Social stratification in science: the ultra-elite in the UK
January 2024
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Journal article
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European Societies
Continuing complexity: the university careers of a scientific elite in relation to their class origins and schooling
July 2023
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Journal article
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The British Journal of Sociology
We report on continuing research on the UK scientific elite, intended to illustrate a proposed new approach to elite studies and based on a prosopography of Fellows of the Royal Society born from 1900. We extend analyses previously reported of Fellows' social origins and secondary schooling to take in their university careers as under- and postgraduates. The composite term ‘Oxbridge’, as often applied in elite studies, is called into question, as members of the scientific elite prove to have been recruited more from Cambridge than from Oxford. Particular interest then attaches to the relation between Fellows' social origins and schooling and their attendance at Cambridge. Among Fellows whose university careers were made at Cambridge, those of more advantaged class origins and those with private schooling are over-represented, although in this, as in various other respects, including Fellows' field of study, family influences persist independently of schooling. One suggestive interaction effect exists in that being privately educated increases the probability of having been at Cambridge more for Fellows from managerial than from professional families. Private schooling leading on to both undergraduate and postgraduate study at Cambridge can be identified as the educational ‘royal road’ into the scientific elite; and Fellows coming from higher professional and managerial families alike have the highest probability of having entered the elite in this way. But the most common route turns out in fact to be via state schooling and attendance at universities outside of ‘the golden triangle’ of Cambridge, Oxford and London; and this route is far more likely to have been followed by Fellows of all other class origins than higher professional. The relation between the degree of social skew in the recruitment of an elite and the degree of social homogeneity among its members can be more complex than has often been supposed.
social mobility, elites, FFR, education
The Social Mobility Commission, State of the Nation 2022: A Fresh Approach to Social Mobility. A commentary
October 2022
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Journal article
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Political Quarterly
<p>The Social Mobility Commission's most recent annual report is entitled <em>State of the Nation 2022: A Fresh Approach to Social Mobility</em>. We examine what in the report is new, whether explicitly or implicitly, and how far the newness serves to enhance our understanding of social mobility in Britain today and is of relevance to problems and policy issues that arise. We find that the supposed greater attention to the findings of academic research is selective and, overall, quite limited; that the proposed new focus on ‘small steps upwards’ shifts attention away from what are the most serious and enduring instances of inequality of opportunity in British society; that the emphasis on individual agency as a means of overcoming disadvantaged social origins neglects the role of agency in maintaining inequality in mobility chances; and that the determinedly upbeat tone of the report raises questions of the independence of the Social Mobility Commission, under its present leadership, as a body charged with holding governments to account in their efforts to ensure that ‘the circumstances of birth do not determine outcomes in life’.</p>
social mobility, FFR, equality of opportunity, Social Mobility Commission
Social class and age-earnings trajectories in 14 European countries
July 2022
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Journal article
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Research in Social Stratification and Mobility
In this paper, we seek to contribute to ongoing discussions of the relationship between income and class in analyses of social inequality and mobility. We argue that while class has sometimes been taken as a proxy for long-term earnings levels, it is of greater importance, at least when treated in terms of the EGP schema or the European Socio-Economic Classification (ESEC), in capturing differences in age-earnings trajectories. Moving beyond previous single country studies, we examine how far the theory that underlies ESEC is reflected in men’s age-earnings trajectories across 14 European countries, while also taking into account any effects of their educational qualifications. Modelling data from the 2017 EU-SILC survey, and focussing on men’s full year/full-time equivalent gross annual earnings, we find that although the age-earnings trajectories that are estimated for different classes do reveal some cross-national variation, there are major features, of a theoretically expected kind, that are evident in our pooled sample and that regularly recur in individual countries. Class differences in earnings are at their narrowest for men in the youngest age group that we distinguish but then widen across older age groups. This occurs primarily because the earnings of men in the professional and managerial salariat, and especially in the higher salariat, show a marked rise with age, while the earnings of men in other classes rise far less sharply or remain flat. We also find evidence that these diverging trajectories are primarily shaped by individuals’ class positions independently of their level of educational qualification – however important the latter in determining the class positions that they hold. What can be regarded as the logic of different forms of employment relations lead to a large degree of cross-national commonality in the association that exists between class and earnings at different ages.
FFR
The social origins and schooling of a scientific elite: fellows of the Royal Society born from 1900
June 2022
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Journal article
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British Journal of Sociology
We present an analysis of the social composition of the UK scientific elite, as represented by
Fellows of the Royal Society, in terms of Fellows’ social class origins and type of secondary
schooling. From various sources, we have assembled data for 1691 Fellows, representing 80%
of our target population of all Fellows born from 1900 onwards whose scientific careers were
spent predominantly in the UK. We find that while these elite scientists come largely from more
advantaged class backgrounds, it is professional rather than business or managerial families
that are the main source of their recruitment – and, increasingly, such families where a parent
is in a STEM occupation. Recruitment from working-class families has declined and for most
recent birth cohorts almost ceased. The scientific elite is thus now more homogeneous as
regards the social origins of its members than it was in the second half of the twentieth century.
