Occupational Attainment Process Research Articles

The gendered occupational value of a U.S. education for skilled Indian immigrants

AbstractThis article revisits conventional understandings of gender differences in occupational attainment through the context of highly skilled legal migration in the United States. Drawing on a unique combination of nationally representative survey data of Indian lawful permanent residents and in‐depth interviews with skilled Indian migrants holding employer‐sponsored visas, we find that a U.S. education has a large premium in occupational prestige scores in the global labour market and has the power to mitigate the gender gap in immigrant occupational attainment. U.S. credentials, social networks, and mentorship programs help drive the occupational prestige‐generating function of a U.S. education for highly skilled Indian immigrant women. This article demonstrates aggregate occupational patterns among a nationally representative sample of Indian permanent residents and develops an in‐depth understanding of the process of occupational attainment. Our findings offer new insights into factors that mitigate gender inequality in the high‐skilled immigrant labour force.

Education and inequality in employment in China and Japan in 2000s: a social network perspective

PurposeThis paper attempts to discover whether or not social networks work in the same way in different sectors of the labour market in the same society, using data from the 2008 Asian Social Survey. Labour markets in some societies are segmented; there are two segments in the labour market, namely, the core sector and the peripheral sector. The practices of each sector differs from the others. Some sectors employ CME labour markets, while others favour LME labour markets (Kanbayashi and Takenoshita, 2014). In other words, we can find both CME and LME labour market in one society.Design/methodology/approachSince Granovetter’s (1973) pioneer study, scholars are interested in investigating in what way social network influence our job searching outcomes. However, these researchers have not yet yielded consistent results. Scholars argue that the institutional context of labour market can shape the network impacts on our job search outcome (Chen, 2014; Chua, 2011).FindingsSurprisingly, this paper finds that there is no room for the use of personal contact in the public sector in both China and Japan. But, mean status is positively related to annual income in the private companies sector in both Japan and China. The significant influences of mean status in the private sectors in both China and Japan reflect the reinforcing of existing social inequality structure. This is because as the status of contact can facilitate respondents' job attainment process, those who are already in higher social status are more likely than those who are in the bottom of the social strata, to get a better job with the help from their network members.Originality/valueThe above findings show us that social network can exert various impacts on people's job searching process even in the same society. This is because it is possible that the labour market are segmented. These segments have very different practices. This difference attributes to the inconsistent findings of network effects on occupational attainment process. Therefore, it is essential to locate which labour market respondents are in, and the features of this labour market. This can help us know more about the use and effectiveness of network in different types of labour markets.

Gender and network effects on occupation: a case study of China

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to ask whether or not social networks can compensate for the disadvantages of being part of an unprivileged group in the job attainment process in urban China, using the 2008 China General Social Survey.Design/methodology/approachThe author compares the network effects on monthly income of local urban residents and rural migrants.FindingsFirst, the results show that social capital exerts no significant effect on monthly income for local residents and rural migrants. Second, having network members who work in state-owned and non-state-owned enterprises helps female rural migrants to obtain higher monthly incomes, compared to those whose network members work only in either state-owned enterprises or non-state-owned enterprises. The same is not true of male rural migrants or local residents.Originality/valueIt can be concluded that a more diversified network may compensate for female rural migrants’ disadvantages, caused by being part of an unprivileged group, in their occupational attainment process.

An Analysis on Occupational Attainment Process for People with Psychiatric Disabilities

The purpose of this research was to investigate the occupational attainment process of a sample of psychiatrically disabled individuals who have been active members of the labor force for most of their adult lives. For the purposes, this study examines a rarely studied cohort of persons with psychiatric disability in the labor market. Specifically, this study examined whether the status attainment process, namely family of origin’s influence and early educational attainment, decays less for those with mental health problems than for those without disabilities? The major finding of this study is the status attainment process is proceeding in a similar way between person with psychiatric disabilities and person without psychiatric disabilities. The results of the study dispute some biases and prejudices with regard to people with psychiatric disabilities. Specifically, the results show that many people with substantial psychiatric problem in the labor force have the similar process with regards to their occupational attainment process and social mobility process.

