Expected Future Subjective Social Status Moderates the Relations between Perceived Parental Expectation and Persistence among Chinese Rural Adolescents

Abstract

Adolescents’ expectations on future subjective social status (SSS) may play a critical role in the relations between perceived parental expectations and persistence; however, there is a lack of research exploring this effect in the context of families experiencing greater economic risk. This study aimed to explicitly address this issue. A total of 698 Chinese rural adolescents participated in this study (Mage = 13.32 years; 54.60% boys). The results showed that for rural adolescents with lower expected future SSS, perceived parental expectation was negatively related to persistence; for rural adolescents with higher expected future SSS, perceived parental expectation was not significantly correlated with persistence. These findings imply the adverse effects of high perceived parental expectation on rural adolescents’ persistence and that expected future SSS can alleviate this adverse relationship.

Keywords

• parental expectations
• future subjective social status
• persistence
• rural adolescents