Work Experience and Mental Health from Adolescence to Mid-Life.

The etiology of psychological differences among those who pursue distinct lines of work have long been of scholarly interest. A prevalent early and continuing assumption is that experiences on the job influence psychological development; contemporary analysts focus on dimensions indicative of mental health. Still, such work-related psychological differences may instead be attributable to selection processes to the extent that individuals can choose, or be selected to, different lines of work, based on their prior characteristics. Whereas much attention has been directed to employment per se as a key determinant of mental health, we consider work status (employed or not) and hours of work, as well as work quality, including both intrinsic and extrinsic dimensions among those who are employed. We also investigate differences in the effects of work experiences on mental health in distinct phases of the work career. Drawing on 11 waves of longitudinal data obtained from a cohort of 9th grade students followed prospectively to age 45-46 (54% female; 73% white), we examine whether key psychological dimensions indicative of mental health (mastery, depressive affect, and self-esteem) change in response to employment and to particular experiences on the job. The findings, based on a fixed effects modeling strategy, indicate that observed psychological differences related to employment and work quality are not attributable to stable individual proclivities. The evidence suggests that mental health is responsive to changing experiences at work from mid-adolescence to mid-life.

Taking the long view of adolescent work quality.

Following Schulenberg's research on teenage employment and vocational development, we ask to what extent do job dimensions reflecting the quality of work experience during mid-adolescence (e.g., work stress, autonomy, learning and advancement opportunities, hourly pay, wage satisfaction, and work hours) predict the same work experiences during the ensuing occupational career? Using longitudinal data from the Youth Development Study (N = 711 individuals over 3164 occasions), and hybrid panel models to control for unobserved time-stable selection influences, we find a high level of continuity of work quality from adolescence to mid-life. Multiple dimensions of adolescent work quality are associated with the same dimensions of work quality in adulthood, even after controlling for educational attainment and other time-varying adult confounders.

Cumulative Unionization and Physical Health Disparities among Older Adults.

Whereas previous research shows that union membership is associated with improved health, static measurements have been used to test dynamic theories linking the two. We construct a novel measure of cumulative unionization, tracking individuals across their entire careers, to examine health consequences in older adulthood. We use data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (1970-2019) and predict self-rated health, functional limitations, and chronic health conditions in ages 60 to 79 using cumulative unionization measured during respondents' careers. Results from growth models show that unionized careers are associated with .25 SD to .30 SD improvements in health among older adults across all measures. Analyses of life course mechanisms reveal heterogeneous effects across unionization timing, age in older adulthood, and birth cohort. Moreover, subgroup analyses reveal unionization to partially, but not fully, ameliorate disparities based on privileged social positions. Our findings reveal a substantial and novel mechanism driving older adulthood health disparities.

Dynamic work trajectories and their interplay with family over the life course.

This review examines major bodies of literature, interrelated but usually considered separately, focused on work trajectories and their intersections with family dynamics through the life course. It begins with a consideration of the life course paradigm, which draws attention to the temporal dimensions of human lives, and recently developed analytic techniques that are well-suited to empirical investigation of life course transitions and trajectories over time. The review proceeds to examine empirical research on work career mobility (including both inter- and intra-generational mobility) measured as either trajectories of continuous outcomes or sequences of categorical outcomes, and their long-term consequences for socioeconomic attainment. Work-family trajectories are then addressed, focusing on the impacts of family on work, notably expressed in the motherhood wage penalty, and how family structure and processes affect long-term labor market outcomes. Research documents considerable heterogeneity in work-family dynamics over the life course across social groups with unequal resources. The review concludes with an assessment of the interplay of work and family trajectories studied longitudinally and makes recommendations for future research. It is argued that while extant studies of the work-family interface are compatible with, and sometimes deliberately reflect, a life course perspective, these bodies of research would benefit from more fully incorporating the life course principles of "agency" and "time and place".

Studying social change in human lives: a conversation.

This commentary reinforces a central commitment of life course research: to make visible how social change matters in human lives. This paper captures a moderated conversation with four senior scholars about how they came to study the intersection between social change and life experience, why this intersection is so important to life course studies, and theoretical and methodological imperatives and challenges that come with it.

Agency and Subjective Health from Early Adulthood to Mid-Life: Evidence from the Prospective Youth Development Study.