Sexual Orientation and Occupational Attainment

Research shows that sexual minorities and heterosexuals differ in the level of success in educational and earnings attainment, but differences in occupational attainment have been unclear. To extend the literature, this article examines sexual orientation differences in young adulthood occupational status by analyzing the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health Waves 1 to 4. Drawing from the life course literature, a theoretical framework is developed to explain how sexual orientation shifts opportunities and constraints in the occupational attainment process. The analysis shows that the association between sexual orientation and occupational status depends on gender, the type of sexual experience used to measure sexual orientation, and the timing of first sexual experience. Women who report their first same-sex attraction or sexual contact in young adulthood have lower occupational status than those without such experience, and men who report their first same-sex dating relationships in young adulthood tend to have higher occupational status than those without such relationships. These findings extend the existing knowledge on sexual development and status attainment, which has mainly focused on heterosexual development.

Social Networks and Prestige Attainment

Abstract Several hypotheses are derived that relate social networks to the occupational prestige attainment process. These hypotheses are evaluated using theoretically derived indicators and ordinary least squares regression. Most of the hypotheses considered in this paper do not receive support, and the one hypothesis that does lacks a consistent theoretical explanation. From this analysis, I draw two important conclusions: First, the relationship between the prestige of a social network contact and prestige attainment may be empirically strong, but the theoretical explanation linking them lacks consistency. Secondly, empirical work performed to test social network theories should no longer focus on dyadic‐data alone. The broader implications of these conclusions for future research are considered.

Poor African American Women and Work: The Occupational Attainment Process

I use multiple measures to examine the occupational attainment process among urban African American women from low-income backgrounds. Using 10-year follow-up data and earlier study data, I found that employment histories and current employment had more impact than childbearing events or amount of education on the income and job quality of minority women in their mid-twenties. Simply being employed led to an adequate job with minimal financial self-sufficiency. The most important contributor to a “good job,” one with ample earnings and more than adequate non-wage benefits, was having content-specific educational goals in high school, attaining post-high school training in the same content area, and obtaining jobs that utilized this content background. These findings suggest that chronological interruptions in the traditional occupational attainment process are normative for poor African American women, and, by themselves, are not opportunity costs; however, interruptions in content consistency result in lowered occupational attainment.

Poor African American Women and Work: The Occupational Attainment Process

Poor African American Women and Work: The Occupational Attainment Process

A Comparative Study of The Occupational Attainment Processes of White Men and Women in The United States: The Effects or Having Ever Married, Spousal Education, Children and Having Ever Divorced

The vast majority of occupational attainment studies have not adequately addressed the effects of marriage and spouses on the occupational attainment process. When spousal influence is taken in account, social scientists tend to take a one - sided approach in focusing on the effects of husbands’ achievements on the occupational attainments of women. The extent to which wives mediate men’s occupational outcomes is rarely the subject of inquiry. This study addresses the single sided approach by comparing the effects of having ever married, spousal educational attainment, number of children, and having ever divorced on the occupational advancements of men and women. A United States national sample of 3,375 white men and 2,612 white women between the ages of 20 and 64 was derived from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics.

The Process of Educational and Occupational Attainment of Adolescent Females from Low-Income, Rural Families

The AA. examine the educational and occupational attainment of young women from low-income, Appalachian families who resided in rural areas. Data from a 10-year longitudinal study from 3 southeastern states were examined. Path analysis was used to test relative contribution of family-of-origine, family life-cycle, and social psychological variables as predictors of young women's status attainment. The variables unique to women's attainment (i.e. significant other influence on marriage and fertility plans, actual marriage and fertility plans, age at mariage, number of children, and household size) were not predictive. Several finding were interpreted as resulting from traditional gender-role expectations, family socialization processes, and the structural limitations faced by low-income women from rural areas.

