sandberg et al., 1991), some found no sex differences (Archer, 1984; Bobo et al., 1998; Trice & King, 1991), and still others found the opposite trend (Trice & Rush, 1995). It is likely that differences in historical time account somewhat for these mixed findings. Although the predominant trend suggests that boys express a greater diversity of career aspirations, other research suggests that children generally perceive girls to be more likely to cross the occupational sex divide and to pursue both male- and female-dominated professions, thereby increasing their range of perceived career options (Griffin & Holder, 1987; Spare & Dahmen, 1984; White & Ouellette, 1980). At the same time, boys tend to have more rigid sex-based preferences than do girls when asked to select their preferred occupations from a prescribed list of gender-stereotypical and neutral professions (Awender & Wearne, 1990) or when simply asked to report their preference in an open-ended format (Franken, 1983; Nelson, 1978; Sandberg et al., 1991). Spare and Dahmen (1984) asked children to report their actual career aspiration (i.e., same sex condition) and their career aspiration if they were the opposite sex (i.e., opposite sex condition). Both boys and girls ascribed a less rigid sex-specific occupational mandate to girls. Other research, employing similar methods, supports these findings (Nelson, 1978; Zuckerman & Sayre, 1982) even across children of different races (Bobo et al., 1998). Demographic variables such as

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parentsÕ educational and employment status, childÕs age and grade level, and the number and ages of the childÕs siblings, however, did not predict whether a child reported a preference for a sex-typed profession (Zuckerman & Sayre, 1982). The tendency of girls to aspire to more cross-sex occupations than their male peers may be explained by the observation that stereotypically masculine occupations tend to yield more income and prestige than do professions typically associated with women. In a study examining the impact of crossing the gender barrier, Adams and Hicken (1984) found that girls who maintained stereotypically female career aspirations and boys who expressed aspirations counter to male stereotypes tended to aspire to lower status professions than their same-sex peers exhibiting the opposite sexbased choice. There appears to be a clear occupational status benefit that may be driving girls to embrace and boys to resist an egalitarian perspective of the occupational world. Research examining the impact of sex and gender-role identity on career aspirations indicates that kindergarten and grade-school childrenÕs career aspirations relate to their sex, with boys and girls aspiring to male- and female-dominated occupations, respectively (Archer, 1984; Sellers et al., 1999). These studies have found gender-role identity unrelated to childrenÕs career aspirations and the majority of the children were classified as androgynous. In contrast, Gorrell and Shaw (1988) found that sex predicted preadolescent and adolescent childrenÕs self-efficacy beliefs about their perceived ability to learn and perform male- and female-dominated occupations. Boys believed to a greater extent than girls that they could learn the tasks required of male-dominated occupations, whereas girls believed to a greater extent than boys that they could learn the tasks required of female-dominated occupations. Children have also been found capable of casting their peers into suitable occupational roles (Clark & Misa, 1967). Such a skill requires knowledge of occupations and peer traits, and the means to match occupations with those traits. Fourth- to 6th-grade children (N = 203, 35% African American, 65% Caucasian) from a racially integrated school were asked to report their occupational choice and do so again 1 month later. Results indicated that the childrenÕs occupational aspirations were quite stable over time (r = .92, p < .001). A significant association was found between the boysÕ aspirations and peer nominations for similar roles in a class play. Boys who aspired to professional or masculine-aggressive occupations such as boxer or baseball player were more likely to be nominated for those roles in the class play. No significant association was found for the girls. 4.3. Race/Ethnicity Some research suggests that children from minority groups in the United States aspire to less prestigious occupations than do their Caucasian peers (Clark & Misa, 1967; Cook et al., 1996) and that race may predict the occupational prestige children associate with their aspirations (Griffin & Holder, 1987). Unfortunately, most of the older studies confound race and SES or imply that African American and Caucasian children come from similar social classes. Therefore, the independent effect of race could not be estimated.