Understanding the determinants of subjective or self-rated health (SRH) is of central importance because SRH is a significant correlate of actual health as well as mortality. A large body of research has examined the correlates, antecedents, or presumed determinants of SRH, usually measured at a given time or endpoint. In the present study, we investigate whether individual mastery, a prominent indicator of agency, has a positive effect on SRH over a broad span of the life course. Drawing on longitudinal data from the Youth Development Study (n=741), we examine the impacts of mastery on SRH over a 24-year period (from ages 21-22 to 45-46). The findings of a fixed effects analysis, controlling time-varying educational attainment, unemployment, age, obesity, serious health diagnoses, and time-constant individual differences, lead us to conclude that mastery is a stable predictor of SRH from early adulthood to mid-life. This study provides evidence that psychological resources influence individuals' subjective assessment of their health, even when objective physical health variables and socioeconomic indicators are taken into account.

Socioeconomic origin, future expectations, and educational achievement: A longitudinal three-generation study of the persistence of family advantage.

Expectations about the future direct effort in goal-oriented action and may influence a range of life course outcomes, including educational attainment. Here we investigate whether such expectations are implicated in the dynamics underlying the persistence of educational advantage across family generations, and whether such dynamics have changed in recent decades in view of historical change. Focusing on the role of domain-specific (educational) and general (optimism and control) expectations, we examine parallels across parent-child cohorts in (a) the relationships between parental socioeconomic status (SES) and children's future expectations and (b) the associations between children's future expectations and their academic achievement. We estimate structural equation models using data from the prospective multigenerational Youth Development Study (N = 422 three-generation triads [G1-G2-G3]; G1 Mage in 1988 = 41.0 years, G2 Mage in 1989 = 14.7 years, G3 Mage in 2011 = 15.8 years; G2 White in 1989 = 66.4%, G3 White in 2011 = 64.4%; G1 mean annual household income, converted to 2008 equivalents = $41,687, G2 mean annual household income in 2008 dollars = $42,962; G1 mode of educational attainment = high school, G2 mode of educational attainment = some college). We find intergenerational similarity in the relationships between parental educational attainment and children's future expectations. Children's educational expectations strongly predicted their academic achievement in the second generation, but not in the third generation. With educational expansion, the more recent cohort had higher educational expectations that were less strongly related to achievement. Overall, the findings reveal dynamics underlying the persistence of educational success across generations. The role of future expectations in this intergenerational process varies across historical time, confirming a central conclusion of life span developmental psychology and life course sociological research that individual functioning is influenced by sociocultural contexts. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

How do grandparents' and parents' educational attainments influence parents' educational expectations for children?

Highly educated parents hold high educational expectations for their children, which influence children's motivation and achievement in school. However, it is unclear whether grandparents' (G1) education influences parents' (G2) expectations for children (G3) independently of, or in interaction with, parents' own education. We address this question using data from 477 families in the US Youth Development Study, which has followed a cohort of young people from adolescence through adulthood. Using mixed models to account for shared characteristics of children in the same family, our results demonstrate both main and interaction effects. First, they indicate that grandparents influence parents' expectations for their children directly. Grandparents' income and the educational expectations they held for their G2 children when they were in high school predict the G2 parents' expectations for their own children, even after controlling G2 college attendance. G1 college attendance does not directly affect G2 expectations for G3 after accounting for other relevant family characteristics. However, G1 college attendance moderates the effect of G2 college attendance on their expectations for G3. If G1 did not attend college, G2 college attendance does not significantly heighten their expectations for G3. But G2 college attendance does significantly boost their expectations for G3 if G1 also attended college. We partially replicate these findings using nationally representative data from the US National Longitudinal Survey of Youth - Child and Young Adult cohort. This study highlights the need to expand the scope of status attainment research beyond the parent-child dyad to examine the influence of prior generations.

Agency, linked lives and historical time: evidence from the longitudinal three-generation Youth Development Study.

Whereas Glen Elder and associates' principles of the life course are usually articulated and investigated individually, they reference analytic distinctions that simplify their empirical coexistence and mutual interrelation. This article illustrates this complexity by focusing on the principle of agency and its intersections with 'linked lives' and 'time and place'. Data are drawn from the Youth Development Study (YDS), which has followed a Minnesota cohort (G2, born 1973-74) from mid-adolescence (ages 14-15) to midlife (ages 45-46). The YDS also includes G1 parents and G3 children, the latter surveyed at about the same age as their parents were when the research began. The findings indicate that multiple agentic orientations, observed in adolescence, affect adult attainments; they are shaped by the 'linked lives' of grandparents, parents and children over longer periods of time than previously recognised; and their associations with educational achievement are historically specific. Whereas the 'linked lives' of parents and adolescents are generally studied contemporaneously, the agentic orientations of parents, measured as teenagers, were found to predict the same psychological resources in their adolescent children (self-concept of ability, optimism and economic efficacy) decades later. We also found evidence that parents' occupational values continue to influence the values of their children as the children's biographies unfold. Suggesting a historic shift in the very meaning and behavioural consequences of agentic orientations, optimism and efficacy replaced educational ambition as significant predictors of academic achievement.