At the same time, little change is evident in the secondary schooling of Fellows. In all birth
cohorts, between two-fifths and a half of all – and over two-thirds of those from more
advantaged class backgrounds – were privately educated, although the proportion attending
Clarendon schools would seem low compared with that in other elites. A further finding of
interest is that some variation in Fellows’ class origins and type of schooling exists across
different research fields.
FFR
Intergenerational class mobility in industrial and post-industrial societies: towards a general theory
May 2022
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Journal article
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Rationality and Society
A large body of often rather complex findings on intergenerational social mobility has by now come into existence but theoretical development has not kept pace. In this paper, focusing specifically on class mobility in European nations and the US, we aim, first of all, to identify the main empirical regularities that have emerged from research, making the now standard distinction between absolute and relative mobility. Next, we review previous theories of mobility, leading up to what we label as the liberal theory, and we note the difficulties now evident with the latter, associated with its functionalist basis. We then set out our own theory of intergenerational class mobility, grounded in the subjectively rational courses of action followed by the various actors involved. We seek to show how the empirical regularities described can in this way be accounted for, while pointing to additional evidence that supports the theory but also to ways in which it is open to further empirical test. Finally, we consider some more general implications of the theory and, on this basis, venture a number of – conditional – predictions on the future of class mobility in more advanced societies.
Intergenerational Class Mobility of Labour Market Entrants in Germany and the UK since the 1950s (vol 38, pg 37, 2022)
March 2022
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Journal article
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EUROPEAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW
In the originally published version of this manuscript, lines falsely indicating the hierarchical ordering between Class 3 and Class 4 as well as between Class 4 and Class 5 were shown in Table 1. On p.8, the formula to calculate the number of odds ratios in a 7-7 mobility table was printed as 212=441 although it should read 212=441. Moreover, on p.9 and p.10, the equation showing the calculation of average global log odd ratios was missing a vertical line in the denominator, and the equations of the log-linear models, including related symbols, were not highlighted as such. This has now been corrected online.
Intergenerational Class Mobility of Labour Market Entrants in Germany and the UK since the 1950s
January 2022
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Journal article
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EUROPEAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW
Mediation analysis for associations of categorical variables: the role of education in social class mobility in Britain
December 2021
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Journal article
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Annals of Applied Statistics
We analyse levels and trends of intergenerational social class mobility
among three post-war birth cohorts in Britain, and examine how much of the
observed mobility or immobility in them could be accounted for by existing differences in educational attainment between people from different class
backgrounds. We propose for this purpose a method which quantifies associations between categorical variables when we compare groups which differ
only in the distribution of a mediating variable such as education. This is
analogous to estimation of indirect effects in causal mediation analysis, but
is here developed to define and estimate population associations of variables.
We propose estimators for these associations, which depend only on fitted
values from models for the mediator and outcome variables, and variance
estimators for them. The analysis shows that the part that differences in education play in intergenerational class mobility is by no means so dominant
as has been supposed, and that while it varies with gender and with particular
mobility transitions, it shows no tendency to change over time.
FFR
Stressful life events, differential vulnerability, and depressive symptoms: critique and new evidence
November 2021
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Journal article
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Journal of Health and Social Behavior
Depressive symptoms are disproportionately high among women and less educated individuals. One mechanism proposed to explain this is the differential vulnerability hypothesis—that these groups experience particularly strong increases in symptoms in response to stressful life events. We identify limitations to prior work and present evidence from a new approach to life stress research using the UK Household Longitudinal Study. Preliminarily, we replicate prior findings of differential vulnerability in between-individual models. Harnessing repeated measures, however, we show that apparent findings of differential vulnerability by both sex and education are artifacts of confounding. Men and women experience similar average increases in depressive symptoms after stressful life events. One exception is tentative evidence for a stronger association among women for events occurring to others in the household. We term this the “female vulnerability to network events” hypothesis and discuss with reference to Kessler and McLeod’s related “cost of caring” hypothesis.
gender, mental health, FFR, stress, life events, depression
Elite Studies: for a new approach
October 2021
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Journal article
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Political Quarterly
After a period in which interest in elites among social scientists went into decline, elite studies
are now reviving. But it is important to understand why the decline occurred. We critically
examine the largely contradictory explanations put forward by Scott and Savage and their
related proposals for new research. We suggest an alternative approach that, we believe,
would prove more rewarding. This entails treating elites quite extensively, but understood as
small-N entities, clearly distinct from social classes. On this basis, elites can be characterised
through prosopographical methods – the construction of collective biographies of their
members. More reliable accounts can thus be produced of the social composition of different
elites and in turn questions addressed of how far skewness in their recruitment results from
the processes through which they are formally constituted and how far from the composition
of the ‘pools’ from which their recruitment primarily occurs. Further questions follow of the
implications not only for equality of opportunity but also for the wastage of talent and loss of
diversity in elite memberships and for the so far neglected issue of the quality and the
effectiveness of elites in whatever field they exist.
