Nomaguchi Kei, Milkie Melissa A
Department of Sociology, Bowling Green State University, 231 Williams Hall, Bowling Green, OH 43403.
Department of Sociology, University of Toronto, 725 Spadina Ave., Toronto, ON M5S 2J4 Canada.
Socius. 2019 Jan-Dec;5. doi: 10.1177/2378023119879016. Epub 2019 Oct 10.
Assessing changes in socialization values for children provides a unique window into how Americans perceive the landscape of their society. We examine whether, since the mid-1980s, Americans (b) emphasized survival values, like hard work, for children as economic precarity rose, or (a) prioritized self-expression values, like autonomy and compassion, as expected in postindustrial society. Analysis of 1986-2018 General Social Surveys ( = 23,109) supports the precarity thesis: preferences for hard work increased steadily whereas preferences for autonomy, the top-ranked quality throughout the period, declined. There was some indication of enduring self-expression values, as support for compassion increased and its relative importance to hard work stayed stable. Decomposition analyses show valuing hard work would have been even greater without demographic changes like an increase in college graduates. Aligning with earlier research, valuing obedience in children continued to decline. Our results extend theoretical work on complexities of socioeconomic links to parenting values.
评估儿童社会化价值观的变化为了解美国人如何看待其社会格局提供了一个独特的窗口。我们研究自20世纪80年代中期以来，随着经济不稳定加剧，美国人是（b）像重视努力工作这样的生存价值观，还是（a）像后工业社会所预期的那样优先考虑像自主性和同情心这样的自我表达价值观。对1986 - 2018年综合社会调查（样本量 = 23109）的分析支持了不稳定论点：对努力工作的偏好稳步增加，而对自主性（在整个时期排名第一的品质）的偏好则下降。有迹象表明自我表达价值观具有持久性，因为对同情心的支持增加且其相对于努力工作的重要性保持稳定。分解分析表明，如果没有像大学毕业生增加这样的人口结构变化，对努力工作的重视程度会更高。与早期研究一致，对儿童顺从的重视程度持续下降。我们的研究结果扩展了关于社会经济联系与育儿价值观复杂性的理论研究。
