Adolescent Agreement with Perceived Maternal and Paternal Educational Goals

Multiple regression analysis shows that adolescent educational expectations are substantially related to perceived maternal and paternal educational goals for offspring, net of the effects of several relevant variables. The statistical effect of perceived maternal goals is 50 percent greater than that of perceived paternal goals, indicating the importance of differentiating between parents. Tests of hypotheses in multiple-classification analyses show that rates of agreement with perceived maternal and paternal goals are positively associated with: (1) selfreported school grades; (2) formal education of the parent; and (3) perceived agreement between the mother's and father's goals for the adolescent. Also, agreement with perceived paternal goals is somewhat more frequent among sixth and eighth than among tenth and twelfth grade students. Whites agree with perceived maternal goals at a slightly higher rate than blacks.