Sunday, March 30, 2008

The impact of gender and family role: my current research project

As part of my grad program (and my pending completion of it) I am required to perform some type of research project. Honestly, it's fairly small in size and the timeline is quite short. In fact, I will be presenting my research on April 22nd. That is really soon and just typing that date gave me a minor anxiety attack. Currently my research is far from completed and I just finished sending out the link to my survey. So, my survey is out...now it is time to research and write!

For this project I am doing a replication study. This exact survey instrument was used 11 years ago. So I am reusing it to survey a different generation of college students. I want to see what has changed in the past decade. I am trying to see how gender and family role impact undergraduate students' view of acceptable career choices.
When this study was done 11 years ago, family role and gender greatly influenced what students viewed as acceptable career choices. In that study, men and fathers were seen as much more suitable to fill most of the occupational roles than women and mothers. The only occupational category that women were seen as being more suitable for were the careers that fell into the "artistic" category. These are careers that include, "cake decorator", artist's model", "interior designer", etc. And even then, women were seen as more suitable for these careers than mothers were.
So, I want to see what has changed! I would assume (and maybe this is part of my hypothesis) that when I collect the results of this survey that gender and family role would have less of an impact on what students view as acceptable career choices. I would assume this because in the past decade, we have gotten a lot closer to achieving equality in the work place. Also, with the divorce rate being at 50%, I would assume that the parents of most college students are both active in the work force. Also, the "Millennial" generation is supposed to be full of students who are used to being busy, handling a lot, and achieving a lot. This generation, according to research, is optimistic about their future and the future of this country. I would assume that the Millennial students would have a "I can have/do it all" mentality. If this is the case, then being a woman, or a mother, or a father, would not influence their view of acceptable career choices to the degree that it did 11 years ago.
So, there it is! That is what I am going to be consumed with for the next 3-4 weeks! I'm really excited about this project and to see the results of the study. I'm also overwhelmed with the work ahead and I know that April 22nd will be here in a flash! I'll let you know if my hypothesis is correct or not...

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