Editing Social mobility (section)

==Typology==
Mobility is most often [[quantitative research|quantitatively]] measured in terms of change in [[economic mobility]] such as changes in [[income]] or [[wealth]].  Occupation is another measure used in researching mobility which usually involves both quantitative and qualitative analysis of data, but other studies may concentrate on social class.<ref name="Grusky10">{{cite conference | url=https://web.stanford.edu/group/scspi/_media/working_papers/grusky_cumberworth_national_protocol_measuring_mobility.pdf | title=A National Protocol for Measuring Intergenerational Mobility | publisher=National Academy of Science | access-date=15 July 2014 | last1 = Grusky | first1 = David B. | author-link1=David Grusky | first2 =Erin | last2 = Cumberworth | name-list-style = vanc | book-title=Workshop on Advancing Social Science Theory: The Importance of Common Metrics | date=February 2010 | location=Washington, D.C. | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140719202742/https://web.stanford.edu/group/scspi/_media/working_papers/grusky_cumberworth_national_protocol_measuring_mobility.pdf | archive-date=19 July 2014 | url-status=live }}</ref> Mobility may be ''intragenerational'', within the same generation or ''intergenerational'', between different generations.<ref>{{cite journal | doi = 10.2307/2576520 | title = Intragenerational versus Intergenerational Mobility in Relation to Sociopolitical Attitudes | last1 = Lopreato | first1 = Joseph |author-link1=Joseph Lopreato  | last2 = Hazelrigg | first2 = Lawrence E. | name-list-style = vanc | journal = Social Forces | volume = 49 | issue = 2 | date = December 1970 | pages = 200–210 | jstor = 2576520 }}</ref> Intragenerational mobility is less frequent, representing "rags to riches" cases in terms of upward mobility.  Intergenerational upward mobility is more common where children or grandchildren are in economic circumstances better than those of their parents or grandparents. In the US, this type of mobility is described as one of the fundamental features of the "[[American Dream]]" even though there is less such mobility than almost all other OECD countries.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.oecd.org/officialdocuments/publicdisplaydocumentpdf/?doclanguage=en&cote=eco/wkp%282009%2948 | title=Intergenerational Social Mobility Economics Department Working Papers No. 707 | publisher=Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development | date=July 2009 | first1 = Orsetta | last1 = Causa | first2 = Åsa | last2 = Johansson | name-list-style = vanc | access-date=2 June 2019 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170105212948/http://www.oecd.org/officialdocuments/publicdisplaydocumentpdf/?doclanguage=en&cote=eco%2Fwkp%282009%2948 | archive-date=5 January 2017 | url-status=live }}</ref>

Mobility can also be defined in terms of relative or absolute mobility. Absolute mobility looks at a person's progress in the areas of [[education]], health, housing, income, job opportunities and other factors and compares it to some starting point, usually the previous generation. As technological advancements and economic development increase so do income levels and the conditions in which most people live. In absolute terms, people around the world, on average, are living better today than yesterday and in that sense, have experienced absolute mobility. 

Relative mobility looks at the mobility of a person in comparison to the mobility of others in the same cohort. In more advanced economies and [[OECD]] countries there is more space for absolute mobility than for relative mobility because a person from an average status background may remain average (thus no relative mobility) but still have a gradual increase in living standards due to a total social average increasing over time. 

There is also an idea of stickiness concerning mobility. This is when an individual is no longer experiencing relative mobility and it occurs mostly at the ends. At the bottom end of the socioeconomic ladder, parents cannot provide their children with the necessary resources or opportunity to enhance their lives. As a result, they remain on the same ladder rung as their parents. On the opposite side of the ladder, the high [[socioeconomic status]] parents have the necessary resources and opportunities to ensure their children also remain in same ladder rung as them.<ref name="www.oecd.org2019">{{Cite web|url=http://www.oecd.org/social/broken-elevator-how-to-promote-social-mobility-9789264301085-en.htm|title=A Broken Social Elevator? How to Promote Social Mobility - en - OECD|website=www.oecd.org|date=15 June 2018 |access-date=2019-10-26|archive-date=26 October 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191026062107/http://www.oecd.org/social/broken-elevator-how-to-promote-social-mobility-9789264301085-en.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> In East Asian countries this is exemplified by the concept of familial [[karma]]. <ref name=":0" />