FFR
Intergenerational class mobility of labour market entrants in Germany and the UK since the 1950s
August 2021
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Journal article
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European Sociological Review
This study examines over-time trends in intergenerational class mobility based on cohorts of labour market entrants in Germany and the UK since the 1950s. We calculate absolute and relative mobility rates, separately for men and women, using the German Socio-Economic Panel (1984–2016), the UK Household Longitudinal Study (2009–2016), and the UK Labour Force Survey (2014–2017). Regarding absolute mobility, we find marked country differences in upward and downward rates. In Germany, downward mobility decreased, while upward mobility rose. In the UK, downward mobility increased, while upward mobility declined. We provide evidence that these differences can be linked to contrasting changes in the distribution of origin and destination classes. Regarding relative mobility, striking country similarities appear. For both countries, we observe increases in social fluidity for respondents entering the labour market during the 1950s and 1960s that cease to continue for cohorts thereafter. Comparisons between adjacent cohorts do not provide evidence that social fluidity follows cyclical developments of the economy or shorter-term volatilities in the labour market.
FFR
Primary and secondary effects of social origins on educational attainment: New findings for England
May 2021
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Journal article
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British Journal of Sociology
We aim to bring together two current strands of research into inequalities in individuals’ educational attainment that are associated with their social origins: that concerned with the “primary” and “secondary” effects of social origins in creating inequalities, and that concerned with the relation between these inequalities and different components of social origins, taken to represent different forms of parental resources. Our main findings are the following. The secondary effects of social origins—their effects via the educational choices that young people make given their prior academic performance—are clearly operative across five key educational transitions within the English educational system. More specifically, we estimate that 35% of the total effect of social origins is secondary in the earliest transition that we consider, and from 15% to 20% in the subsequent four. Furthermore, mediation analyses reveal that secondary effects are most strongly associated with parental education and then, to a lesser degree with parental status, while little association exists with parental class and none at all with parental income. Primary effects are also at all transitions most strongly associated with parental education and status but in this case both parental class and parental income do retain some importance. We suggest an explanation for our empirical findings as resulting largely from the concern of highly educated, professional parents, and their children to avoid the occurrence of downward intergenerational mobility, especially in terms of education and status.
FFR
The case for studying the intergenerational transmission of social (dis)advantage: A reply to Gary Marks.
March 2021
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Journal article
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The British journal of sociology
Double trouble: does job loss lead to union dissolution and vice versa?
February 2021
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Journal article
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European Sociological Review
A now-substantial literature claims that job loss and union dissolution (the end of a marriage or cohabiting relationship) each increase individuals’ risk of the other, highlighting that major negative life events in the labour market and family can spill over across domains. We address three limitations of this research using UK data. First, these associations might arise from unmeasured factors which jointly predispose individuals to the two events. Second, the distinction between job loss (an event) and unemployment (the state it may lead to) has been neglected. Third, where the impact of unemployment has been considered, its duration has not. We simultaneously model both processes: does job loss (or being unemployed) lead to union dissolution, and does union dissolution (or being divorced/separated) lead to job loss? To investigate the role of unobserved, time-invariant confounders, we model the individual-specific effects as random variables allowed to correlate across the models for the two outcomes. Upon allowing such cross-process correlations, we find that job loss and union dissolution have modest and non-significant prospective associations with one another. We also find no support for a connection between being divorced/separated and subsequent job loss. Unemployment appears to increase risk of union dissolution; by attending to duration we uncover gender differences in this relationship.
divorce, FFR, UK, union dissolution, unemployment, job loss
‘Primary’ factors in intergenerational class mobility in Europe: results from the application of a topological model
October 2020
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Journal article
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European Sociological Review
There is little consensus in past research regarding the sources of cross-national variation in
relative rates of intergenerational class mobility. We argue for the importance of distinguishing
between ‘primary’ factors that explain why inequalities in relative chances of mobility exist in
the first place, and ‘secondary’ factors that explain variation in these chances. Our main aim is
to identify primary factors. We follow Erikson and Goldthorpe (1992) in developing a
topological model of the endogenous mobility regime which we then apply to class mobility
tables for 30 European nations. The model claims that inequalities in relative class mobility
chances derive from three kinds of effect: those of class hierarchy, class inheritance and status
affinity. When applied to all nations together, the model accounts for the very large part of the
total association between class origins and destinations. Clear differences, however, show up
between the mobility regimes of men and of women: gender is a secondary factor. When the
model is applied separately to nations in the high fluidity and low fluidity sets that we
distinguish, we find that the effects of the primary factors identified by our model strengthen
in a consistent way from the former set to the latter, although it seems likely that different
secondary factors may operate in offsetting ways. Finally, when the model is applied to the
groups of nations that we distinguish within the high and low fluidity sets, few differences in
the strengths of the various effects show up, but those that do are highly concentrated in postsocialist nations and can be related to secondary factors of a specific kind associated with
particular features of their transitions to some form of capitalist democracy.
FFR
Intergenerational educational mobility and smoking: a study of 20 European countries using diagonal reference models.
