Gendered Career Decision-Making: Investigating Contexts of Reproduction

Beckmann, Janina (2022). Gendered Career Decision-Making: Investigating Contexts of Reproduction. PhD thesis, Universität zu Köln. Open Access

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Abstract

Occupational segregation by gender is a well-known feature of many labour markets. This dissertation addresses the reproduction of horizontal gender segregation throughout the early educational and vocational career of young people in Germany. As an overall research aim, this dissertation describes contextual conditions under which and through which gender-segregated expectations and choices are formed in two stages of the career decision-making process. The following overall research question guides this dissertation: Under and through which (socio-cultural and institutional) contexts are gendered career expectations and career choices reproduced in young people’s career decision-making process? This dissertation is divided into two parts. Both parts address the two different stages of the career decision-making process and answer two distinct subquestions regarding the relevance of contextual conditions in the formation of gender-segregated expectations and choices. The first part of this dissertation looks at the development of gendered occupational expectations during secondary education, addressing the role of the social classroom environment (Study 1) and curricular differentiation in upper-secondary education (Study 2). The second part of this dissertation focuses on students’ early vocational choices and looks at apprentices’ progression through the vocational education and training (VET) system. The two studies investigate the dropout decisions of apprentices in gender-atypical occupations (Study 3) and the relationship between career compromises in terms of occupational gender-type and dropout behaviour (Study 4). Overall, the results of this dissertation show that while young people’s aspirations are highly gendered in late adolescence, social and institutional conditions shape the extent to which gender-segregated aspirations and choices are maintained or attenuated. The first two studies show that school contexts are related to gender differences in students’ STEM expectations, supporting the relevance of schools as social and institutional contexts for gendered career decision-making. The last two studies revealed that the gender type of an occupation constitutes an essential context for apprentices’ dropout decisions.

Item Type:

Thesis (PhD thesis)

Creators:

Creators	Email	ORCID	ORCID Put Code
Beckmann, Janina	janina.beckmann@bibb.de	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED

Contributors:

Contribution	Name	Email
Surveyor	Prof. Dr. Jacob, Marita	UNSPECIFIED
Censor	Prof. Dr. Ebner, Christian	UNSPECIFIED
Other	Prof. Dr. Wicht, Alexandra	UNSPECIFIED
Other	Siembab, Matthias	UNSPECIFIED