Influence of Parents' Socio-Economic Status on Educational Aspirations of Students in Split (Croatia): Sociological Research

Abstract

Numerous studies show that the socio-economic factors significantly affect the child's psychophysical abilities as well as the development of certain values and morals. Socio-economic status is often singled out as a factor of social stratification and as such, directly or indirectly, affects all stages of an individual's education. Regardless of "free" education in Croatia (at primary and secondary school level), socio-economic status is still associated with the possibility of choosing a school, school program and further profiling of students. That is why the aim of this research is to examine the impact of parents 'socioeconomic status on students' educational aspirations. The characteristics of the socioeconomic status examined in this paper are the level of education of the parents, household income, the number of books in the household and reading activities. At the same time, the researchers in this paper examine the extent to which children will follow the parental example and whether parents will impose their wishes and ideas regarding the child's education.The research was conducted using the survey method in 2020 on a convenient sample of 203 respondents aged 18 to 22 years living in Split (first and second year students of different faculties). The obtained results indicate the existence of a latent socio-economic impact in terms of the level of education of both father and mother, where a higher level of education of parents is associated with a more positive attitude towards university obligations and desires in continuing education. The results show that the division into malefemale occupations is still present in society, with a high percentage of fathers who were educated in technical occupations, while mothers were mostly educated in the social sciences and humanities. There is a correlation between the number of books in the home library and the total number of books that students have read, but the number of read books is not related to the parent's reading habits. However, no direct and intrusive influence of parents on respondents' decisions regarding study and life habits was found.