Parental Attitudes

As you might expect, there's a fair number of witnesses, both for and against, this particular theory.

Douglas and Kahl ("Some Measurements of Academic Orientation", 1965), for example, identify parental attitudes as a crucial variable in explaining why working class and middle class children of similar measured ability tend to have widely-differing educational experiences.

In basic terms, the argument here is that working class children lack parental support and motivation and family pressures tend to push such children into choosing the option of work, rather than education, at the earliest possible opportunity. Thus, working class children are more likely to leave school at the earliest opportunity (16 in Britain) and less likely to move into Higher Education (and the various forms of professional employment that requires a degree-level education).

Similarly, as writers such as Willis ("Learning to Labour") have demonstrated, working class children develop different expectations of education based around their future adult life expectations. In the classic, traditional, way of such things, boys would anticipate a life of manual labour (either employed or self-employed) and girls would anticipate a future filled with children, family responsibilities and part-time work. For neither of these mapped-futures is a high level of educational success required...

Whether or not this (stereotypical) situation still applies in modern Britain (or, perhaps more correctly, whether it still applies to the same extent) is open to doubt. The decrease in traditional working class manual jobs and educational changes (such as the New Vocationalism) may have effected changes in this scenario - although it is probably still true to say that working class and middle class children have different perceptions of their future lives.

Be that as it may, writers such s Douglas argue that the difference between working class and middle class parental attitudes can be expressed in terms of the latter having future orientated attitudes where the former are present orientated. Thus, middle class children are encouraged to stay in school for as long as possible (even though it means parents being willing and able to support them financially) since, by gaining qualifications, higher paid professional work becomes a realistic option in the future. Another way of expressing this idea is in terms of:

a. Deferred gratification:

• Middle class children are encouraged by their parents to see their education as a "means to an end" (higher pay, higher social status). In simple terms, although education may be relatively boring, meaningless and time-consuming, the rewards for persistence are to be found in later life.

b. Immediate gratification:

• Working class children are encouraged by their parents to "take what they can get, when they can get it". Leaving school at the earliest opportunity is a form of "immediate gratification", since the working class child can start to earn money at an earlier age than their middle-class peers.

The ideas of "future" and "present" orientation stem from the different adult experiences of working and middle class parents, which they use to condition the attitudes of their off-spring. Thus, middle class children are surrounded by proof of the connection between educational qualifications and high occupational levels. It is easier for them to make this connection.

Olive Banks ("The Sociology of Education", 1971) argues that the question of "aspirations" cannot be taken for granted or simply expressed in absolute terms. Parental aspirations for their offspring have to be seen in the light of different starting points for people of different social classes:

For example, the son of an unskilled labourer who aspires to become a skilled craftsman may have relatively higher aspirations than the son of a bank clerk who aspires to become a bank manager.

Thus, it may not simply be the case that the attitudes of middle class parents reflect high aspirations for their children, whilst the attitudes of working class parents reflect lower aspirations.

Thus, it is not clear how we are supposed to be able to measure (or operationalize) the relative difference in social aspirations and achievements across the class structure.

While it might be possible to demonstrate a correlation between the values, attitudes and aspirations of parents and their offspring (highly-motivated parents producing highly-motivated children), it is more difficult to see parental attitudes / socialisation alone as being responsible for differential achievement.

Other socialising agencies (such as teachers, peer-groups and the mass media) may be significant in shaping the aspirations and motivation of children. Where these socialising influences conflict, the relationship between parental attitudes and child attainment may not be as clear-cut as writers such as Douglas and Kahl suggest.

Furthermore, the question of parental motivation is a contentious one, since it is not possible to see parental aspirations for their offspring simply in terms of:

a. Middle class parents encouraging their children, whilst working class children lack such encouragement.

b. The "solution" to lower working class achievement being some form of change in parental attitudes / encouragement.

Attitudes about the social world develop in a context of social experience; they reflect that experience and people’s experience conditions attitudes towards the future. Children are not "empty vessels" waiting to be filled with knowledge. They are conscious human beings who take-note of the world in which they live. If that world consists of widespread unemployment (even amongst those who achieve some form of educational qualification), this will place limitations on their behaviour and condition their attitude towards the value of qualifications.

For example, a boy who aspires to be a professional footballer will come to recognise the level of competition and limited opportunities to realise this aspiration (the risks involved in failure may outweigh the advantages). For a girl with similar aspirations, the limitations are even more pronounced, since there are no professional women footballers in Britain.

Finally, it is by no means certain that working class parents fail to see the value of educational qualifications and fail to encourage their children. Diane Reay, for example, has cited a huge range of empirical evidence to suggest that working class parents do try to do this, but they lack certain social advantages and resources enjoyed by other classes power, influence, status and so forth). In basic terms, working class parents may not be as socially equipped as middle class parents to "play the system" to their children’s advantage.

Parental attitudes do play a part in the differential achievement equation, but it is by no means certain that this idea can be used to explain class differences in achievement. Too many other factors (in particular power and status) are involved to be able to make an easy and definitive connection between parental attitudes and working class underachievement.