Search

Byline: Arthur Sakamoto, Department of Sociology, University of Texas, Austin, Texas 78712; email: asakamoto@austin.utexas.edu; Kimberly A. Goyette, Department of Sociology, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19122; email: kgoyette@temple.edu; ChangHwan Kim, Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas 66045; email: chkim@ku.edu Keywords: educational attainment, labor market, earnings, majority-minority paradigm, model minority myth, post-Civil Rights era Abstract According to the majority-minority paradigm, racial and ethnic minorities have lower socioeconomic characteristics than whites owing to discrimination. Asian Americans defy this conventional view, however, at least on average. Asian Americans tend to have higher mean levels of educational achievements, and several recent studies indicate approximate parity with whites in most arenas of the labor market for those Asian Americans who were schooled in the United States. Their favorable socioeconomic outcomes stand in contrast to the widespread discrimination and labor market disadvantages that Asian Americans encountered during the earlier part of the twentieth century. The improved opportunities for Asian Americans suggest increasingly successful interrelations with whites in the post-Civil Rights era, with its more multicultural ethos. Less encouragingly, the favorable average socioeconomic profile of Asian Americans in the post-Civil Rights era in part reflects the rising significance of class resources and associated inequalities. The latter trend is evident in the notable socioeconomic variability within the racial category of Asian Americans.

For several decades now, social scientists interested in the relationship between higher education and social stratification have directed their research efforts toward evaluating how college access is conditioned by students' [...]

This article explores the relationship between economic potential and rates of entry into marriage and cohabitation. Using data from the 1990 census and the 1980-1992 High School and Beyond (Sophomore Cohort), we developed a method for explicitly estimating five time-varying measures of earnings potential. The analyses of union formation are based on an intergenerational panel study of parents and children, to which our measures of earnings potential were appended. The results indicate that all five measures of earnings potential strongly and positively influence the likelihood of marriage for men, but not for women. Earnings potential does not affect entry into cohabiting unions for either men or women.

Although sociologists have found direct links between parents' education and the high school and college educational attainments of their offspring, researchers have been surprised to find no parental effects on educational enrollments beyond college. Postgraduate matriculation appears to result from academic success in college, divorced from parents' educational capital. Using new data from the Baccalaureate and Beyond Longitudinal Study, the authors reexamine this issue and extend the literature by disaggregating graduate programs by type. They find that parents' education has no effect on their children's entry into MBA programs and only a small influence on entry into master's programs; however, there is a strong effect of parents' education on entry into first-professional and doctoral programs. The role of parental education is largely indirect, working primarily through the characteristics of a student's undergraduate institution, academic performance, educational expectations, and career values. In addition, college performance maintains a strong, independent effect on enrollment in graduate school.

Objective. This paper is the first systematic study of the intersection of immigration and gender among scientists and engineers. Methods. We use data from the 5% Public Use Microsample (PUMS) of the 1990 census and the longitudinal 1982-1989 Survey of Natural and Social Scientists and Engineers (SSE) to compare the labor force outcomes of women immigrant scientists to immigrant men and native-born women scientists. Results. We find that immigrant women are less likely to be employed and promoted than immigrant men and native-born women. Although women immigrants appear to earn slightly less than native-born women, this gap is explained by such factors as field, employment sector, and family characteristics. We suggest that immigration paths may underlie some of the labor force disadvantages experienced by immigrant women scientists. Conclusions. The results of this paper highlight the importance of considering gender differences, particularly differences in migration path, when studying immigrant scientists. Consideration of gender leads to a fuller understanding of immigrant scientists' labor force outcomes., Immigrants are an important source of the scientific workforce in the United States. According to an estimation from the 1990 census, 11.7% of all scientists in the United States are [...]

This article examines the socioeconomic and demographic correlates that are associated with whether biracial children with an Asian parent are racially identified with their Asian parent or with their non-Asian parent. With data extracted from the 5-percent Public Use Microdata Sample (PUMS) of the 1990 census, we take into account explanatory variables at three levels: the child's characteristics, the parents' characteristics, and the locale's racial composition. Our results indicate that the racial identification of biracial children with an Asian parent is to a large extent an arbitrary option within today's prevailing racial classification scheme. We find empirical evidence in support of the theoretical proposition that both assimilation and awareness of Asian heritage affect the racial identification of biracial children with an Asian parent., Asian Americans are the fastest-growing minority in the United States, and most of their growth is attributed to immigrants and their children (Barringer, Gardner & Levin 1993; Kitano & Daniels [...]

The entrenchment of college for all norms is explored documenting the rise in expectations to achieve a bachelor's degree and by investigating several possible reasons for the growth of these expectations.

A synthetic framework that is strategic adaptation for understanding the social mobility process of Asian Americans is proposed. The study reveals four findings, which explain the better academic performance of Asians and Americans.

In Service and Servitude: Foreign Female Domestic Workers and the Malaysian Modernity Project. By Christine B.N. Chin. New York: Columbia University Press. 1998. Pp. 299. $17.50. Domestic workers are often [...]

By Min Zhou and Carl L. Bankston, III. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. 1998. Pp. 270. University of Michigan The main title of this book, Growing Up American, is somewhat [...]

The study presented here explored three factors that may explain why distinct Asian American groups have higher educational expectations than do whites: favorable socioeconomic and background characteristics, demonstrated academic ability, and parents' high expectations. With data from the National Educational Longitudinal Study, the authors used linear and logistic multivariate regression models to examine these differences in educational expectations. The analyses indicated that although all Asian American ethnic groups have higher expectations than whites, the higher educational expectations of Asian American groups that are well assimilated into U.S. society are principally influenced by socioeconomic and demographic factors. Parental expectations generally explain a large portion of children's high educational expectations for all Asian American groups.