April 2020
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Journal article
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Public health
ObjectivesIntergenerational educational mobility can be particularly relevant for smoking because it implies moving from individuals' family background to a new position in the social hierarchy. Existing research, however, does not provide an answer as to how the process of mobility, per se, is associated with the likelihood of smoking.Study designWe used cross-nationally comparable survey data for 20 countries collected within the health module of the European Social Survey in 2014. The analytical sample consisted of 22,336 respondents aged 25-64 years.MethodsSmoking was operationalized by daily and occasional smoking, while the intergenerational educational mobility variable was derived from a comparison of respondents' and their parents' highest levels of educational attainment. We employed diagonal reference models to examine the association of intergenerational educational mobility and smoking.ResultsIn the country- and age-adjusted analysis, intergenerational downward mobility was associated with odds ratios of 1.34 (CI95 1.07, 1.68) and 1.61 (CI95 1.34, 1.93) for smoking, respectively, among men and women. Intergenerational upward mobility, on the other hand, was negatively associated with smoking but only among women.ConclusionOur findings provide new evidence that the process of intergenerational educational mobility is associated with individuals' likelihood of smoking and that this effect cannot be explained by conventional covariates of smoking.
Humans, Smoking, Intergenerational Relations, Parents, Time, Social Mobility, Adult, Middle Aged, Educational Status, Employment, United States, Europe, Female, Male
Intergenerational class mobility among men and women in Europe: Gender differences or gender similarities?
February 2020
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Journal article
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European Sociological Review
In this article, we address two inter-related questions. Are there gender differences in the level and the pattern of intergenerational class mobility? If so, do these differences show up in a uniform fashion in Europe? To answer these questions, we use a newly constructed comparative data set that allows us to examine how far differences between men and women in absolute and relative mobility can still be characterized in the same way as in the last decades of the 20th century. We also examine the effects of women’s heterogeneity in terms of labour market attachment on their class mobility. Our results show that in most countries, women are more likely than men to be found in different class positions to those of their parents’. But we point out that the reasons for this might be quite different in the West and in the East. As regards relative mobility chances, we are able to underwrite the dominant finding of past research that women display greater social fluidity than men only in a certain group of countries. In most countries, we do not find any systematic and uniform gender difference between men and women in the level of their relative mobility rates. But, we do find significant and systematic gender differences in the pattern of relative rates: women’s class mobility appears to be more impeded by hierarchical barriers than by the propensity for class inheritance. And, in this regard, our findings point to a large degree of commonality across European countries.
Understanding the mobility chances of children from working-class backgrounds in Britain: how important are cognitive ability and locus of control?
January 2020
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Journal article
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British Journal of Sociology
Research in social stratification has shown that children from working‐class backgrounds tend to obtain substantially lower levels of educational attainment and lower labor market positions than children from higher social class backgrounds. However, we still know relatively little about the micro‐level processes that account for this empirical regularity. Our study examines the roles of two individual‐level characteristics—cognitive ability and locus of control—in mediating the effect of individuals’ parental class background on their educational attainment and social class position in Britain. We find that cognitive ability mediates only about 35% of the total parental class effect on educational attainment and only about 20% of the total parental class effect on respondents’ social class position, net of their educational attainment. These findings contradict existing claims that differences in the life chances of children from different social class backgrounds are largely due to differences in cognitive ability. Moreover, we find that although individuals’ locus of control plays some role in mediating the parental class effect, its role is substantially smaller than the mediating role of cognitive ability. We measure individuals’ social class positions at different points in their careers—at labor market entry and at occupational maturity—and find that the mediating roles of cognitive ability and locus of control are remarkably stable across individuals’ working lives.
locus of control , cognitive ability, inequality of opportunity, intergenerational social mobility, FFR, meritocracy
'Persistence of the social': The role of cognitive ability in mediating the effects of social origins on educational attainment in Britain - Reply to Gary Marks
June 2019
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Journal article
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RESEARCH IN SOCIAL STRATIFICATION AND MOBILITY
Social origins, cognitive ability, educational attainment and social class position in Britain: A birth cohort and life-course perspective
May 2019
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Report
The aim of this Summary Report is to show how social origins, when viewed in a comprehensive, multidimensional way, affect the educational and labour market attainments of individuals whose cognitive ability at a relatively early stage in their educational histories is at a similar level.
Intergenerational class mobility in Europe: a new account
April 2019
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Journal article
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Social Forces
Comparative research into intergenerational social mobility has been typically restricted to a relatively small number of countries. The aim of this paper is to widen the perspective, and to provide an up-to-date account of rates of intergenerational class mobility across 30 European countries, using a newly-constructed comparative data-set based on the European Social Survey. Absolute mobility rates are found to vary quite widely with national differences in the extent and pattern of class structural change. As regards relative rates, countries are best seen as falling into groups within comparatively high and low fluidity sets, within which groups a high degree of cross-national commonality prevails. Further results indicate that country differences in relative rates play only a very limited part in accounting for country differences in absolute rates, confirming that the latter are primarily determined by class structural change. Based on our findings, we suggest a restatement of the FJH-hypothesis to the effect that in societies with a capitalist market economy, a nuclear family system and a liberal-democratic polity, a limit exists to the extent to which relative rates of class mobility can be equalized, which countries may move closer to or, in the case of post-socialist societies, recede from.