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SES and the prestige and socioeconomic class of childrenÕs occupational expectations and aspirations have been found to be positively linked. As is the case with much of the research on the effects of race, the SES studies often confound race and SES. Adding to the confusion, other investigations have reported conflicting findings, with children from minority races reporting higher aspirations or expectations (Gray, 1944). Establishing a mean estimate of the effect of race on aspirations and expectations, independent of childrenÕs SES, is therefore not advisable given this serious limitation within the literature, but there appears to be at least a multiplicative effect involving the two demographic variables. Any conclusions about the effect of race on childrenÕs vocational aspirations, based on studies that span as many as 7 or 8 decades, must also be tempered by knowledge that social conditions and personal attitudes about race have undergone profound changes during this period. What may have been true in 1950 may no longer be true or relevant in the 21st century. These observations highlight the significance of studies that explore potential mechanisms underlying presumed race differences in career aspirations, in contrast to studies that simply document the existence of such differences. One such study asked 282 children aged 3–6 years old (98 African Americans and 184 Caucasians) to respond to the question, ‘‘A (boy or girl) can be all sorts of things when (s)he grows up. What would you like to be when you grow up?’’ (Vondracek & Kirchner, 1974, p. 253). African American childrenÕs responses tended to focus on their present circumstance (e.g., ‘‘be a boy’’) and the immediate future (e.g., ‘‘a boy scout’’), whereas their Caucasian counterparts tended to report specific adult occupations, thereby suggesting that they were more focused on the future. African American children who named adult-based roles tended to be less specific such as ‘‘be a lady or man,’’ whereas Caucasian children tended to name more specific occupational roles such as nurse or policeman. Vondracek and Kirchner concluded that African American children may be less able to project themselves into future adult occupational roles than their Caucasian age mates and this may indicate a delay in their vocational development that could impact later vocational choices and outcomes. These findings were replicated in a subsequent study of 387 African American children in the 1st through 5th grades that used the same measurement scheme (Miller & Stanford, 1987). Recent research suggests that 1st- through 6th-grade Caucasian children aspire to a greater diversity of occupations than do their Hispanic and African American peers (Bobo et al., 1998). African American boys have been found less likely to aspire to professional occupations than their Caucasian peers (Clark & Misa, 1967). In this same study, a significant association emerged between aspirations and peer nominations into occupations for African American boys who aspired to professional occupations, but not for Caucasian boys. Underscoring and combining these race-based effects, 40% of the African American and 75% of the Caucasian boys aspired to professional occupations, but 90% of the African American and 54% of the Caucasian children who aspired to professional occupations were classified into those professions by their African American and Caucasian peers. The children in this sample were better able to distinguish the professionally oriented African American boys than the pro-

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fessionally oriented Caucasian children from their peers aspiring to other occupations. African American boys from poorer families generally have reported less prestigious career aspirations and expectations than their wealthier Caucasian male age mates (Cook et al., 1996). As the children became older the prestige gap between the African American boysÕ aspirations and expectations became larger relative to their Caucasian male peers. Cook et al. suggested that as children get older, they may become more aware of an opportunity structure that is partly contingent upon race and class differences, and that this increasing awareness could yield a widening occupational aspiration-expectation difference in groups of people who are typically excluded from occupational opportunities at the top end of the prestige hierarchy. In sum, Caucasian children may demonstrate more advanced career development than their African American age mates in terms of their ability to project themselves into future occupational roles and in terms of the diversity of their aspirations (Bobo et al., 1998; Miller & Stanford, 1987; Vondracek & Kirchner, 1974). These differences may contribute to race- and/or SES-based differences in vocational aspirations and expectations (Cook et al., 1996), career choices, and career outcomes later in life. Future research could explore the factors that contribute to these racial differences and whether and to what extent they affect subsequent vocational development. 4.4. Sex and race interaction Minority children exhibit sex differences similar to those observed in Caucasian children (Miller & Stanford, 1987). Gray (1944) reported in a large sample of 6to 14-year-old African American children that 24% more girls than boys aspired to either professional or semi-professional occupations, partly due to the fact that the vast majority of girls aspired to become either a teacher (34%) or nurse (22%), whereas the more popular aspirations for boys were doctor (16%), farmer (14%), and carpenter (12%). Gray compared these results to previous research findings using the same measurement scheme (Boynton, 1936) and concluded that African American and Caucasian children reported very similar occupational aspirations but on average African American children aspired to more skilled (i.e., prestigious) occupations than did the Caucasian children. Caucasian, Hispanic, and African American girls have exhibited very similar aspirations (e.g., nurse and teacher), whereas boys report a greater variety of occupations (Bobo et al., 1998). Unfortunately, as in most studies on aspirations, race and SES were confounded. Also, the data in this study were not subjected to statistical analyses, nor were the aspirations coded in terms of their prestige or socioeconomic class. Nevertheless, these findings suggest that differences attributable to race may be more pronounced in boys than girls, but the magnitude of the difference was not estimated quantitatively. Miller and Stanford (1987) found that African American gradeschool children (1st through 5th grades) from economically disadvantaged families exhibited sex differences in their career aspirations that were consistent with studies employing Caucasian samples. The boys reported aspiring to a greater variety of jobs