Believing and Achieving: Gendered Pathways Toward Upward Educational Mobility in the United States.

Little research has investigated the impact of adolescent motivational resources, other than educational plans, on adult educational attainment, or whether their effects differ by gender and social class. Data from the St. Paul Youth Development Study (n = 874, 55% female, 30% children of college graduates) are used to estimate a second-order latent motivation factor encompassing adolescent (age 15-16) educational plans, academic self-concept, economic self-efficacy, and mastery. Then, using logistic regression, the effect of this second-order factor on odds of college graduation in adulthood (ages 26-27 to 37-38) is estimated. Heterogenous effects of motivation by gender and parental education are investigated. The results show that the second-order motivation factor had strong positive effects on educational attainment after adjusting for family background variables. The effect of motivation did not differ by gender in the whole sample nor among children of college graduates. However, among children of less-educated parents, women were found to benefit more than men from these psychological assets for achieving upward educational mobility. These findings suggest that adolescent motivation, especially among U.S. women whose parents do not have college degrees, may be a resource for higher educational attainment.

Decline of "the American Dream"? Outlook toward the Future across Three Generations of Midwest Families.

Expansion of higher education and long-term economic growth have fostered high aspirations among adolescents. Recently, however, deteriorating labor force opportunities, particularly since the "Great Recession," and rising inequality have challenged the "American Dream." To assess how parental and adolescent outlooks have evolved over time, we examine shifts in future orientations across three generations of Midwest American families. Our unique data archive from the Youth Development Study includes 266 Generation 1 and Generation 2 parent-child dyads and 422 Generation 3 children. We assess change over two decades in parental expectations for their children's educational attainments (comparing G1 and G2) and in adolescents' socioeconomic aspirations, life course optimism, and anticipated work-family conflict (comparing G2 and G3). An initial between-families analysis examines aggregate change across generations; a second fixed-effects analysis assesses attitudinal differences between parents and children in the same families and the extent to which generational shifts in family circumstances and adolescents' educational performance account for change in adolescents' future orientations. We find that "millennial" adolescents had more positive outlooks than "Gen X" parents did at the same age. Generational increase in adolescent socioeconomic aspirations held even when socioeconomic origin, parent-child relationship quality, adolescent school performance, and other predictors were controlled. We find evidence that growing adolescent optimism across generations is attributable to rising parental educational expectations, increasing adolescent grades in school, and higher-quality parent-child relationships. We conclude that the "American Dream" is still alive for many contemporary parents and their adolescent children.

Is Adolescent Employment Still a Risk Factor for High School Dropout?

Past cohorts of teenagers who spent long hours in jobs were more likely to drop out of high school than those who worked moderate hours or did not work at all. This article examines the association between employment intensity and dropout among adolescents in the High School Longitudinal Study of 2009 who traversed high school during a time of decreased prevalence of both employment and dropout relative to earlier cohorts. Analyses reveal that a relatively small percentage of teenagers nowadays are characterized as either intensive workers or dropouts (around 11% each). Yet, despite declines in intensive employment and dropout, disadvantaged youth remain overrepresented in both groups, and intensive work is still a risk factor for poor grades and dropout.

Understanding the effects of Covid-19 through a life course lens.

The Covid-19 pandemic is shaking fundamental assumptions about the human life course in societies around the world. In this essay, we draw on our collective expertise to illustrate how a life course perspective can make critical contributions to understanding the pandemic's effects on individuals, families, and populations. We explore the pandemic's implications for the organization and experience of life transitions and trajectories within and across central domains: health, personal control and planning, social relationships and family, education, work and careers, and migration and mobility. We consider both the life course implications of being infected by the Covid-19 virus or attached to someone who has; and being affected by the pandemic's social, economic, cultural, and psychological consequences. It is our goal to offer some programmatic observations on which life course research and policies can build as the pandemic's short- and long-term consequences unfold.

The Long-Term Effects of Time Use during High School on Positive Development.

