Sociologický časopis / Czech Sociological Review 2015, 51(4): 637-666 | DOI: 10.13060/00380288.2015.51.4.210

The Role of Values in Choosing between a Career and the Home: An International Comparison

Simona Weidnerová, Petr Matějů
Institut pro sociální a ekonomické analýzy, z.s., Praha
Vysoká škola finanční a správní, o.p.s.

The objective of this article is to theoretically and empirically link Catherine Hakim's preference theory to Shalom Schwartz's basic values theory and determine to what extent women's preferences in relation to employment and a career are supported by their value orientations. A related question, and one with policy relevance, concerns the role of education in women's deep-rooted preferences and individual concepts of life-success. A third question is to what extent higher education helps women to overcome social barriers to implementing their choices between job (career) and family (household), barriers that mainly derive from the prevalence of conservative values and low labour-market flexibility. The authors carried out a comparative analysis of 25 European countries using data from the second round of the European Social Survey (ESS2) collected in the year 2004. The results of multilevel modeling reveal that education not only significantly reduces the tendency towards conservative values and strengthens openness to change - more significantly with women than with men - but simultaneously helps women overcome the social barriers in the formation of their work-career preferences, particularly in countries with stronger barriers.

Keywords: values, education, gender, modernisation, preference theory, work orientations

Published: August 1, 2015Show citation

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Weidnerová, S., & Matějů, P. (2015). The Role of Values in Choosing between a Career and the Home: An International Comparison. Sociologický časopis / Czech Sociological Review, 51(4), 637-666. doi: 10.13060/00380288.2015.51.4.210.
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