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Title: Is the Beneficial Effect of College on Self-esteem and Mastery Overstated?
Resulting in 1 citation.
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Dirlam, Jonathan Merry, Joseph |
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Is the Beneficial Effect of College on Self-esteem and Mastery Overstated? Presented: Philadelphia PA, American Sociological Association Annual Meeting, August 2018 Cohort(s): NLSY79 Young Adult Publisher: American Sociological Association Keyword(s): College Education; Debt/Borrowing; Pearlin Mastery Scale; Personality/Big Five Factor Model or Traits; Self-Esteem Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher. Prior studies have found college attendance and degree attainment to increase self-esteem and mastery in young adults. Yet college attendance itself is likely influenced by self-esteem and mastery levels experienced in adolescence. This implies that college education may act as a mediator for adolescent personality characteristics. Using data from the NLSY79-YA, we investigate the potential mediating effect of college education by estimating group based self-esteem and mastery trajectories for respondents between the ages of 14 and 18. We then test the mediating hypothesis for college education by first analyzing whether these adolescent trajectories are influential for college attendance and graduation. Second, we analyze whether the inclusion of these adolescent trajectories significantly reduces the effects of college attendance and degree attainment on self-esteem and mastery levels experienced between the ages of 24 and 32. We also investigate potential mediating relationships of adolescent personality characteristics for education and credit card debt. Our findings suggest that both college education and debt accumulation act as mediators for adolescent self-esteem and mastery trajectories. These findings imply that the benefit of going to college or acquiring debt may be overstated when adolescent personality characteristics are not taken into consideration. |
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Bibliography Citation
Dirlam, Jonathan and Joseph Merry. "Is the Beneficial Effect of College on Self-esteem and Mastery Overstated?" Presented: Philadelphia PA, American Sociological Association Annual Meeting, August 2018. |