Occupational status attainment in Liberia: The roles of achievement and ascription

Using a subsample of respondents from the 1974 Liberian census, this study examines occupational status attainment in Liberia. The study finds that education is the strongest determinant of occupational status for Americo-Liberians and non-Americo-Liberians, men and women, and never and ever married women. Although the process of occupational status attainment is generally similar for all groups, the status return to education is greater for women than it is for men. While Americo-Liberian women have the highest levels of educational and occupational attainment, women in general are relatively disadvantaged in terms of socioeconomic achievement. The findings also indicate an incipient pattern of occupational sex segregation in Liberia. In an extended model of female attainment, the findings provide minimal support for the human capital theory which implies that never married women would be more like men in their occupational distribution and attainment. The paper explores the implications of these findings.

College effects on occupational status attainment

This study represents a further examination of the relative importance of social origin and educational measures in the occupational status attainment of former college students. The study is longitudinal and is based on a causal model that incorporates multiple measures of students' precollege characteristics, the undergraduate institutions they attended, and their performance and experiences within these institutions. Separate analyses were performed for those employed in professional and nonprofessional occupations. The results suggest a basic distinction between the characteristics of undergraduate institutions and students' performance and experiences within those institutions that are most influential in the occupational status attainment process for those employed in professional and nonprofessional positions. Occupational status attainment in professional careers appears to be influenced more by cognitive attributes of the college attended and the students' educational performance, whereas the attainment process in nonprofessional careers appears to be influenced more by affective attributes of the collegiate experience.

Weber on Action

script, Graduate School of Business, Stanford University. Reich, Michael 1971 The economics of racism. Pp. 107-13 in David M. Gordon (ed.), Problems in Political Economy. Lexington, MA: Heath. Reich, Michael, David M. Gordon and Richard C. Edwards 1973 A theory of labor market segmentation. American Economic Review 63:359-65. Richardson, Harry W. 1969 Regional Economics. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. Sewell, William H., Archibald 0. Haller and George W. Ohlendorf 1970 The educational and early occupational status attainment process: replication and revision. American Sociological Review 35:1014-27. Singelmann, Joachim and Harley L. Browning 1980 Industrial transformation and occupational change in the U.S., 1960-70. Social Forces 59:246-64. Smelser, Neil J. 1964 Toward a theory of modernization. Pp. 258-74 in Amitai Etzioni and Eva Etzioni (eds.), Social Change. New York: Basic.

A Model of Stratification with Response Error in Social and Psychological Variables

The well-known Wisconsin model of achievement posits that the influence of socioeconomic origins on educational, occupational and economic attainment is largelv mediated bY acsademic performance, social influences and aspirations in secondary schooling. The model has been widely replicated, elaborated and criticized. The present analysis asks how powerful this model might be in accounting for social influences, aspirations and attainments when measurement error has been taken into account. There are two indicators of most theoretical construc ts in the model, and manv of these were ascertained from independent sources or as many as 20 Years apart. The model identifies selected response error c orrelations between variables ascertained on the same occasion, from the same person or using the same method. The model also permits retrospective reports of social influences and aspirations to be c ontaminated by intervening events. In our revised estimates, we find empirical support for earlier spec ificsations of the Wisconsin model. We alsofind that the revised model is more powerful in explaining the process of educational and occupational attainment.

Dimensions of Educational and Occupational Attainment in Great Britain

The usual analysis of status attainment has ignored important dimensions of both education and occupation and has consequently underestimated the role of education in the occupational attainment process. We examine four aspects of British educational attainment (years of schooling, type of school attended, examinations passed in school, and qualifications obtained) andfour aspects of occupations (prestige, authority, control, and earnings). The analysis is conducted for four ten-year age cohorts of British men. Findings include: (a) No single dimension of educational attainment suffices to represent the effects of education on occupation. (b) Different patterns of the educational attainment measures are important in explaining different dimensions of occupational attainment. (c) The degree to which educational attainment is important for occupational attainment depends on the dimension of occupational attainment considered. (d) The persistent importance of school type in explaining occupational outcomes suggests the importance of chartering in British education. (e) The full model varies greatly in its ability to explain occupational outcomes, indicating that alternative models will need to be constructed.

