Parental Involvement in the Career Decision Making of Adolescent Girls

The current research is a qualitative outline of the shared narrative between adolescent girls and their parents on the impact of parental involvement on the career decision-making process of their children. For this purpose, semi- structured interviews of 10 college-going adolescents and their parents (privileged= 5; unprivileged= 5) were taken. The study sought to identify and understand the positioning of adolescent girls in career decision-making within the family. Particularly, the nature of parental involvement in relation to choosing a stream and a career along with the mediating pathway were examined. Using content analysis, some of the major themes that emerged suggest that in contrast to their counterparts, under privileged adolescent girls had lower aspirations due to limited opportunities which are further rendered inaccessible due to added restrictions (social, economic, etc.), and that these culminated from beliefs of inferiority. Such beliefs appear to be reinforced by lowered parental expectation of the success of their daughters. Consequently, a finding of particular interest indicated more number of female students hailing from the privileged section of the society to agree with the educational and career related goals specifically of their mothers. Thus, the obtained results reiterate the importance of parental, specifically the mothers’ involvement in their daughter’s career-related outcomes and hence bear some crucial implications for the fields of career counselling and public policy.

Keywords: Adolescent Girls, Parenting, Career Decision Making