FFR
Class Mobility in Absolute Terms: The End of the Golden Age
January 2019
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Chapter
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SOCIAL MOBILITY AND EDUCATION IN BRITAIN
Class Mobility in Relative Terms: Resistance to Change
January 2019
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Chapter
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SOCIAL MOBILITY AND EDUCATION IN BRITAIN
Education and Social Mobility: The OED Triangle
January 2019
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Chapter
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SOCIAL MOBILITY AND EDUCATION IN BRITAIN
Education and the Labour Market: Is Education Now Class Destiny?
January 2019
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Chapter
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SOCIAL MOBILITY AND EDUCATION IN BRITAIN
Lifelong Learning: Compensation or Cumulative Advantage?
January 2019
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Chapter
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SOCIAL MOBILITY AND EDUCATION IN BRITAIN
Origins versus Education: Are there 'Glass Floors' and 'Glass Ceilings'?
January 2019
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Chapter
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SOCIAL MOBILITY AND EDUCATION IN BRITAIN
Social Class as the Context of Social Mobility
January 2019
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Chapter
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SOCIAL MOBILITY AND EDUCATION IN BRITAIN
Social Mobility and Education in Britain
January 2019
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Book
Social Mobility and Education in Britain Research, Politics and Policy Conclusions
January 2019
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Chapter
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SOCIAL MOBILITY AND EDUCATION IN BRITAIN
Social Mobility in Britain in Comparative Perspective: Is Britain a Low Mobility Society?
January 2019
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Chapter
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SOCIAL MOBILITY AND EDUCATION IN BRITAIN
Social Origins, Ability and Educational Attainment: Is there a Wastage of Talent?
January 2019
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Chapter
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SOCIAL MOBILITY AND EDUCATION IN BRITAIN
The Pattern of Social Fluidity within the Class Structure: Hierarchy, Inheritance and Status Effects
January 2019
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Chapter
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SOCIAL MOBILITY AND EDUCATION IN BRITAIN
‘Falling from grace’ and ‘rising from rags’: Intergenerational educational mobility and depressive symptoms
December 2018
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Journal article
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Social Science and Medicine
With this study, we make a number of contributions to the ongoing debate on the implications of intergenerational mobility for individuals' health. First, instead of focusing on absolute intergenerational mobility in educational attainment, we analyse varying implications of relative intergenerational mobility for depressive symptoms by considering the distribution of educational credentials separately in the parental and offspring generations. Second, unlike conventional approaches, which predominantly emphasise that upward and downward mobility has a negative effect, we argue that upward mobility might improve individuals' mental well-being and that this effect may vary by gender. Third, we use statistical approach which was designed specifically to study the consequences of intergenerational mobility and does not conflate mobility effects with effects of the positions of origin and destination. Using the 2012–2014 waves of the European Social Survey and data for 52,773 individuals nested in 28 societies, we fit the diagonal reference models with both individuals' short- and long-range experiences of intergenerational educational mobility. The results indicate that upward and downward mobility is associated with, respectively, lower and higher levels of depressive symptoms, as measured with the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale, and that these effects are only observed among men.
social mobility, depressive symptoms, gender, health, European social survey, FFR, inequality, education, diagonal reference models
Cognitive ability, lifelong learning, and social mobility in Britain: Do further qualifications provide second chances for bright people from disadvantaged backgrounds?
December 2018
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Journal article
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European Sociological Review
There is evidence to show that, even among individuals who have relatively high levels of cognitive ability, coming from disadvantaged social origins hinders their chances of securing high levels of qualification and advantaged labour market positions. But it has been argued that lifelong learning could provide second chances for these people through providing an alternative route to high qualifications. The main objective of this article is to examine this issue. We pose two questions. Does further education enable individuals from disadvantaged origins but with a high level of cognitive ability to improve on their initial levels of qualification? And does any such improvement then lead to better labour market positions, in terms of social class, for these individuals? Based on the complete qualification histories of individuals in the 1970 British Birth Cohort Study, our analyses show that men and women from disadvantaged origins, especially if of high ability, are indeed able to raise their levels of qualification, but they do so mainly via the attainment of further vocational, rather than further academic, qualifications. And while our results also indicate that acquiring further academic qualifications does improve the upward mobility chances of people of high ability from disadvantaged backgrounds, a similar effect does not show up from acquiring further vocational qualifications. In addition, we find that there remains a substantial ‘direct effect’ of cognitive ability on class attainment. This suggests that obtaining further academic qualifications is only one channel for upward mobility and that there are others which are more directly related to ability.