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than their female age mates across all represented school grades, but the differences were not all statistically significant. 4.5. Contextual influences 4.5.1. SES Researchers examining the relationship between socioeconomic status and career aspirations implicitly or explicitly test the theory that wealth begets wealth and poverty begets poverty. Research spanning most of the 20th century supports this theory by finding that SES is positively associated with the prestige or socioeconomic class associated with childrenÕs career aspirations and expectations (Boynton, 1936; Brook et al., 1974; Cook et al., 1996; Galler, 1951; Reisman & Banuelos, 1984; Vigod, 1972; Weinger, 2000). Some studies, however, have found no difference based on social class (Morland, 1960). Typically, when a positive association was found, the investigatorsÕ methods confounded race and SES (Boynton, 1936; Cook et al., 1996; Weinger, 2000) or the racial composition was unclear (Galler, 1951; Vigod, 1972). When investigators did not confound race and SES the results were mixed, with one study finding (Brook et al., 1974) and one failing to find an association between SES and the prestige of occupational aspirations and expectations (Morland, 1960). Wealthier Caucasian children have reported more prestigious aspirations and expectations than poorer African American children (Cook et al., 1996). Poorer African American children also have demonstrated a larger gap between expectations and aspirations and the gap widens with age (Cook et al., 1996; Morland, 1960). In an earlier study, Vigod (1972) explored many of the same SES-based issues as Cook et al. (1996) by employing a sample of 574 Canadian school children who ranged in age from 5 to 16 years of age (M = 10 years) and who represented a wide range of socioeconomic classes. Consistent with expectations, Vigod (1972) found that the association between SES and occupational expectations was stronger than the association between SES and occupational aspirations for the boys. For the girls, the association was much weaker but followed the same trend. The association between SES and expectations was generally larger in older cohorts of boys and girls. Consistent with Cook et al.Õs (1996) later findings, Vigod (1972) also found that social class was inversely associated with the difference between the socioeconomic index of aspirations and expectations of boys and girls and this association became stronger with age. Two studies examined the career aspirations of lower- and middle-class children and their perceptions of childrenÕs career aspirations residing in lower- and middle-class households (Weinger, 1998, 2000). Both studies used a projective technique involving three pictures portraying a typical lower-, middle-, and upper-class home. The children, aged 5–14 years, were asked to imagine a child residing in each of the homes and then they were questioned about the career prospects of these imagined children. Children from more impoverished backgrounds tended to believe that poorer children aspire to less prestigious occupations requiring less formal education and that poorer children are less likely to achieve their career goals than are children from wealthier families. Middle-class children may not be as aware as their lower-

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class peers of the barriers associated with financial status, given that they reported greater optimism for the imagined poorer child and failed to identify barriers associated with discrimination as frequently as their age mates from impoverished backgrounds. When asked to report their personal career aspirations, the middle-class children reported professional career tracks twice as frequently as the children from low-income households (Weinger, 2000). The poorer children were three times more likely to aspire to occupations in the law-enforcement and manual labor sectors and twice as likely to aspire to occupations in professional athletics and show business. Poorer children, therefore, appeared to be as optimistic as their middle-class peers of fulfilling their career aspirations. The lower- and middle-class children reported personal characteristics (e.g., skill and motivation) and financial resources as factors that would enhance their chances of success. Weinger (2000) concluded that the poorer children may have compartmentalized their perceptions of the career barriers associated with SES to preserve optimism about their occupational futures. Subsequent research could examine whether and to what extent compartmentalized perceptions of class- and race-based barriers may hinder progress toward career aspirations and whether changes in compartmentalization relate to changes in the prestige of childrenÕs career aspirations. Brook et al. (1974) effectively addressed the potential for collinearity between race and SES by intentionally sampling an equivalent range of social classes within a group of African American and Caucasian children. Poorer children demonstrated more upward mobility in their vocational aspirations across age. Lower-SES girls had higher occupational aspirations, whereas wealthier girls had lower aspirations relative to their male peers with similar socioeconomic backgrounds. 4.5.2. Family Presumably, the family wields considerable influence on childrenÕs vocational development, including aspirations and expectations (Schulenberg et al., 1984). The surprisingly little research in this area supports this notion. For instance, Trice (1991) reported that 47% of 8-year-olds and 16% of 11-year-olds aspired to the same occupation held by one of their parents. Of those 8- and 11-year-olds who exhibited stability in their career aspirations across an 8-month period, approximately 55% of the former and 70% of the latter reported aspiring to one of their parentsÕ occupations. Aspiring to a parentÕs occupation appears to yield greater stability in childrenÕs vocational aspirations. Hill (1965) found that relatives and friends influenced gradeschool studentsÕ career aspirations more than school personnel, and Chown (1958) found parents to be the single most important factor influencing childrenÕs vocational preferences and choices, and the quality of this influence varied with the childÕs sex. Parents were more directive and specific about boysÕ desired occupational choices, leaving girls freer and more open, at least initially, to state their preferences. Paradoxically, girls were found to be more in conflict with their parents over their preferences than were boys. In a sample of children aged 7–11 years (81 girls, 77 boys), perceived parental power influenced girlsÕ preferences for sex-typed occupations but not those of boys (Lavine, 1982). Preference for traditionally female-typed occupations occurred

