The role of parents

in career guidance

Lorelei R. Vinluan
College of Education
University of the Philippines Diliman

Batch 2011 Career Fair

Philippine Science High School, Quezon City / January 9, 2010
 Points to ponder
• Where are you right now in terms of your career?
• Are you happy where you are now?
• Where do you want to be or what else do you want
to have / achieve?
• What are your frustrations as regards your career?
Do you understand why you are frustrated?
• How did you deal or how are you dealing with those
frustrations?
• If you were to start your career all over again, what
will you do?
 Answer
• Career development begins in childhood
(Gottfredson, as cited in Isaacson and Brown, 1997)
• Life career development is a life-long spiraling
process (Magnusson & Starr, 2000)
• Career choice is not a single event but a series
of developmental steps and that adolescence
is a critical period in career development
(Savickas, 2002)
 Early career
development theories…
 focused mostly on the individual.
1. Parsons – career selection based on self-
knowledge, knowledge of the world of work,
and choice based on true logic
2. Trait-and-factor – individuals are different
and their different capacities can be
measured and related to occupations
 focused mostly on the individual.
3. Person-environment fit – individuals seek
work environments compatible with their
attitudes and values and allows them to use
their skills & abilities (Holland)
 focused mostly on the individual.
4. Gottfredson – environments are partly genetic
in origin so even if we were all provided
identical parents, classrooms, and
neighborhoods, our personal proclivities
would constantly incline us to perceive,
provoke, and exploit them differently
But later theories…
 considered family influences.
1. Roe – early childhood environments
predisposed children to enter certain
occupational groups
2. Bordin – developments in early childhood
accounts for work motivation
 considered family influences.
3. Ginzberg, et al. – career development
begins in early childhood and progresses
through three stages (fantasy, tentative, and
realistic)
4. Super – stages of vocational development
correspond to recognized life stages
(exploration, etc)
• Super’s five stages or "maxicycles“ of
career development
1. Growth (4-to13)
2. Exploration (14-to-24)
3. Establishment (25-to-44)
4. Maintenance (45-65)
5. Disengagement (65 and over)
Some factors affecting
career choice
 1. Birth order
• Adler – the position an individual by the order
of birth had significantly affected the
individual’s growth and personality
• a child’s place in the family birth order may
play a role in the type of occupations that will
interest him as an adult (SAE, 2002)
• birth order was one of 16 influences that led
377 freshmen in a large mid-western
university to decide to become teachers (Marso
& Pigge, 1994)
 2. Academic achievement
• variables related to school performance have the
greatest effect on high school students’ aspirations
(Mau & Bikos, 2000)
• science-engineering was the field most frequently
identified by both the academically-talented and the
academically-oriented groups (Pate, Derdeyn, & Goodnough,
1989)
• significant positive relationship between academic
achievement and the education and career aspirations
of high school seniors (Balingit, 1982; Co, 1990)
 3. Interests
• occupational interests reflect heterogeneous
patterns of likes and dislikes that are typical of
members of a particular occupation
• interests is one of the top reasons considered
by students in choosing a career (e.g., Agana, 1982;
Mani, 2003; Valdez, 1988)
• recent statistics indicate males, more than
females, are likely to pursue education and
careers in science and math (Jacobs et al., 1998)
 4. Motivation
• micro level influences are more significant in
career choices than meso or macro influences
(Ozbilgin, Kushu, & Erdogmus, 2004)
• micro level influences
 education and training
 skills, competencies, and abilities
 acquaintances, friends and/or family
 knowledge of labor and/or career market
 financial and economic condition
 background
• respondents chose a career in science or
engineering because of social status of the job,
availability of job, and financial security (Ong,
2002)
• the only factor found significantly associated
with the career choice of 404 graduates of
three science high schools was the value for
power and the need for prestige (Alto, 1984)
Salazar-Clemeña (2002). The Career Development Quarterly, 50, 246-256
 5. Gender
• Research results mixed
 predictive of career decisions (e.g., Aleidan, 2002; Dela Paz, 2005; Mau
& Bikos, 2000; Ong, 2002)
 not predictive (e.g., Houston, 1999; Olson, 1993; Emmett, 1990)
• two-year longitudinal study of nationally representative
sample of 10th-grade students (Mau & Bikos, 2000)
 female students expressed significantly higher occupational
aspirations
 after high school, girls’ vocational aspirations drop, becoming
more traditional and less prestigious
 many ultimately opt for careers that underutilize their talents
and abilities
• female adolescents had more modern attitudes
regarding work, family, and work-family
relationships than male adolescents (Dela Paz, 2005)
• male and female subjects have significantly
different perceptions on sex stereotyping of
science or engineering as a career (Ong, 2002)
 6. Significant others
• guidance counselors
• teachers
• friends / peers
• community / religious leaders
• media
• relatives
Summary of factors influencing career
choice
1. Birth order
2. Academic achievement
3. Interests
4. Motivation
5. Gender
6. Significant others
7. ?
But most especially…

