This article examines the intergenerational covariation in detailed aspects of occupational
roles. Occupations are conceptualized and measured on the basis of indicators for role
requirements, content, and rewards. The detailed components are thought to underlie
overall role characterizations such as socioeconomic status transmission. Data pertain
to a national sample of male members of the civilian labor force and to a countywide
sample of high school males. Canonical correlation analyses for two role relationships,
involving parent occupation, early career occupation, and late adolescent occupational
aspirations, show: (1) role transmission occurs for a multiplicity of occupational characteristics that span the requirements, content, and rewards of roles; (2) the two role relation ships are not isomorphic in their structure; (3) support for recent arguments that complexity of roles is a key organizing feature of role transmission processes; and (4) mixed
support for recent research on patterns of intergenerational occupational movement.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Barker, D.G. (1969) "Factor analysis of worker trait requirements." J. of Employment Counseling6: 162-168.
2.
Berg, I. (1970) Education and Jobs: The Great Training Robbery . New York: Praeger.
3.
Bielby, W. and A. Kalleberg (1975) "The differentiation of occupations." Presented to the annual meetings of the American Sociological Association, San Francisco.
4.
Blau, P. and O.D. Duncan (1967) The American Occupational Structure. New York: John Wiley.
5.
Bluestone, B.A. (1974) "The personal earnings distribution: individual and institutional determinants." Ph.D. dissertation, University of Michigan.
6.
Bowles, S. and H. Gintis (1976) Schooling in Capitalist America. New York: Basic Books.
7.
Broom, L. et al. (1977) "Worker traits and worker functions in DOT ." J. of Vocational Behavior11: 253-261.
8.
Coser, R.L. (1975) "The complexity of roles as a seed bed of individual autonomy," pp. 236-263 in L. A. Coser (ed.) The Idea of Social Structure: Papers in Honor of Robert K. Merton . New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich .
9.
Davis, K. and W.E. Moore (1945) "Some principles of stratification." Amer. Soc. Rev.10: 242-249.
10.
Duncan, O.D. (1968) "Social stratification and mobility," pp. 675-719 in E. B. Sheldon and W. E. Moore (eds.) Indicators of Social Change. New York: Russell Sage.
11.
---( 1961) "A socioeconomic index for all occupations," pp. 109-138 in A. J. Reiss (ed.) Occupations and Social Status. New York: Free Press.
12.
———D.L. Featherman, and B. Duncan (1972) Socioeconomic Background and Achievement. New York: Seminar.
13.
Eckaus, R. (1964) "Economic criteria for education and training." Rev. of Economics and Statistics46: 181-188.
14.
Featherman, D.L. and R.M. Hauser (1978) Opportunity and Change. New York: Academic Press.
15.
——— (1975) "Design for a replicate study of social mobility in the United States," pp. 219-251 in S. Spilerman and K. Land (eds.) Social Indicator Models. New York: Russell Sage .
16.
Featherman, D.L., F.L. Jones, and R.M. Hauser (1975) "Assumptions of social mobility research in the US.:the case of occupational status." Social Sci. Research4: 329-360.
17.
Gaertner, G. (1977) "The intergenerational transmission of job complexity in horizontal divisions of the occupational structure." Presented to the annual meetings of the American Sociological Association , Chicago.
18.
Hall, R.T. (1975) Occupations and Social Structure. New York: McGraw-Hill.
19.
Haller, A.O. and I.W. Miller (1971) The Occupational Aspiration Scale. New York: Schenckman.
20.
Hauser, R.M. and D.L. Featherman (1977) The Process of Stratification: Trends and Analyses. New York: Academic Press.
21.
Herzberg, F., B. Mausner, and B. Snyderman (1959) The Motivation to Work. New York: John Wiley.
22.
Jencks, C. et al. (1972) Inequality: A Reassessment of the Effects of Family and Schooling in America. New York: Basic Books.
23.
Kalleberg, A. (1977) "Work values and job rewards: a theory of job satisfaction ." Amer. Soc. Rev.42: 124-143.
24.
Klatzky, S. and R.H. Hodge (1971) "A canonical correlation analysis of occupational mobility." J. of Amer. Statistical Association66: 16-22.
25.
Kohn, M.L. (1969) Class and Conformity. New York : Dorsey.
26.
——— (1978) "The reciprocal effects of the substantive complexity of work and intellectual flexibility: a longitudinal assessment." Amer. J. of Sociology84: 24-52.
27.
---and C. Schooler (1973) "Occupational experience and psychological functioning : an assessment of reciprocal effects." Amer. Soc. Rev.38: 97-118.
28.
Lucas, R. (1972) "Working conditions, wage rates and human capital: a hedonic study." Ph.D. dissertation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
29.
Mortimer, J.T. (1974) "Intergenerational occupational movement." Amer. J. of Sociology79: 1278-1299.
30.
Reiss, A.J. et al. (1961) Occupations and Social Status. New York: Free Press.
31.
Scoville, J. (1966) "Education and training requirements for occupations ." Rev. of Economics and Statistics47: 387-394.
32.
Sewell, W.H. and R.M. Hauser (1975) Education, Occupation and Earnings. New York: Academic Press.
——— (1976) "Cognitive complexity: a dimension underlying the socioeconomic achievement process," pp. 103-131 in W. H. Sewell et al. (eds.) Schooling and Achievement in American Society. New York: Academic Press.
35.
Spenner, K.I. (1980) "Occupational characteristics and classification systems: new uses of the Dictionary of Occupational Titles in social research ." Soc. Methods and Research.
36.
——— (1977) "From generation to generation: the transmission of occupation." Ph.D. dissertation, University of Wisconsin-Madison .
37.
Stewart, D.K. and W.A. Love (1968) "A general canonical correlation index." Psych. Bull.70: 160-163.
38.
Temme, L.V. (1975) Occupation: Meanings and Measures. Washington, DC: Bureau of Social Science Research .
39.
Timm, N.H. (1975) Multivariate Analysis with Applications in Education and Psychology. Monterey, CA: Brooks-Cole .
40.
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1973) Subject Reports: Occupational Characteristics. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
41.
——— (1972) "1970 occupation and industry classification in terms of their 1960 occupation and industry elements." Technical Paper26.
