Young people’s aspirations rise with parents’ income

What do you want to do when you grow up? We’re all asked this question in our youth, and – while many of us find that our answers don’t turn out accurate – our capacity to plan for the future shapes our lives. The ability to look ahead allows us to set goals, plan, and cope with setbacks – and people who don’t have expectations for future success are more likely to develop depression and have fewer problem-solving skills.

Research shows that most young people believe they have a prosperous, happy future, involving a well-paid job, marriage, and parenthood. Current generations of young people, though, face different pathways to adulthood to those of previous generations. High divorce rates mean people don’t necessarily expect to pair for life, living together without getting married is common, and people are delaying parenthood – or not doing it at all. Climate change and the rejection of traditional gender roles are also changing things – so, how much do young people still expect a traditional adulthood?

Our approach

We wanted to model young people’s expectations, and explore how they predict adult outcomes. We looked at 16-year-olds’ educational, vocational, and family expectations, alongside household income (the net income for everyone in the household over 16, minus household expenses). The aim was to see if we could identify groups with similar aims, and determine whether household income shapes expectations and outcomes by the age of 21.

Using the data

We looked at answers from Understanding Society participants between 16 and 21 to questions about their future expectations, covering issues such as:

• going to university
• being successful
• being unemployed
• working abroad
• marrying
• having children.

These questions were asked of 4,222 16-year-olds who were born between 1993 and 2004.

What did we find?

We initially simply looked at who expected to reach each of these common adult milestones. We found most adolescents wanted to attend university or other training (over 90%), marry (75%), and have at least one child (74%). Comparatively few adolescents thought they would be unemployed for a long period time (20%).

We then tried to classify adolescents into groups, based on their responses to these questions, and examine whether we could predict who would belong to these groups based upon factors like sex, household income, and wellbeing.

We found four groups across the sample:

• Aspirational – just over half of our sample, with the strongest likelihood of studying, finding work, marrying, and having children
• Balanced Expectations – around a quarter of the sample, broadly following the pattern of the aspirational group, but expressing the likelihood of each event less strongly
• Career Focused – about 18% of our sample, with similar career expectations to the aspirational group, but more likely to have low expectations of marriage, living together, and children
• Expectation-less – 6% of the sample, with low expectations for working, studying, and parenting.

Those in the first two groups had a realistic, informed outlook, anticipating potential career disruptions and the possibility of working overseas. They tended to come from more affluent households, with an average weekly income between £200-£400 higher than the rest of our sample. Those in the fourth group were the least affluent. In fact, for every £100 increase in weekly household income, the likelihood of belonging to the aspirational group increased by 5% compared to the expectation-less group.

Young women were more likely to be in the aspirational and career-focused groups, and were less represented in the expectation-less group. Young people in the balanced expectations group had the highest level of mental health disturbances, but adolescent mental health did not significantly differentiate any other groups, including those with consistently low expectations.

Actual outcomes

We then looked at how aspirations at 16 compared to outcomes at 21. The expectation-less group was significantly less likely to report finishing their studies than all other groups. About half the proportion in this group said they’d finished their studies compared to the aspirational group. The aspirational class was also more likely to report finishing their studies than the career-focused and balanced expectations groups, but by smaller margins.

The expectation-less group was the most likely to report long-term unemployment between the ages of 17 and 21. In fact, they were six times more likely to report this than the aspirational group. Also, despite saying they had few plans to become parents, the expectation-less were more likely to have a child before the age of 21 compared to the other groups.

What do these findings mean?

The aspirational group – the most optimistic – had the highest average household income, likely giving them access to better education, extracurricular opportunities, and a supportive school environment. It is also very likely that their parents (both explicitly and implicitly) convey the idea that success is the norm, and something they can achieve themselves.

Something that’s new in this paper is the emergence of the career-focused group. We know that fertility rates have been dropping in developed nations – with the UK, in particular, failing to achieve replacement rates of 2.01 children per couple since the 1970s. Some of the delay in having children is down to the difficulty of achieving other life goals (such as owning a home) in challenging social and economic circumstances (e.g. unaffordable housing). Some can also be attributed to concerns about climate change.

The existence of the economically disadvantaged expectation-less group is rather less surprising, but it raises concerns about government plans to reduce inequalities. A group with uniformly low expectations for education, career, and family suggests disengagement or disenchantment with traditional pathways of success. They didn’t have significantly different rates of psychological distress than the other groups, so their low expectations are unlikely to be down to poor mental health. Household income was the largest and most consistent predictor of being in this group.

Our conclusions

Overall, the great majority of 16-year-olds have a positive outlook, with high expectations. The two largest groups expected to achieve traditional adult milestones like education, employment, and family – and were realistic about the challenges of balancing work and family. They expected career success, but thought it likely that their career would be ‘held back’ at some point due to caregiving or family requirements.

However, household income is clearly an important factor shaping teenagers’ expectations, and their outcomes in life. Those in the most advantaged groups have the highest aspirations, and those with the lowest expectations are more likely to be unemployed parents by the age of 21. In other words, socioeconomic disadvantage is still a significant and systemic barrier to success. When a government has announced that one of its missions is to “break down barriers to opportunity”, this finding is more timely than ever.

Policy, especially in education, should be geared towards identifying who is most and least likely to report high expectations, and targeting resources appropriately.

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