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more in girls with high perceived father dominance, whereas preference for neutral or primarily male-typed occupations occurred more in girls with egalitarian or mother-dominant parental power distributions. Five-year-old children who perceived their fathers as powerful, attractive, and warm could better articulate their preferences (Seligman et al., 1988). FatherÕs influence on childrenÕs vocational interest expression was found to wane, however, in a follow-up study of 10-year-olds (Seligman et al., 1991), prompting these researchers to interpret this finding as commensurate with the decreasing influence of power and mastery needs among older children. ParentsÕ gender stereotypes, maternal employment status, and traditionality of their occupations relative to the traditionality of their childrenÕs vocational interests were examined in a sample of 113 preschool children (Barak, Feldman, & Noy, 1991). Traditionality of motherÕs occupation proved to be the only variable significantly correlated with traditionality of childrenÕs interests. Children of mothers working in jobs not customarily female-occupied demonstrated fewer gender-typed interests. 4.5.3. Urban–rural differences Rural 8- and 11-year-old children exhibited more stability in their career aspirations over an 8-month period than did their urban peers (Trice, 1991). Regardless of age, rural children tended to aspire to a parentÕs occupation more frequently than did their urban peers, thus leading to the conclusion that parental occupations and a finite set of choices in rural communities serve to promote greater stability in rural childrenÕs career aspirations. 4.5.4. Socio-cultural and national differences Political and cultural context influenced the career aspirations of Irish Catholic and Protestant children living in Belfast, Ireland (Hammond & Dingley, 1989). Nearly 10% of Protestant grade-school children aspired to professions within the British military, while virtually no Irish Catholic girls and boys aspired to these occupations. Lambert and Klineberg (1963) examined the vocational aspirations of 6-, 10-, and 14-year-old boys, the relationship of the boysÕ aspirations to their fathersÕ occupations, and the variability in this relationship across children residing in urban middle and lower-class communities within 11 different nationalities. Engineering, medicine, and mechanical occupations were consistently popular choices across nationalities. Social class did not appear to have an influence on the prestige associated with the boysÕ occupational aspirations except in cases of older French and German children who demonstrated a positive association between social class and the prestige associated with their vocational aspirations. No systematic age-specific variation in the boysÕ aspirations was observed. The degree of similarity between the prestige associated with the boysÕ aspirations and the prestige associated with their fathersÕ occupations varied by nationality, age, and the interaction between the two. Across all nationalities, boys tended to aspire to more prestigious occupations than their fathers currently held. A cluster of countries exhibited a larger gap (in order of mag-

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nitude: Turkey, Lebanon, French Canada, Israel, Bantu [South Africa], Brazil, and the United States) relative to the countries exhibiting a smaller gap (in order of magnitude: English Canada, France, West Germany, and Japan). Second, the prestige gap tended to be larger in the older cohorts of boys. Finally, the prestige gap tended to be smaller in older cohorts of French boys and larger among older Japanese, German, and Israeli boys relative to their younger countrymen. Regarding the last finding, Lambert and Klineberg suggested that French society may exert increasing social control as children move into adolescence and the reverse may be true in Japan, Germany, and Israel. Lambert and Klineberg (1963) also examined the association between the mean parent–child prestige gap of the various countries and an estimate of the degree of achievement motivation endorsed in popular childrenÕs readers employed by school districts within all of the nations except South Africa and Brazil. The association between the two variables was r = .87 (p < .01). In order from lowest to highest, the sample readers from Japan, Germany, the United States, and English Canada received the lowest achievement motivation scores, and they also tended to demonstrate the smallest gap between boysÕ aspirations and expectations. In order from lowest to highest, the readers from Lebanon, French Canada, and Turkey received the highest achievement motivation scores. These national differences suggest that emerging countries appear to foster more achievement motivation and intergenerational upward mobility in children than do more economically and politically established nations. 4.6. Summary Three distinct yet related lines of research suggest that occupational barriers and a lack of occupational opportunities may be the primary factors driving the observed differences between aspirations and expectations. First, more girls are aspiring to traditionally male-dominated professions, and as a potential consequence of this trend toward crossing the gender barrier, the gap in the prestige of girlsÕ aspirations and expectations has widened during the latter part of the 20th century relative to boys (Adams & Hicken, 1984). Research also finds a widening gap in aspirations and expectations across race and SES with advancing age, suggesting that as children age, they become more aware of racial and socioeconomic class barriers (Cook et al., 1996). Lastly, a set of studies has found a positive relationship between SES and the prestige associated with aspirations and expectations (Boynton, 1936; Brook et al., 1974; Galler, 1951; Vigod, 1972; Weinger, 2000) and between SES and the gap in expectations and aspirations (Cook et al., 1996; Morland, 1960; Vigod, 1972). This suggests that perceived barriers and an opportunity deficit associated with SES might lead to a larger gap between aspirations and expectations. The prevailing theme across these findings supports the proposition that a childÕs perception of their occupational barriers, an absence of occupational opportunities, and historical change in social conventions may be fundamental factors driving between-person differences in the prestige associated with occupational aspirations and expectations and in the within-person difference between the two.

