Some Aspects of Women's Ambition

Correlational analysis shows that several discrete measures of ambition express two latent types of ambition for both men and women, but are more highly differentiated in the case of women than men. Material ambition approximates one type, and women's career and men's eminence ambition the other. Degree of difference between level of men's and women's ambitions arrays on the same dimension. Since career-and non-career-choosers, with minimum acceptable husband's occupation controlled, do not differ in level of material ambition, the conclusion is suggested that women expect to leave the extrinsic rewards to the husband, while seeking intrinsic satisfactions from career and education. Comparisons between career-choosers and non-career-choosers with respect to value indorsements and sociometric characteristics round out a consistent picture.