Social Mobility and Education in Britain
December 2018
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Book
Income inequality, living standards and intergenerational social mobility
October 2018
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Chapter
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Generating Prosperity for Working Families in Affluant Countries
‘Persistence of the social’: The role of cognitive ability in mediating the effects of social origins on educational attainment in Britain
September 2018
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Journal article
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Research in Social Stratification and Mobility
In this paper, we address two research questions on the basis of the series of British birth cohort studies. First, how large is the part played by cognitive ability in mediating the association that exists between individuals’ educational attainment and their social origins, and is there evidence of any change in the importance of its mediating role over recent decades? Second, does the importance of its mediating role change over the course of individuals’ educational careers? As regards the first question, we find that only around half of the effects of individuals’ social origins on their educational attainment is mediated via their cognitive ability, as measured in early life. There has been some fluctuation in the mediation percentage over time, but no sustained increase. Moreover, this is the case in whatever way we measure social origins. As regards the second question, we find that the mediating role of cognitive ability changes little in importance as individuals’ educational careers progress, with the possible exception that it declines in the case of an educational threshold relating to upper secondary qualifications. In the light of our results, we call into question the idea that the intergenerational reproduction of educational inequalities is driven overwhelmingly via the intergeneration transmission of cognitive ability; and also claims such as those made by Marks (2014) of ‘the decline of the social’ in the determination of the educational attainment of children from more or less advantaged families. While the relative importance of different forms of parental resources for children’s educational success may be changing somewhat, our findings indicate a strong ‘persistence of the social’.
Wastage of talent?: Social origins, cognitive ability and educational attainment in Britain
September 2017
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Journal article
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Advances in Life Course Research
The extent to which societies suffer „wastage of talent‟ due to social inequalities in educational attainment is a longstanding issue. The present paper contributes to the relevant literature by examining how social origins and early-life cognitive ability are associated with educational success across three British birth cohorts. We address questions of over-time change, bringing current evidence up-to-date. Our findings reinforce the well-established trend that the importance of cognitive ability declined for cohorts born between 1958 and 1970, but we show that for a cohort born in the early 1990s this trend has reversed. We further show that the relative importance of family background has not seen a corresponding decline. In distinguishing between different components of social origins, we show that family economic resources have become somewhat less important for children‟s educational success, while socio-cultural and educational resources have become more important. Even high ability children are unable to transcend the effects of their social origins. The problem of „wastage of talent‟ remains; young people from disadvantaged backgrounds are still lacking the opportunity to fully realise their potential within the British educational system.
cognitive ability, cohort studies, educational attainment, ALSPAC, social origins
Why have relative rates of class mobility become more equal among women in Britain?
July 2017
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Journal article
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British Journal of Sociology
In a previous paper it has been shown that across three cohorts of men and women born in Britain in 1946, 1958 and 1970 a gender difference exists in regard to relative rates of class mobility. For men these rates display an essential stability but for women they become more equal. The aim of the present paper is to shed light on the causes of this trend—or, that is, of increasing social fluidity—among women. We begin by considering a refined version of the perverse fluidity hypothesis: that is, one that proposes that part‐time work leads to increasing downward worklife mobility among women that also entails downward intergenerational mobility and thus promotes greater fluidity. We do in fact find that the increase in fluidity is very largely, if not entirely, confined to women who have had at least one period of part‐time work. However, a more direct test of the hypothesis is not supportive. We are then led to investigate whether it is not that part‐time working itself is the crucial factor but rather that women who subsequently work part‐time already differ from those who do not at entry into employment. We find that eventual full‐ and part‐timers do not differ in their class origins nor, in any systematic way, in their educational qualifications. But there is a marked and increasing difference in the levels of employment at which they make their labour market entry. Eventual part‐timers are more likely than eventual full‐timers to enter in working‐class positions, regardless of their class origins and qualifications. Insofar as these women are from more advantaged origins, they would appear not to seek to exploit their advantages to the same extent as do full‐timers in order to advance their own work careers. And it is, then, in the downward mobility accepted by these women—who increase in number across the cohorts—that we would locate the main source of the weakening association between class origins and destinations that is revealed among women at large.
social mobility, gender difference, birth cohort studies, social class
Linking the macro to the micro: A multidimensional approach to educational inequalities in four European countries
June 2017
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Journal article
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European Societies
Recent research into educational inequalities has shown the importance of decomposing social origins into parental class, status and education, representing economic, socio-cultural and educational family resources, respectively. But we know little about how inequalities in educational attainment at the micro-level map onto institutional characteristics of educational systems at the macro-level, if we treat social origins in a multidimensional way. Drawing on the rich over-time variation in educational systems in four European countries – Britain, Sweden, Germany and Italy – this paper develops and tests a number of hypotheses regarding the effects of various components of social origins on individuals’ educational attainment in different institutional contexts. It is evident from our results that a great deal of similarity exists across nations with different educational systems in the persisting importance for individuals’ educational attainment of parental class, status and education. But our findings also indicate that changes in the institutional features of educational systems have, in some instances although not in others, served to reinforce or to offset the social processes generating educational inequalities at the micro level.
