Microsoft Word Socialized Choices 31-12 pod docx

Socialized Choices - Labour Market Behaviour of Dutch Mothers 
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invited to look back on their life courses while I attempt to reconstruct patterns 
within the possible influences of significant others on their current values and 
attitudes, in order to explain overall Dutch mothers’ diverse work preferences and 
subsequent labour market behaviour. Since I could not investigate the real 
influence of significant others throughout a mother’s life, the study focuses 
explicitly on whether a mother has perceived support of significant others 
towards her prior professional choices and career ambitions. This theoretical 
choice is also induced by the socialization theory of Berger and Luckmann 
(1967), the theory of planned behaviour (Ajzen and Fishbein, 1991, 2005) and the 
social learning theory of Bandura (1977), as well as by different partial 
theoretical notions (e.g. Grube and Morgan, 1990). These theories all emphasise 
that the perceived approval of significant others towards specific behaviour will 
have a positive impact on people’s own values and attitudes towards the 
behaviour of interest. This will be especially at issue where one feels actively 
supported towards a certain type of behaviour. The perceived social support that 
is investigated in this study is the stimulation towards fulfilling job ambitions 
(which does necessarily mean vertical mobility). Subsequently it is assumed that 
a mother will endorse more egalitarian gender roles within her general values, as 
well as her personal attitudes, if she perceives she has been supported in her 
professional and career choices by secondary socialization agents. 
Hypothesis 4: 
A mother endorses more egalitarian values and attitudes if she has perceived 
the professional and career support of significant others. 
A concise overview of relevant literature concerning the influence of important 
‘others’ is given below, respectively addressing the possible influence of teachers, 
partners, friends and people at work. Empirical studies on the influence of these 
significant others on mothers’ gender roles and work values and attitudes 
appeared scarce. And studies that do address these social influences mostly reveal 
a lack of encouragement of women’s career ambitions as a result of stereotypical 
gender expectations.   
Teachers 
According to Berger and Luckmann (1967), modern education is the best 
illustration of how secondary socialization takes place under the auspices of 
specialised agencies (p.166). The educational period is seen as an important phase 
for socializing young people in particular skills and values in society (Bourdieu, 
1984; Nagel and Ganzeboom, 2002). However, there is not much empirical 
research on how teachers affect the gender role and work attitudes of their pupils. 
Some research has demonstrated that teachers who communicate high 
expectations can bring positive changes in the behaviour and education interests 

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Chapter 2 - Theoretical framework and hypotheses 
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of their pupils and students (Grusec and Hastings, 2007, p.391; Wentzel et al., 
2010). Teachers can also reinforce gender roles through their different 
expectations for the boys and girls in their classes (Allana et al., 2010). For 
example, a recent study among Spanish parents and teachers by Sáïnz et al. 
(2012) shows how teachers endorse gender stereotypical beliefs about their 
students’ educational preferences (in this study ICT), and only indirectly consider 
their own role in shaping these preferences. 
Partner  
The influence of a partner on the wife’s gender attitude is perceived as two-
directional. On the one hand, based on homogamy in mate selections, people seek 
marital partners with similar (gender) attitudes (Inman-Amos et al., 1994). On the 
other hand, it is possible that the partners’ attitudes will have become similar over 
the years, as their marriage or partnership matures. In general is expected that 
women committed to employment are more likely to share parenting 
responsibilities than those who are not (Covin and Brush, 1991). Hoffnung and 
Williams (2013) revealed with their longitudinal study (1994- 2009) among circa 
200 women living in the US,  that career oriented  “have it all” women often 
found partners who supported their full-time work for reasons of personal 
preference or situational constraints, or a combination of both. Their ‘husbands’ 
appeared more family-oriented and less career-oriented than the partners of 
traditional women, or else they had a lower educational levels and thus earning 
capacity.  
Furthermore, Vlasblom and Schippers (2005) showed that the decision to 
participate in the labour market is made within the family, in which the view 
about the division of care of both partners plays an important role (also Geist, 
2005, p.25).  Dutch empirical research has also demonstrated that wives’ 
employment decisions are generally not a subject that partners talk about 
(Portegijs et al., 2008b, p.105). When such discussions take place, mothers are 
more often motivated by their partners to work less, rather than to work more 
(also Keuzenkamp et al., 2009). In the survey of Keuzenkamp et al. (2009) only 
16 per cent of the women with a small part-time job were prompted by their 
partner to work more hours (p.76). An unintentional consequence of this process, 
where mothers are (by absence of encouragement) discouraged in their career 
ambitions, might be that over time cohabiting partners become more traditional 
with subsequent division of household tasks, rather than more egalitarian.    
Peers 
The socialization among peers is conceptualised by Ryan (2001) as a process that 
occurs through frequent interactions, shared experiences and exchanged 
information among a relatively intimate group of friends who interact with each 
other on a regular basis (Ryan, 2001, p.1138). Much relevant research has been 

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