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5. Vocational interests 5.1. Developmental progress It has been widely assumed that the establishment of interests occurs in childhood, yet only modest research attention has been accorded to child vocational interest development (Betz, 1992; Fagin, 1953; Hansen, 1984; Tracey, 2002). The empirical deficit notwithstanding, childrenÕs vocational interests have been a long-standing topic in both vocational and developmental psychology. Research has investigated development during childhood in terms of interest stability, structure and content, and differentiation. Few differences in vocational interests have been documented across African American, Hispanic, White, and Spanish Primary Language [SPL] racial groups (Arbona, 1995; Davison Aviles & Spokane, 1999). 5.1.1. Stability The earliest studies of vocational interest development examined interest stability in childhood and adolescence (Boynton, 1936; Lehman & Witty, 1929). Thorndike (1912, 1917) initiated inquiry in this area, finding college studentsÕ retrospective rank order preferences for various school subjects moderately stable between elementary school and college (r = .60–.85). Nevertheless, the consensus from more recent research appears to be that interest patterns are rather variable from childhood to adolescence and gain relative stability in early adulthood (Betsworth & Fouad, 1997; Hansen, 1984), supporting FaginÕs (1953) assertion that ‘‘interest patterns are probably neither well differentiated nor very stable before age 15’’ (p. 172). 5.1.2. Structure and content In terms of the development of interest content and structure, an early study involving a large sample of 30,545 students aged 10–20 years identified distinct expressed interest categories of aesthetical, practical, intellectual, and sports (Bruhn, 1938). Three interest dimensions associated with play behavior (i.e., active outdoor play, indoor play with toys, and paper–pencil–crayon activity) and one work interest dimension (i.e., helping adults with work) were identified in a study of kindergartnersÕ free responses to interview questions (Tyler, 1945). Similar interest groupings were found among a small sample of 5-year-olds (Seligman et al., 1988). A longitudinal study of vocational interest development among 6- to 10-year-old children, investigated the origins of vocational interest structure in terms of discrete patterns of likes and dislikes (Tyler, 1955). Findings indicated that wholesale activity preferences during early childhood become patterns of more specific, differentiated vocational interests as children begin to identify those activities that they dislike. This finding in part prompted a later contention that interests derive at least as much from what one dislikes or rejects as they do from what one likes or accepts (Tyler, 1964). OppenheimerÕs (1991) work attributed the occupations girls and boys come to prefer and not prefer to socialization effects and occupational gender stereotyping. In a series of studies exploring general interest development and structure in children and adolescents aged 4–20 years (Van der Wilk & Oppenheimer, 1991), three pri-

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mary interest clusters were identified: personal (e.g., work as a source of success), personal/social (e.g., dating and adventure), and social (e.g., social influences on learning). The structure of vocational interests appears to change with age (Dusek, Kermis, & Monge, 1979; Freeberg & Rock, 1973; Zbaracki, Clark, & Wolins, 1985). An emerging line of inquiry based on HollandÕs (1997) RIASEC types supports the occurrence of age-graded structural changes. In two studies reported by Tracey and Ward (1998), a circular or circumplex model did not fit the RIASEC scores of elementary school students, was a poor fit in middle school students, and fit well with the RIASEC scores of college students. These results indicated a positive relationship between the RIASEC circular structure of interests and age. A subsequent study further supported the validity of the circumplex structure of interests with increasing age (Tracey, 2002). Based on his review and analysis of the literature, Tracey (2002) posited that the structure of childrenÕs interests develops over time from more concrete to more abstract and that interest structures are variable and uneven across individuals. These studies suggest that distinct interest categories can be identified for elementary school-age children. 5.1.3. Differentiation Genetic influences on vocational interest development have been supported in various twin studies, which suggest that from 36 to 50% of the variance in interests can be attributed to genetic factors (Betsworth et al., 1994; Moloney, Bouchard, & Segal, 1991), thereby supporting the notion that biologically defined potential relates to vocational development. A study examining the influence of physical characteristics (height and weight during the 4th grade) on later interest development, however, did not find a systematic relationship (Raygor & Watley, 1965). Age differences in vocational interest development (defined as interest differentiation) were examined in a study of five large and diverse samples comprising children (4th-, 5th-, and 6th-grade students), adolescents, and adults (Edwards, Nafziger, & Holland, 1974). Results supported the hypothesis that older age groups have more differentiated interest profiles than do younger age groups. One notable exception was that elementary school girls had more differentiated interests than did high school girls. The findings supported prior research by Cureton (1970) and prompted Edwards et al. (1974) to conclude that increased interest differentiation could be used as an indicator of advancing vocational maturity. This conclusion is supported by other findings indicating age-related increases in childrenÕs awareness about interests and a shift from powerful and famous imaginary heroes to more realistic interests between ages 8 and 11 years (Van der Wilk & Oppenheimer, 1991). Commenting on such age differences in occupational preferences, Oppenheimer (1991) indicated that vocational interests reflect social rationalizations of ‘‘the pleasure-related interests evident during the first 4–7 years of life’’ (p. 49), thereby suggesting that the narrowing (i.e., differentiation) of vocational interests from childhood to adolescence may be due to socialization effects that restrict the range of vocational interests that society permits children to pursue at different ages.