educational attainment, social origins, comparative research, educational system
The direct effect of social origins on social mobility chances: ‘Glass Floors’ and ‘Glass Ceilings’ in Britain
March 2017
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Journal article
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European Sociological Review
In this paper we pursue, using appropriate British birth-cohort data, various issues that arise from recent research into the ‘direct’ effect of social origins on individuals’ social mobility chances: i.e. the effect that is not mediated by education and that can be seen as giving rise to non-meritocratic ‘glass floors’ and ‘glass ceilings’. We show that if educational level is determined at labour market entry, class destinations are significantly associated with class origins independently of education. However, we go on to investigate how far the direct effect may be underestimated by an insufficiently comprehensive treatment of social origins; and also how far it may be overestimated by a failure to take into account the effects of later-life education and resulting changes in individuals’ relative qualification levels. Finally, having arrived at our best estimates of the extent of the direct effect, we seek to identify factors that mediate it. While individuals’ cognitive ability and sense of locus of control prove to play some part, reported parental help in the labour market does not appear to be of any great importance. Some implications of our findings both for further research and for the ideal of an education-based meritocracy are considered.
social mobility, birth cohort studies, later-life education, meritocracy
The Pattern of Social Fluidity within the British Class Structure: a Topological Model
September 2016
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Journal article
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Journal of Royal Statistical Society: Series A
It has previously been shown that across three British birth cohorts, relative rates of intergenerational social class mobility have remained at an essentially constant level among men and also among women who have worked only full-time. We aim now to establish the pattern of this prevailing level of social fluidity and its sources and to determine whether it too persists over time, and to bring out its implications for inequalities in relative mobility chances. We develop a parsimonious model for the log odds ratios which express the associations between individuals’ class origins and destinations. This model is derived from a topological model that comprises three kinds of readily interpretable binary characteristics and eight effects in all, each of which does, or does not, apply to particular cells of the mobility table: i.e. effects of class hierarchy, class inheritance and status affinity. Results show that the pattern as well as the level of social fluidity is essentially unchanged across the cohorts; that gender differences in this prevailing pattern are limited; and that marked differences in the degree of inequality in relative mobility chances arise with long-range transitions where inheritance effects are reinforced by hierarchy effects that are not offset by status affinity effects.
topological models, social mobility, indicator models, loglinear models, social class
Cumulative inequalities over the life-course: Life-long learning and social mobility in Britain
September 2016
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Journal article
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Journal of Social Policy
This paper examines the possibility that life-long learning promotes intergenerational class mobility. The following two research questions are asked. Is it the case that further education provides individuals coming from less advantaged origins with a second chance to improve on their educational attainment? Is it the case that the returns to further qualifications, in terms of chances of upward class career mobility, are greater for children from less advantaged backgrounds than for children from more advantaged backgrounds? The analyses – that are based on the complete educational and class histories of men and women in a British birth cohort – mainly produce negative findings. Children coming from managerial and professional backgrounds seem to benefit most from further education. More specifically, further education appears to be an effective means of career advancement for individuals of managerial and professional origins who start out in their working lives in relatively low level class positions. Via further education they can increase or update their qualifications, and in turn enhance their chances of being counter-mobile back to their class of origin. Overall, based on the findings of this paper, we can conclude that qualifications attained through life-long learning primarily serve to maintain, rather than to narrow, inequalities attached to social origins in Britain.
Is education now class destiny? Class histories across three British birth cohorts
September 2016
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Journal article
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European Sociological Review
We investigate claims originating in the work of Daniel Bell that in post-industrial societies educational qualifications obtained prior to labour market entry increasingly determine individuals’ class positions - while opportunities for achieving upward class mobility over the course of working life correspondingly diminish. We apply optimal matching techniques of sequence analysis as a basis for constructing typologies of class histories for men and women in three British birth cohorts whose lives span the period from the mid-twentieth to the early twenty-first century. We find a steady increase across the cohorts in class histories characterised by entry into, and stability within, managerial and professional positions and associated with relatively high levels of qualification. However, there is no decline in class histories characterised by upward mobility; and, while there are clear associations between education and most of the types of class history that we distinguish, the effects of education are systematically and persistently reinforced, or modified, by the independent effects of early life cognitive ability and of class origins. In Britain at least, there is little indication of movement towards an education-based meritocracy, and educational level at labour market entry is today no more class destiny than it was half-a-century ago.
Educational attainment - relative or absolute - as a mediator of intergenerational class mobility in Britain
March 2016
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Journal article
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Research in Social Stratification and Mobility
3902 Education Policy, Sociology and Philosophy, 39 Education, 44 Human Society
The effects of social origins and cognitive ability on educational attainment
November 2014
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Journal article
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Acta Sociologica
4410 Sociology, 44 Human Society, Behavioral and Social Science, Basic Behavioral and Social Science, Pediatric, 1 Underpinning research, 2 Aetiology, 2.1 Biological and endogenous factors, 1.2 Psychological and socioeconomic processes, 2.3 Psychological, social and economic factors, Mental health, 4 Quality Education
The mobility problem in Britain: new findings from the analysis of birth cohort data
October 2014
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Journal article
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British Journal of Sociology
Social mobility is now a matter of greater political concern in Britain than at any time previously. However, the data available for the determination of mobility trends are less adequate today than two or three decades ago. It is widely believed in political and in media circles that social mobility is in decline. But the evidence so far available from sociological research, focused on intergenerational class mobility, is not supportive of this view. We present results based on a newly‐constructed dataset covering four birth cohorts that provides improved data for the study of trends in class mobility and that also allows analyses to move from the twentieth into the twenty‐first century. These results confirm that there has been no decline in mobility, whether considered in absolute or relative terms. In the case of women, there is in fact evidence of mobility increasing. However, the better quality and extended range of our data enable us to identify other ‘mobility problems’ than the supposed decline. Among the members of successive cohorts, the experience of absolute upward mobility is becoming less common and that of absolute downward mobility more common; and class‐linked inequalities in relative chances of mobility and immobility appear wider than previously thought.
