Microsoft Word Socialized Choices 31-12 pod docx

Chapter 8 - Synthesis: overview and discussion 
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norm
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 and perceived behavioural control
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 (Ajzen and Fishbein, 2005, p.194). 
Sociological empirical researchers have demonstrated the value of including 
women’s gender and work attitudes in explaining their labour market behaviour 
(Beets et al., 1997; Hakim, 2000; Hooghiemstra, 2000; Marks and Houston 
2002a; Portegijs et al., 2008b; Risman et al., 1999) and yet generally these studies 
have not included the possible intermediating effect of intentions (defined in this 
study as work preferences) between attitudes and employment decisions. 
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 In this 
study, it is argued that gender and work attitudes are closer (but not identical) to 
work preferences than to behaviour. The first aim of this study is therefore to 
disentangle the separate roles of attitudes and work preferences in the 
employment decision-making process.  
The second theoretical notion of this study is the assumption that the 
employment decision-making process is socially formed and embedded. Labour 
market activity is understood as an outcome of a process that consists of 
consecutive decision-making moments, like dependent paths: each successive 
step depends on previously taken decisions. Attending school, whether as a high 
achiever or not, taking erroneously or correctly chosen continuation courses, and 
then the ensuing steps taking into professional work, are all not facts that can 
easily adjusted or reversed.  Most people experience the consequences of each 
educational and occupational step taken throughout their life. Besides being based 
on personal characteristics and structural circumstances, like the availability of 
financial support, studies and jobs, these important steps forward are all partly 
based on peoples’ values and attitudes, and their subsequent work preferences. 
People have developed these values and attitudes through the exposure to and 
internalization of parental behaviour, norms, values and attitudes, especially 
during childhood (Bandura, 1977; Berger and Luckmann, 1967; Handel, 2006). 
Experiences and social interactions in later life can change the intensity of these 
values and attitudes, however the underlying assumption is that values and 
attitudes are not easily modified in opposite directions, because individuals 
generally like their identity to be confirmed, and significant others are salient for 
this ongoing substantiation of their identity (Berger and Luckmann, 1967, p.170).  
Nevertheless, it is not only important to understand that values and attitudes 
have been formed, developed and sustained within different social relational 
contexts. The motivation for this study is also to understand how social 
backgrounds and networks have influenced the career-relevant attitudes and 
preferences of mothers, and which values and attitudes, that have been 
transmitted and sustained, are important in understanding mother’s labour market 
behaviour. Put differently, more needs to be known about the nature of micro 
                                                           
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   A person's expectation of social approval or disapproval of the specific behaviour. 
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  A person's feeling of being able to enact the specific behaviour, which is related to the supposed 
ease or difficulty of performing the behaviour 
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  Work preferences are in this study measured as the number of hours a mother wants to work. 

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Socialized Choices - Labour Market Behaviour of Dutch Mothers  
188 
socialization processes that may have mediated or regulated Dutch mothers’ 
diverse work preferences. 
 
The central question of this research is: 
Can specific (micro) socialization processes explain the current differences 
among Dutch mothers’ gender and work values, attitudes and work 
preferences, and how, in turn, do work preferences affect mothers’ labour 
market behaviour?   
The answers to this question are elaborated in this chapter through the four 
hypotheses of the study. The aim of the synthesis, besides summarising the most 
important findings of the study, is also to confront the similarities and differences 
of the qualitative findings and the quantitative results, while addressing the merits 
and limits of both research methods. The four hypotheses tested in this study are: 
1. 
A mother’s labour market behaviour is based on her preferred number of 
work hours. 
2. 
A mother’s preferred number of work hours is influenced by her general 
gender values and personal gender and work attitudes. 
3. 
A mother’s general gender values and gender and personal work 
attitudes are influenced by parental socialization during childhood. 
4. 
A mother endorses more egalitarian values and attitudes if she has 
perceived the professional and career support of significant others. 
8.2 
A mother’s labour market behaviour is based on her preferred 
number of work hours 
The first aim of this study was to disentangle the separate role of diverse work 
preferences (preferred number of work hours) in explaining mothers’ 
heterogeneous employment decisions. The labour market behaviour of mothers 
can be divided into the number of hours that mothers work and the participation 
decision of whether to work or to stay at home. The expected relationship 
between work preferences and labour market behaviour has similarities with the 
theory of planned behaviour of Ajzen (1991) and Azjen and Fishbein (1973, 
2005). This theory assumes intention to be an aim that guides action to perform a 
particular behaviour, and that intentions are based on a person’s attitudes, 
expected approval of significant others, and perceived ability to perform the 
behaviour. The stronger the intention to engage in particular behaviour, the more 

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