This longitudinal study examines how the time that youth spend in activities during high school may contribute to positive or negative development in adolescence and in early adulthood. We draw on data from 1103 participants in the longitudinal Youth Development Study, followed from entry to high school to their mid-twenties. Controlling demographic, socioeconomic, and psychological influences, we estimate the effects of average time spent on homework, in extracurricular activities, and with friends during the four years of high school on outcomes measured in the final year of high school and twelve years later. Our results suggest that policies surrounding the implementation and practice of homework may have long-term benefits for struggling students. In contrast, time spent with peers on weeknights was associated with both short- and long-term maladjustment.

Familial Transmission of Educational Plans and the Academic Self-Concept: A Three-Generation Longitudinal Study.

This research investigates the social reproduction of inequality by drawing on prospective longitudinal data from three generations of Youth Development Study respondents. It examines intergenerational influence on the relatively unexplored academic self-concept as well as educational plans, a critical component of the status attainment model. A structural equation model, based on 422 3-generation triads, finds evidence that the sources giving rise to the development of children's (Generation 3) achievement orientations do not only result from parental (G2) contemporaneous influence. Prior influences implicate grandparent (G1) educational attainment and income, grandparental expectations for the G2 adolescent, the G2 academic self-concept and educational plans measured more than twenty years earlier (in G2's adolescence), and G2 educational attainment. A familial culture emphasizing academic self-confidence and high educational expectations may be an important component of "family capital" that supports educational attainment and contributes to the maintenance of social class position in each successive generation.

PARENTAL ASSISTANCE, NEGATIVE LIFE EVENTS, AND ATTAINMENT DURING THE TRANSITION TO ADULTHOOD.

Responding to the longer and more variable transition to adulthood, parents are stepping in to help their young adult children. Little is known, however, about the extent to which parental support promotes success, and whether parental support has different effects for young adult sons and daughters. Using longitudinal data from the Youth Development Study, we find that parental scaffolding assistance for educational expenses predicts college graduation for both men and women. Negative life events experienced during the transition to adulthood are associated with lower earnings by the early 30s, although there is some variation by type of event. More frequent parental support during times of need does not predict long-term economic attainment for sons or daughters.

Unemployment, Parental Help, and Self-Efficacy During the Transition to Adulthood.

Youth unemployment reduces the capacity to achieve diverse markers of adulthood, potentially undermining the young adult's sense of confidence and independence. While parents often come to the aid of their unemployed young adult children, such support may also have negative psychological repercussions. Applying a hierarchical modeling strategy to longitudinal data from the Youth Development Study, we find that both unemployment and parental financial support have negative consequences for youth's self-efficacy. These common experiences may thus diminish youth's personal psychological resources as they make the increasingly lengthy and precarious transition to adulthood.

The value of educational degrees in turbulent economic times: Evidence from the Youth Development Study.

Rising costs of higher education have prompted debate about the value of college degrees. Using mixed effects panel models of data from the Youth Development Study (ages 31-37), we compare occupational outcomes (i.e., weekly hours worked, earnings, employment status, career attainment, and job security) between educational attainment categories within year, and within categories across years, from 2005 to 2011, capturing the period before, during, and in the aftermath of the Great Recession. Our findings demonstrate the long-term value of post-secondary degrees. Bachelor's and Associate's degree recipients, while experiencing setbacks at the height of recession, were significantly better off than those with some or no college attendance. Vocational-Technical degree holders followed a unique trajectory: pre-recession, they are mostly on par with Associate's and Bachelor's recipients, but they are hit particularly hard by the recession and then rebound somewhat afterwards. Our findings highlight the perils of starting but not finishing post-secondary educational programs.

The Transition to Adulthood: Life Course Structures and Subjective Perceptions.

We examine the relationships between objective life course structures and the subjective sense of timing of adult roles and acquisition of adult identity. Hierarchical latent class analysis is applied to longitudinal data from the Youth Development Study, describing roles related to school, work, family formation, and living arrangements from age 17 to 30. The transition to adulthood in this cohort is well-represented by five pathways probabilistically mapping the timing and sequencing of these roles and their configurations. Three pathways are characterized by a school-to-work transition with on-time, delayed, or negligible family formation. The remaining pathways involve early parenthood with either a partner and stable full-time work or the lack of a partner and low labor force attachment. We then show that the subjective sense of timing with respect to certain adult roles and adult identity acquisition is empirically tied to these life course structures.