Maternal Employment, Parent Involvement, and Mathematics Achievement among Adolescents

Abstract

Of women in labor force, it mothers with children at home whose numbers have grown fastest in recent decades. In 1987, 71% of mothers with husbands present in household and children between ages of 6 and 17 years and 57% of those with husbands present and children under 6 were employed. In 1973 (roughly year students in this study were born), those figures were only 50% and 33%, respectively (U.S. Department of Labor, 1989). The research on effects of maternal employment on child indicate mixed results. In a review of research on maternal employment and children's achievement for National Academy of Sciences, Heyns (1982) concluded that the children of working mothers differ very little from children of non-working mothers [on achievement] (p. 238). Another review published 2 years before found that there were measurable differences in academic performance and other measures of children's well-being depending on maternal employment status (Hoffman, 1980). Each has maintained and elaborated her position since (Heyns & Catsambis, 1986; Hoffman, 1989). Surely if maternal employment makes a difference to child it likely to be exhibited in parent-child relationships. Nock and Kingston (1988), for example, found differences in amount of time spend with their children depending on maternal employment status, although differences were most pronounced for of preschoolers and in non-child-centered time. Parents may interact with their child differently, and may in particular be involved in their child's education differently, depending on employment of mother outside home. Involvement in education likely to be very important for school-age children. We have very little knowledge about how relationships between and adolescents are influenced by amount of time mother spends at work outside home, and how that may influence critical transition of child from elementary to high school. This article examines two questions: First, does maternal employment status make a difference in how are involved with their eighth-grade adolescent child, and, if so, how? Second, in what ways does parent involvement intervene in relationship between maternal employment and mathematics achievement of adolescent child? A better understanding of ways in which maternal employment makes a difference in parent-child relationships, and of which relationships are important for child's academic development, will allow us to evaluate how needs of families are changing. Parent involvement in a child's education known to make a difference in child's achievement (Epstein, 1991; Fehrmann, Keith, & Reimers, 1987; Lareau, 1989; Muller, 1993a; Stevenson & Baker, 1987). Yet results of those studies suggest that there are many different ways for to be involved with their child. And may become involved differently depending on resources available to them (Baker & Stevenson, 1986; Lareau, 1989; Muller, 1993a). Lareau and Muller each suggested that not all forms of parent involvement have same consequences for child. Moreover, children of different ages may need different kinds of involvement from parents. As students get older, a style of managing school career increasingly important. As Baker and Stevenson (1986) stated, parents must...help [their child] move skillfully through [school] organization (p. 157). This may mean reaching out to school or developing strategies from home. To study parent involvement in education to identify one aspect of process by which family background makes a difference in a child's academic success. Coleman (1988) suggested that family background is analytically separable into at least three different components: financial capital, human capital, and social (p. S109). Financial capital may be measured by family income or wealth, human capital best measured by level of parents' education, and social capital has to do with relations among actors, in this case among and children. …