Parents Influence

College is a crucial point in a young adult’s life, and it begins with choosing a major. This is an important decision in that it starts the blueprint of your career. While many believe that choosing a major is based solely on one’s self-influence, research suggests that outside influences such as family, social environment, economic factors, community and school are likely to influence one’s decision as well (Ferry, 2006). Of these outside factors, students reported parental influence as the greatest influence for deciding their major (Kniveton, 2004). Based on a study from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill (Taylor, Harris, & Taylor, 2004), more than half of the freshman parents seem to be unaware of the impact that they have on

When the child is treated with unconditional support, despite the parent’s personal feelings, he is more receptive of the parent’s idea and that creates a gateway for the child in choosing the same profession as their parent. Although direct career advice can be influential, many parents fail to realize that they can influence their child’s career decision by serving as an example (Kniveton, 2004). Children begin to identify with their parents’ career by the age of five. (Havighurst, 1964). The purpose of this study is to investigate the parental influence on students’ choice of major. More so, to investigate whether the parent’s career choice has an influence on the student’s choice of major. There are not many studies that focus on students choosing their majors with the idea of pursing the same professions as their parents. This is important because very few parents understand the impact that they have on their child’s decision, especially by example, thus making this particular study a further contribution to the field.

Literature

This theory suggested that career choice is a continuous process that occurs in three stages: fantasy choices, tentative choices, and realistic choices (Ginzberg, 1988). Fantasy choice is the first stage and occurs before the age of 11. During this stage, children are more impetuous about their career choice and make “an arbitrary translation …. of needs into an occupational choice” (Ginzberg, 1988). Trice’s (1995) review of Ginzberg’s theory stated that during the fantasy choice, “children … aspire wifely and impulsively with the principal constraints being the father’s occupation and parental suggestions”. Ginzberg (1988) didn’t hint parental again until the tentative and realistic choice stages, in which he stated that children much, “work out a compromise between their interests, capacities, and values, and the opportunities and limitations of the environment”. It can be inferred that these “opportunities and limitations of the environment” may include parental influence, although he did not mention it specifically. He did however, say that the families were too relaxed by saying to children: “You make any choice you want. All I want is for you to be happy” (Ginzberg, 1988). He seemed to be implying that parents should take more interest and be more involved in planning their children’s