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5.2. Gender and sex-role influences Gender has been described as the most important factor influencing childrenÕs occupational preferences, with childrenÕs views of occupational sex-typing well established by the early elementary school years (Bigler, Averhart, & Liben, 2003; Stockard & McGee, 1990). Thus, differences in childrenÕs interest patterns are clearly associated with socially circumscribed gender roles. These differences have also been demonstrated cross-culturally in a large scale study of children from former East and West Germany (Vondracek, Silbereisen, Reitzle, & Wiesner, 1999). Early studies indicated that boys generally prefer more active, outdoor activities and girls prefer more sedentary, indoor activities (Boynton, 1936; Fagot & Littman, 1976; Harmon, 1971; Lehman & Witty, 1931b; Lehman & Witty, 1936). Research has consistently produced findings of some clearly defined occupation-specific gender differences (a proxy for interests) such as boys preferring aviator, carpenter, physician, scientist, and police officer, and girls preferring nursing, teaching, secretary, and artist (Boynton, 1936; Lehman & Witty, 1931b; Stockard & McGee, 1990). Girls have been shown to prefer occupations described as sedentary, esthetic, and personal service oriented, whereas boys prefer occupations involving travel, movement, physical activity, and giving orders or commands and boysÕ interests change more with age than do girlsÕ (Fagot & Littman, 1976; Lehman & Witty, 1936). Greater heterogeneity of interests has been found in boys than in girls (Boynton, 1936; Fagot & Littman, 1976; Gray, 1944; Siegel, 1973). Interestingly, one study found that girls were more interested in occupations in the professions than were boys (Boynton, 1936). Studies have almost invariably indicated that girls prefer stereotypically female occupations, boys prefer stereotypically male occupations, and that boys report a higher number and broader range of vocational interests (Birk & Blimline, 1984; Hammond & Dingley, 1989; Harmon, 1971; Karre, 1976; Looft, 1971; Miller & Stanford, 1987; Stockard & McGee, 1990; Vondracek & Kirchner, 1974). These sex differences have been attributed to gender identity development and the general process of occupational role knowledge development (Stockard & McGee, 1990). In two studies, however, girls were found to have an equally broad if not wider range of vocational interests as compared to boys (Gregg & Dobson, 1980; Lavine, 1982). Fagot and Littman (1976) examined the relationship between preschool interest patterns and intellectual ability in elementary school. Results indicated for boys an inverse relationship between work interests and science, math, and art ability. High masculinity at preschool in girls correlated positively with high teacher ratings in science, mathematics, and language arts at elementary school. Boys and girls were rated equally on intellectual ability, yet girls identified far fewer career goals (n = 9) than did boys (n = 27). Boys have been found to prefer traditional gender-stereotyped occupational roles more than do girls, and children of lower socioeconomic status tend to select occupations traditional for their sex more so than do children of higher socioeconomic status (Awender & Wearne, 1990). A few studies have supported a lessening of gender-typed vocational interests in children, perhaps commensurate with changing gender-role norms and expectations

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(Adams & Hicken, 1984). This trend is underscored by research demonstrating that children tend to exhibit fewer gender-typed vocational interests when their mothers are working in stereotypically masculine occupations (Barak et al., 1991). Another study found little support for girls and boys holding traditional gender-typed occupational preferences (Gorrell & Shaw, 1988). This finding may be due to increased cognitive flexibility during middle childhood that results in decreased rigidity and more traditional attitudes toward masculine and feminine roles. 5.3. Psychological correlates High masculinity in 1st-grade boys correlated positively with development of scientific interests in high school (Tyler, 1964). A modicum of research has focused on relationships between interests, abilities, and intelligence. Thorndike (1912) found a positive correlation between interests and abilities in a study of college students who retrospectively reported their childhood interests and abilities. In a concluding statement about his research and consistent with a contemporary view advanced by Tracey (2001), Thorndike (1912) attributed the interest-ability link to individuals liking what they are able to do, developing the capability to do what they like, or some combination of these two mechanisms. In a more contemporary evaluation of a cognitive restructuring intervention that aimed to raise levels of perceived ability to perform, expected success, and anticipated satisfaction, the intervention was associated with an increased interest in the target activities (Barak, Shiloh, & Haushner, 1992). Tracey (2001) noted that theory widely supports the interest-competence link suggesting that children are more likely to develop interests in activities in which they feel competent. ChildrenÕs competence beliefs and interests have also been found to relate reciprocally over time such that self-perceived ability to perform an activity predicts level of interest in that activity and vice versa (Tracey, 2002). 5.4. Summary Research indicates that interest patterns vary from childhood to adolescence and gain relative stability in early adulthood. Gender influences, in the form of occupational sex-typing, have generally been found to affect interest development. Changing gender roles for women and men may result in less gender-stereotypic vocational interests as expressed through activity- and occupational-based preferences.

6. Career maturity/adaptability 6.1. Developmental progress Consistent with theory, research supports age-graded increases in vocational maturity during childhood. For example, a longitudinal investigation found an increase in rate of vocational choice readiness among 111 girls and boys as they progressed from 8th grade to 10th grade (Gribbons, 1964). Studies that have used