Sex differences in the Canadian occupational attainment process*

Sex differences in the Canadian occupational attainment process*

Class, Family, Education, and the Process of Status Attainment: A Comparison of American and British Women College Graduates

Turner's conceptualization of the relationship between education and social mobility in Great Britain and the United States as forming “sponsored” and “contest” systems is used as a theoretical framework for comparing the process of occupational status attainment of British and American women college graduates. British women graduates are more occupationally mobile than Americans; they gain more from attending prestigious institutions, studying science and mathematics and securing a higher class degree as compared with American women with similar qualifications. American graduate women benefit more from attaining a Ph.D. Marriage and motherhood have less significant, but different, cross-national effects.

Sex differences in the process of occupational attainment: A closer look

Most previous studies of sex differences in occupational attainment indicate that the two sexes attain the same mean level of occupational status and do so by similar processes. These studies have examined the level of occupational status achieved only at a single point in time and have not distinguished between the process by which those of each sex acquire a given level of status at entry into the labor force and the process by which their occupational status changes over the adult life cycle. They also have ignored a large proportion of women in the sample since they have been based only on women employed at the time of the survey. Analyzing data from a 15-year follow-up study of the high school students studied by J. S. Coleman in The Adolescent Society (1961, Free Press, New York) this paper examines sex differences in the determination of occupational prestige both at entry into the labor force and at the time of the follow-up survey. The analysis is based on an elaborated model of the occupational attainment process, and the parameters of the model are estimated for all women and men who entered the labor force. The results indicate that although the mean level of occupational status at entry into the labor force is virtually the same for the two sexes, men experience greater upward mobility after entry than women. Sex differences are documented in the process by which occupational prestige is determined, both at entry into the labor force and at the time of the follow-up survey. Ignoring women who are not in the labor force is shown to affect the analysis, particularly the relationship between occupational prestige at entry into the labor force and occupational prestige at a subsequent point in time.

Young Children's Conception of Status and Role

Sewell, W. H., A. 0. Haller, and A. Portes 1969 The educational and early occupational status attainment process. American Sociological Review 34:82-92. Sewell, W. H., and V. Shah 1967 Socioeconomic status, intelligence, and the attainment of higher education. Sociology of Education 40:1-23. Spenner, K. I. 1974 Predicting levels of aspiration: A comparison of perceived and actual informational inputs from significant others. Paper presented at the annual meetings of the Rural Sociological Society, Montreal.

The Structure of Opportunity in School

Official school records are used to analyze the opportunity structure and selection mechanisms within a school. Critics' charges that tracking systems preclude choice and mobility are not entirely supported, but more complex and subtle mechanisms for restricting opportunity are found to operate. Moreover, the analysis discovers that even if college admissions committees wished to admit high-achieving lower-track students, the use by many high schools of a grade-weighting procedure by which lower-track students' achievements are belittled reduces their post-graduate opportunities. These findings suggest that customary assumptions about the influence of choice and achievement may be too simple and customary conceptual models of contest and sponsored mobility may be less appropriate for describing actual track systems than a tournament model. Even after a decade of great progress in understanding the educational and occupational attainment process, we still know very little about the structure of opportunity within schools and its influence on youths' opportunities in society. Researchers have looked at school-wide effects, and they find much greater variance in educational attainment within schools than among different schools (Coleman et al.; Jencks et al.). This suggests that it is important to study selection systems within schools. Turner and S0rensen have proposed models of the opportunity structure within schools, but no research has looked at such structures directly. A number of recent studies have considered the effects of high school curriculum tracks on post-school attainment, but they have been largescale studies unable to examine selection processes within schools in detail (Alexander and Eckland; Alexander and McDill; Hauser et al.; Heyns; Jencks et al.). Cicourel and Kitsuse investigated in detail how a single school selects students for track placements, but they did not look at what kind of track mobility was permitted within the school. *This research was supported by the Institution for Social and Policy Studies, Yale University. Lee Rainwater and Paul V. Smith contributed many ideas throughout this work. I am also indebted to Wendell Bell, Goeffrey Bock, David Cohen, Christopher Jencks, Alan Kerckhoff, John Low-Beer, Rosemary Morazzini, Virginia Warcholik, Harold Wechsler, and anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.