The GAP Between Children's Educational Expectations And Parents' Educational Expectations

Educational expectation is often divided into parents' educational expectation(the level of education parents want their children to achieve)and children's educational expectation(the level of education children want themselves to achieve).Many previous studies have found that there is an intergenerational relationship between parents' educational level and children's educational level.Educational expectation,as a psychological reflection of the actual education level,is actually the driving force and tool to promote the transmission of intergenerational education.There is also a corresponding transmission relationship between intergenerational educational expectations.Some scholars have found that in real life,there exists Self-Fulfilling Prophecy in inter-generational education transmission: parents' expectations for children's education formed by various factors(such as parents' own educational background,family affluence,professional level and other variables that children can not decide)will be passed on to their children through the Self-Fulfilling Prophecy,thus Children also have similar or even the same educational expectations as their parents which affecting their children's education acquisition.However,an another obvious fact is that the educational expectations between generations are not entirely consistent,the educational expectations of children fluctuate with the educational expectations of parents.Parents with high educational expectations may also have children with low educational expectations.Similarly,parents with low educational expectations may have a child with high educational expectations.Such fluctuations indicate that besides the self-evident predictive effect,there may be some factors that deviate from the ascribed factors in influencing children's educational expectations.In the process of accumulating children's educational achievements,besides the strength of parents,there also are many subjects such as schools,teachers,classmates and so on.In the study of individual education expectation and education acquisition,some studies focus on the participation of various subjects.Coleman put forward the theory of social capital of social closure in 1988,which is based on the social structure formed by the interaction of various subjects.Social capital,as a concept that can break away from Self-Fulfilling Prophecy to explain the relationship of intergenerational educational expectations,can partly avoid the influence of ascribed factors and explain the fluctuation of intergenerational educational expectations beyond Self-Fulfilling Prophecy.Based on Coleman's social capital theory and CEPS baseline survey data from 2013 to 2014,this paper uses a hierarchical linear model to find whether the differences in intergenerational educational expectations are influenced by subjects' interaction and school environmental variables.The study finds these conclusions: 1.The higher the interaction between teachers and students,the more likely children's educational expectations will catch up with and exceed their parents' educational expectations;2.The more "progressive friends" children have,the more likely their children's educational expectations will catch up with and exceed their parents' educational expectations.Friends' deviant behavior has no significant influence which make children's educational expectations bridge and surpass their parents' educational expectations,so this paper verifies the “example” role of peer groups in the transmission of intergenerational educational expectations,but the "contagion" effect of deviant behavior has not been verified.3.The higher the average socioeconomic status' s level of school,the more likely children's educational expectations will catch up with and surpass their parents' educational expectations.4.The effect of interactions which involve parents,such as parents-child interaction and parentsteacher interaction to bridge and surpass the differences in inter-generational educational expectations is negative,which may indicate that parents' deep participation in their children's learning and life has become an obstacle to their children's aspirations.The article also finds that although the children of the poor family can rely less on social capital,they can still improve their aspirations and increase the possibility of rising class through certain "capital supply".