PARENTS!
 Parents’ educational attainment
• students chose educational levels similar to their
parents’ (Balum, 2002)
• parents with post-secondary education tend to pass
along its importance to their children (Lankard, 1995; Mortimer
et al., 1992)
• students whose parents had limited education or no
schooling at all preferred vocational courses (Amilbahar,
1983)
• relationships between students’ educational and career
aspirations and parental factors differed by mother and
father (Signer & Saldana, 2001)
 Parents’ occupational status
• occupational transmission – pag laki ko, gagayahin ko
ang tatay (o nanay) ko
 rural high school students who had a parent or grandparent in
the military were likely to choose military involvement too
(Balum, 2002)

• father’s occupation was one of the predictors of choice

of “ideal” job (Conroy, 1997)
• children of jobless fathers were attracted to vocational
courses (Amilbahar, 1983)
• children’s early aspirations are more similar to their
mothers’ occupations than their fathers’ (Trice & Knapp, 1992;
Trice et al., 1995)
• But identification with parents’ work seems to
weaken somewhat by sixth grade
• The status of the mother’s and father’s
occupations had no effect on girls’ occupational
aspirations
• But boys were more likely to aspire to their
mothers’ occupation if the mothers’ and fathers’
occupations were of equal status or the mother’s
job was of higher status
 Occupational suggestions
• elementary school children are influenced by
direct suggestions related to occupational
direction and that they are most likely to cite
their parents as making occupational
suggestions to them (Trice, McClellan, & Hughes, 1992)
• grandparents and siblings occasionally provided
occupational suggestions (same study)
 Parental expectations
• children early in elementary school tended to aspire
to occupations within the same occupational category
(e.g., technical, clerical, and service) as their parents’
expectations of them
• however, as children progressed through the
elementary grades, they increasingly reported their
own aspirations rather than the aspirations their
parents had for them (Helwig, 1998)
• Lesson: Talk to them early about career goals.
 Family configuration
• children living in family situations other than
two-parent homes (e.g., in single-parent
households, with extended family, in foster
care) were substantially more likely to express
no occupational aspirations than were
children in two-parent homes (Trice, McClellan, &
Hughes, 1992)
 Family environment
• family circumstances and the family environment of
children at age 11 were moderately related to career
aspirations at age 16 (Marjoribanks, 1984)
• family functioning is a significant predictor of vocational
identity—the degree to which one has a clear sense of
his or her interests, goals, and values as they pertain to
career planning (Penick & Jepsen, 1992)
• the notion of family interaction or functioning—
incorporating parenting style (authoritarian or passive),
level of support, guidance, and responsiveness—may
have more influence on career development than
demographics
 Parenting style
• children’s career development is enhanced
when parents strike a balance between
encouraging openness and exploration and, at
the same time, actively monitoring and
controlling certain adolescent behaviors (Kracke,
1997)
 Parental career behavior
• The following were found to be among the
predictors of career decision-making self-
efficacy of adolescents (Keller & Whiston, 2008)
1. Parental expression of interest in various teenage
issues that are important to the child
2. High parental expectations for the child’s career
 Parental career behavior
• The following were found to be among the
predictors of career maturity in adolescents
(Keller & Whiston, 2008)
1. Parental expression of interest in various teenage
issues that are important to the child
2. Parental encouragement to make own decisions
3. Parental help to understand results from career
tests or interest assessments taken
4. Parents tell child that he/she is proud of him/her
On the basis of the foregoing,

here are some tips.

 1. Be actively involved…
• in the lives of your children. Find out what
he/she:
likes
fears
worries about, or
maybe even his/her crushes.
• But also tell him/her, in a non-intimidating way,
what your dreams or expectations of him/her
are.
 2. But learn to let go too.
• Strike a balance between monitoring and
controlling certain behaviors and encouraging
openness and exploration.
• Be available when he/she approaches you for
assistance in decision-making. Guide but do
not impose.
 3. Show faith…
• in your child’s abilities to be successful.
Provide information.
Give encouragement.
Show pride.
 4. Keep a “healthy”
family environment.
• What is your parenting style?
authoritarian
authoritative
not involved
• How well is your communication with your
children?
how deep
how often
how comfortable
 5. Work with teachers and
counselors.
• Some studies have shown that adolescents are
influenced by parents, teachers, and counselors
(frequently in that order) in career
development.
• Discuss your child’s career development options
with them based also on data from tests and
assessments, not just on their (and your) likes
and ambitions.
• Familiarize yourself with career development
materials.
You are what you are
through your
CHOICE
alone.
Wishing you all the best.

Thank you very much.

E-mail me at: lei_vinluan@yahoo.com; lcrv@up.edu.ph