Life Plans of Estonian Young Adults and Their Realization: The Impact of Parental Divorce in the Context of Late Socialism and the Post-Socialist Transition

Abstract

Previous studies have shown a connection between parental family characteristics, young adults’ life plans and their actual family life events. However, less is known about parental family influence in the context of the latesocialist period and rapid social, economic and political change. We use data from the longitudinal survey Paths of a generation in Estonia to look at the life plans and actual life events of the students graduating from secondary schools during the Soviet period in 1983. We compare the life plans of leaving home and starting a family made during the Soviet regime to the same life events actually occurring in 1986-2005. The analyses show that only the girls from families with divorced parents plan to start their independent lives earlier than girls from families with both biological parents. On the other hand, in the plans for family formation (marriage and birth of the first child) there are no major differences between these groups. In the actual life events of girls, however, we see the influence of parental dissolution. Girls from divorced families do not plan to create a family earlier than others, but in reality they do so. The result suggests that the parental family has an important role in shaping girls’ lives in the context of the late socialist period and societal change. Boys’ life plans seem to be more influenced by their educational choices than by the parental family.