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cross-sectional designs generally address degree of career development, yet also make inferences about developmental rate from the data. In this line, an early study of vocational choice preference found an increase with age in occupational choice realism among children and adolescents aged 8.5–18.5 years (Lehman & Witty, 1929). At each increasing age level, participants in the study were less likely to report a willingness to engage in occupations deemed to be unrealistic, such as cowboy or cowgirl. Research on career decidedness of students in grades 6–12 (N = 5200) similarly found age and grade-level increases in choice realism and decidedness (Hollender, 1967, 1971). Based on a sample of 117 5th- and 6th-grade boys, Kelso (1977) reported evidence to indicate that realism and attitudinal career maturity increase with age. These findings were supported by a later study indicating that realism of vocational interests increased with advancing age in children between 8 and 11 years of age (Van der Wilk & Oppenheimer, 1987). A sample of 489 German children, aged 10–13 years, evidenced a high level of choice realism and identity development associated with early vocational preference formation (Vondracek et al., 1999). Identity achievement also increased significantly with grade level in a sample of 6th-, 8th-, 10th-, and 12th-grade students (Archer, 1982). Developmental increases in choice realism occurred among a sample of Caucasian and African American preschool children between ages 3 and 6 years (Vondracek & Kirchner, 1974). Consequent to a career guidance intervention, degree of vocational maturity significantly increased in a sample of middle school students (Rubinton, 1985). Consistent with career maturity theory, these findings indicate developmental progress in career choice readiness on the realism dimension during childhood. Increases in cognitive vocational maturity have been found among children as young as preschool to 3rd grade (Nelson, 1978). Borgen and Young (1982) investigated how 5th- through 12th-grade children and adolescents process occupational information and construe the world-of-work. Their findings indicated that children in the lower age groups construed occupations more in terms of the activities and behaviors associated with these occupations, whereas older children and adolescents proffered more sophisticated descriptions of occupations in terms of variables such as interests and the steps involved in preparing for, entering, and progressing in an occupation. Similar findings emerged in a study that examined cognitive vocational maturity levels among 3rd-, 6th-, 9th-, and 12th-graders (Walls, 2000). Significant developmental progress was found such that children in each progressively older age group conveyed more accurate knowledge about occupations in terms of status, requirements, earnings, and so on. 6.2. Gender and sex-role influences Consistent with theoretical assertions related to sex differences in aspirations and expectations, studies involving adolescent samples have typically found significant gender differences in career maturity, with girls scoring higher than boys on measures of the construct. Among children, this finding is supported by research with 5thgrade girls (N = 3000), who obtained higher scores on a measure of general psychosocial maturity than did boys (Greenberger, Campbell, Sorensen, & OÕConnor,

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1971). However, no significant gender differences in occupational planfulness were found among preschool-age children between 3 and 6 years of age (Vondracek & Kirchner, 1974). Stockard and McGee (1990) noted that sex-typing strongly biases childrenÕs attitudes toward occupations such that girls and boys prefer occupations that they perceive as appropriate for their sex. Research by Liben and Signorella (1980) similarly found that occupational sex-typing biases childrenÕs knowledge about the world-of-world in terms of occupations perceived as traditional and appropriate for women and men. 6.3. Contextual influences Higher SES has been found to significantly predict more career mature attitudes among a sample of 300 6th-grade students (Holland, 1981). Retrospective research indicated higher levels of career maturity among community college students who reported a positive early parental environment than among those reporting a negative early parental environment (Miller, 1978). Parental support behaviors and family relocation have been found to affect the timing of vocational preference formation in samples of German children and adolescents aged 13–19 years (Silbereisen, Vondracek, & Berg, 1997). Children of parents who provided higher levels of support made vocational choices earlier in both samples. Timing and disruptiveness of family relocations also was associated with earlier (probably foreclosed) expression of vocational choices for children and adolescents in the East German sample. A subsequent study, however, found that these variables did not affect timing of choice, leading the authors to surmise that the difference in findings may be attributable to these parent variables assuming importance only at the time when preferences are actualized (Vondracek et al., 1999). 6.4. Psychological correlates More advanced identity development has been linked to the formation of early vocational preferences among 10- to 13-year-old children (Vondracek et al., 1999). A direct correlation between intelligence in childhood and later occupational status attainment has also been reported in the range of .57–.71 (Ball, 1938). It has been suggested, based on findings of age-graded increases in vocational interest differentiation, that occupational perceptions could be used to estimate vocational maturity level (Edwards et al., 1974). Specifically, the ability to differentiate among occupational groups might be linked to vocational maturity. A small positive relationship has also been found between career maturity and self-concept (Holland, 1981). Harter (1982) developed a measure of childrenÕs perceived competence that may be useful for studies of this construct as a correlate of career maturity. 6.5. Summary On balance, empirical research on vocational maturation in childhood supports theory. The data indicate that children move from more fantasy-based to more real-

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ity-based orientations in their occupational decision-making behavior as they approach adolescence. Age-graded increases in career maturity occur on both the attitudinal and cognitive dimensions as children become more oriented to the future, engage in exploratory behavior, and become more knowledgeable about the world-of-work and making career decisions.

