Pathways to Adulthood in Changing Societies: Variability and Mechanisms in Life Course Perspective

(2000) - Michael J. Shanahan

Journal: Review of Sociology
Link::
DOI:: 10.1146/annurev.soc.26.1.667
Links::
Tags:: #paper #LifeCourse #SocialTheory
Cite Key:: [@shanahanPathwaysAdulthoodChanging2000]

Abstract

The transition to adulthood has become a thriving area of research in life course studies. This review is organized around two of the field's emerging themes. The first theme is the increasing variability in pathways to adult roles through historical time. The second theme is a heightened sensitivity to transition behaviors as developmental processes. Accounts of such processes typically examine the active efforts of young people to shape their biographies or the socially structured opportunities and limitations that define pathways into adulthood. By joining these concepts, I suggest new lines of inquiry that focus on the interplay between agency and social structures in the shaping of lives.

Notes

“The first theme is the increasing variability in pathways to adult roles through historical time. The second theme is a heightened sensitivity to transition behaviors as developmental processes.” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 667)

“The timing and sequencing of transition markers have changed through historical time, simultaneously reflecting long-term trends and short-term fluctuations between cohorts, as well as variability within coh” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 668)

“this argument, individualization and standardization reflect the modernization of society, especially changes in labor markets (see also Beck 1992) and the increasing role of the state in people's lives (see also Mayer & Mu” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 669)

“Course According to Kohli (1986), the organization of public services, transfer payments, and employment opportunities by age renders the life course more orderly an” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 669)

“fe Course Many theorists also maintain that as people were freed from the traditional constraints of family and locale, they were able to exercise more agency in the construction of their biographies (e.g. Beck 1992, Giddens 1” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 670)

“s. According to Kohli, "the new thrust of individualization" occurs against the "background of a regulated labor market and... public social security systems" (Kohli 1986, p. 303). Within the framework of a highly predictable life course, people are able to improvise considerably in the planni” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 671)

“Buchmann's (1989) argument is different, emphasizing that the highly standardized trajectories of school, work, and family have been "shattered" by several structural and cultural developments since the 1960s, leading to new levels and forms of individualization. Links between educational certification and occupational status have been weakened, the "half-life" of occupational training and expertise has decreased substantially, the family has reached new levels of instability, and cultural representations of love and work emphasize flexibility, choice” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 671)

“Unemployment, inflation, and economic reorganization in the form of sectoral shifts have exerted substantial period effects on the age of first birth, affecting all cohorts in the child-bearing years (Rindfuss et al 198” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 672)

“eriences In addition to economic fluctuations, discrete historical events, especially wars, have altered the transition to adultho” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 673)

“As the duration, sequencing, and directionality of movement between age-graded statuses become more tenuous during the transition to adulthood, it may be that social psychological factors become more important in determining the life course (Mortimer 1994).” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 675)

“stitutionalized connections between school and work have been conceptualized as networks of associations among educators, students, and prospective employers (for a review, see Rosenbaum et al 1990), as well as articulated links between positions in the educational system and labor mark” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 677)

“Young people are strategic in that they foster plans and pursue them, but they are also constrained by the limits that attend their position in the educational and occupational systems. V” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 682)

“A different perspective is offered by studies of educational tracking, which suggest that social structures foster orientations underlying selections into positions in the stratified educational system (the socialization process) and allocate individuals into these same positions (the allocative process)” (Shanahan, 2000, p. 683)