SBTMR
Decomposing 'social origins': The effects of parents' class, status, and education on the educational attainment of their children
The relationship between work history and partnership formation in cohorts of British men born in 1958 and 1970
July 2012
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Journal article
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POPULATION STUDIES-A JOURNAL OF DEMOGRAPHY
cohabitation, marriage, work history, event-history analysis, birth cohort
The relationship between work history and partnership formation in cohorts of British men born in 1958 and 1970.
July 2012
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Journal article
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Popul Stud (Camb)
This study investigated the relationship between work history and partnership formation for British men. Two questions were asked: (i) Do instabilities in young men's careers lead to a higher probability of entering into cohabitation and, in turn, to a postponement of first marriage? (ii) Are there cohort differences in the effects of men's careers on their partnership decisions? The analyses were based on data from two birth-cohort studies for men born in 1958 and 1970. The results suggest that highly unstable occupational careers make it very likely that young men's first partnership is a cohabitation rather than a marriage. Further, having an unstable occupational career early in working life is a strong impediment to transforming cohabitation into marriage. Finally, there is no evidence of a weakening between cohorts of the effects of men's work careers on their partnership decisions.
Adult, Career Mobility, Cohort Studies, England, Humans, Male, Marriage, Middle Aged, Occupations, Retrospective Studies, Salaries and Fringe Benefits, Sexual Partners, Survival Analysis, United Kingdom, Work, Young Adult
Changing career trajectories of women and men across time
January 2012
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Chapter
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Gendered Lives: Gender Inequalities in Production and Reproduction
Serial Cohabitation among Men in Britain: Does Work History Matter?
January 2012
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Journal article
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EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF POPULATION-REVUE EUROPEENNE DE DEMOGRAPHIE
Cohabitation, Marriage, Separation, Work histories, Event-history analysis, Birth cohort studies
Serial Cohabitation among Men in Britain: Does Work History Matter?
January 2012
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Journal article
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European Journal of Population
Late careers in hungary: Coping with the transformation from a socialist to a market economy
December 2011
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Chapter
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Aging Populations, Globalization and the Labor Market: Comparing Late Working Life and Retirement in Modern Societies
CLASS ORIGINS, EDUCATION AND OCCUPATIONAL ATTAINMENT IN BRITAIN Secular trends or cohort-specific effects?
January 2011
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Journal article
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EUROPEAN SOCIETIES
occupational attainment, social class, education, cohort effects
The conceptualisation and measurement of occupational hierarchies: a review, a proposal and some illustrative analyses
Globalization, Uncertainty and Women's Careers: An International Comparison
Globalization, Uncertainty and Late Careers in Society
June 2006
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Chapter
Late careers and career exits in Hungary
January 2006
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Chapter
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GLOBALIZATION, UNCERTAINTY AND LATE CAREERS IN SOCIETY
Globalization, Uncertainty and Youth in Society
June 2005
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Chapter
4410 Sociology, 44 Human Society
Changes in Intergenerational Class Mobility in Hungary, 1973–2000
August 2004
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Chapter
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Social Mobility in Europe
4406 Human Geography, 44 Human Society
Dual Career Pathways: The Occupational Attainment of Married Couples in Hungary
June 2002
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Journal article
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European Sociological Review
This paper explores career mobility in the family, between the time of marriage and the time of data collection. The upward and downward moves of husbands and of wives are analysed separately, in the light of various theoretical frameworks, such as advantage redistribution, advantage accumulation, and status similarity. Empirically, the statistical models consider cohort and age differences, work experience, the social characteristics of respondents (education and occupation), the number and age of the children in the household, and the characteristics of the spouse. Another factor expected to be crucial to the chances of a person experiencing mobility is the occupational heterogeneity or homogeneity of the marriage. The data analysed are taken from the Hungarian Social Mobility Survey for 1992. The probability of upward and downward mobility by partners during the marriage has been subjected to event-history analysis. This reveals strong evidence that the resources of the spouse have positive effects on the occupational success of both husbands and wives, which supports the process of advantage accumulation in Hungarian households. With comparative advantages, results do not support advantage redistribution but status similarity as the framework for couples' career mobility.
Intergenerational class mobility among men and women in Europe: Gender differences or gender similarities?
Journal article
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European Sociological Review
Intergenerational class mobility among men and women in Europe: Gender differences or gender similarities?
Journal article
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European Sociological Review
‘PRIMARY’ FACTORS IN INTERGENERATIONAL CLASS MOBILITY IN EUROPE: RESULTS FROM THE APPLICATION OF A TOPOLOGICAL MODEL