7. Conclusion Vocational development clearly begins during childhood (Dorr & Lesser, 1980; Magnuson & Starr, 2000; Vondracek, 2001a). Rather than conceiving of it as a passive, quiescent period disconnected from the whole of life-span vocational development, childhood should be viewed as a period of active precursory engagement in the world-of-work to develop initial concern about the future, control over oneÕs life, conceptions about career decision making, and confidence to make and implement career choices (Savickas, 2002a). An orientation and openness to the future lived in the present and respective of the past is a critical dimension of vocational development that ideally first emerges during this early life period. Curiosity, fantasy, interests, and capacities are aroused and take shape as children playfully construct possible future selves projected in work and other social roles (Ginzberg et al., 1951; Super, 1984). Preliminary evidence suggests that steady progress in vocational exploration, awareness, aspirations and expectations, interests, and adaptability during childhood facilitates the development of personal identity and connectedness to the social and interpersonal world. Such progress at the same time may reduce the likelihood of delinquent and deviant behaviors, including alcohol and drug abuse. We hope that the present review creates a pathway for linking knowledge about child vocational development with what is known about such development in later age periods to construct a more complete portrayal of life-span vocational ontogeny. Our overarching goal was to use the review to suggest that we study the gestalt of vocational development through inquiry that links developmental periods rather than isolates them piecemeal according to specific age periods. This goal parallels currents within developmental psychology to study the developing person continuously over the life span rather than in discrete age-graded periods, as has been the mode of American developmental psychology with its distinct emphases on child development, adult development, and gerontology (Baltes, Staudinger, & Lindenberger, 1999). Our review indicated that much research on the topic of child vocational development has been conducted over the past 80 years. It also revealed that the literature is scattered across a wide range of disciplines and journals. Additionally, conceptual and definitional issues make it difficult to compare studies across disciplines and across historical time. Clearly, one pathway for future research involves responding to recent calls for research on life-span vocational development that uses truly longitudinal designs (Savickas, 2002b; Silbereisen, 2002). Most scientists and applied professionals who concern themselves with vocational development continue to labor under the mistaken assumption that key processes in vocational development take place almost

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exclusively in adolescence or later. The research evidence presented herein suggests otherwise. Vocational development begins much earlier in the life span than generally assumed, and what children learn about work and occupations has a profound affect on the choices they make as adolescents and young adults, and ultimately, on their occupational careers. Resonating with this assertion, Goldstein and Oldham (1979) concluded in their seminal volume examining children and their relationship to work that the development of an orientation toward work ‘‘not only starts early, but is far more extensive and rapid than many of us would have otherwise been prepared to believe’’ (p.177). Our review serves only to validate and reinforce these sentiments expressed a quarter of a century ago. It also alerts us to the need to focus more systematic research attention on the childhood antecedents and dimensions of occupational choice and vocational development across the life span and over the life course. References Adams, G. R., & Hicken, M. (1984). Historical-cultural change in the expression of vocational preference and expectation by preschool and elementary school age children. Family Relations, 33, 301–307. Arap-Maritim, E. K. (1984). Sex differences in the vocational aspiration and sex-role perceptions of primary-school children in rural Kenya. Journal of Social Psychology, 124(2), 159–164. Arbona, C. L. (1995). Career intervention strategies and assessment issues for African Americans. In F. T. L. Leong (Ed.), Career development and vocational behavior of racial and ethnic minorities (pp. 37–66). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. Archer, S. L. (1982). The lower age boundaries of identity development. Child Development, 53(6), 1551–1556. Archer, C. J. (1984). ChildrenÕs attitudes toward sex-role division in adult occupational roles. Sex Roles, 10, 1–10. Archer, S. L. (1989). Gender differences in identity development: Issues of process, domain and timing. Journal of Adolescence, 12, 117–138. Awender, M. A., & Wearne, T. D. (1990). Occupational choices of elementary school children: Traditional or non-traditional? Paper presented at the 16th Annual National Consultation on Vocational Counselling, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Bailey, B. A., & Nihlen, A. S. (1989). Elementary school childrenÕs perceptions of the world of work. Elementary School Guidance and Counseling, 24(2), 135–145. Bailey, B. A., & Nihlen, A. S. (1990). Effect of experience with nontraditional workers on psychological and social dimensions of occupational sex-role stereotyping by elementary school children. Psychological Reports, 66(3, Pt. 2), 1273–1282. Ball, R. S. (1938). The predictability of occupational level from intelligence. Journal of Consulting Psychology, 2, 184–186. Baltes, P. B., Lindenberger, U., & Staudinger, U. M. (1998). Life-span theory in developmental psychology. In R. M. Lerner (Ed.), Handbook of child psychology (Vol. 1, pp. 1029–1143). New York: Wiley. Baltes, P. B., Staudinger, U. M., & Lindenberger, U. (1999). Lifespan psychology: Theory and application to intellectual functioning. Annual Review of Psychology, 50, 471–507. Barak, A., Feldman, S., & Noy, A. (1991). Traditionality of childrenÕs interests as related to their parentsÕ gender stereotypes and traditionality of occupations. Sex Roles, 24, 511–524. Barak, A., Shiloh, S., & Haushner, O. (1992). Modification of interests through cognitive restructuring: Test of a theoretical model in preschool children. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 39, 490–497. Barclay, L. K. (1974). The emergence of vocational expectations in preschool children. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 4(1), 1–14.

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