===Social status and social class===

Social mobility is highly dependent on the overall structure of [[social status]]es and [[Employment|occupations]] in a given society.<ref>{{cite journal | jstor=2095555 | title=Comparative Social Mobility Revisited: Models of Convergence and Divergence in 16 Countries | last1 = Grusky | first1 = David B  | first2 = Robert M. | last2 = Hauser | name-list-style = vanc | journal=American Sociological Review |date=February 1984  | volume=49 | issue=1 | pages=19–38 | doi=10.2307/2095555}}</ref> The extent of differing social positions and the manner in which they fit together or overlap provides the overall [[social structure]] of such positions.  Add to this the differing dimensions of status, such as [[Max Weber]]'s [[three-component theory of stratification|delineation]]<ref>{{cite book| last = Weber | first = Max | name-list-style = vanc |year=1946|chapter=Class, Status, Party|pages=[https://archive.org/details/frommaxweberessa00webe/page/180 180–95]|title=From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology|chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/frommaxweberessa00webe|editor1=H. H. Girth |editor2=C. Wright Mills|location=New York|publisher=Oxford University}}</ref> of economic stature, prestige, and power and we see the potential for complexity in a given social stratification system. Such dimensions within a given society can be seen as [[independent variable]]s that can explain differences in social mobility at different times and places in different stratification systems. The same variables that contribute as [[intervening variable]]s to the valuation of income or wealth and that also affect social status, [[social class]], and [[social inequality]] do affect social mobility.  These include [[gender inequality|sex or gender]], [[racism|race]] or [[ethnocentrism|ethnicity]], and [[ageism|age]].<ref name="Hill1998">{{cite book |chapter=Toward a new vision: race, class and gender as categories of analysis and connection |title=Social Class and Stratification: Classic Statements and Theoretical Debates |publisher=Rowman & Littlefield |last=Collins |first=Patricia Hill |year=1998 |location=Boston |pages=[https://archive.org/details/socialclassstrat00levi/page/231 231–247] |isbn=978-0-8476-8542-4 |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/socialclassstrat00levi/page/231 }}</ref>

Education provides one of the most promising chances of upward social mobility and attaining a higher social status, regardless of current social standing. However, the stratification of social classes and high [[wealth inequality]] directly affects the educational opportunities and outcomes. In other words, social class and a family's socioeconomic status directly affect a child's chances for obtaining a quality education and succeeding in life. By age five, there are significant developmental differences between low, middle, and upper class children's cognitive and noncognitive skills.<ref name="Greenstone2016">{{Cite web|url=https://www.brookings.edu/research/thirteen-economic-facts-about-social-mobility-and-the-role-of-education/|title=Thirteen Economic Facts about Social Mobility and the Role of Education| vauthors = Greenstone M, Looney A, Patashnik J, Yu M |date=18 November 2016|website=Brookings Institution|access-date=5 April 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170408171434/https://www.brookings.edu/research/thirteen-economic-facts-about-social-mobility-and-the-role-of-education/|archive-date=8 April 2017|url-status=live}}</ref> 
<blockquote>Among older children, evidence suggests that the gap between high- and low-income primary- and secondary-school students has increased by almost 40 percent over the past thirty years. These differences persist and widen into young adulthood and beyond. Just as the gap in K–12 test scores between high- and low-income students is growing, the difference in college graduation rates between the rich and the poor is also growing. Although the college graduation rate among the poorest households increased by about 4 percentage points between those born in the early 1960s and those born in the early 1980s, over this same period, the graduation rate increased by almost 20 percentage points for the wealthiest households.<ref name="Greenstone2016" /></blockquote>

Average family income, and social status, have both seen a decrease for the bottom third of all children between 1975 and 2011. The 5th percentile of children and their families have seen up to a 60% decrease in average family income.<ref name="Greenstone2016" /> The [[wealth gap]] between the rich and the poor, the upper and lower class, continues to increase as more middle-class people get poorer and the lower-class get even poorer. As the socioeconomic inequality continues to increase in the United States, being on either end of the spectrum makes a child more likely to remain there and never become socially mobile.
<blockquote>A child born to parents with income in the lowest quintile is more than ten times more likely to end up in the lowest quintile than the highest as an adult (43 percent versus 4 percent). And, a child born to parents in the highest quintile is five times more likely to end up in the highest quintile than the lowest (40 percent versus 8 percent).<ref name="Greenstone2016" /></blockquote>

This may be partly due to lower- and working-class parents, where neither is educated above high school diploma level, spending less time on average with their children in their earliest years of life and not being as involved in their children's education and time out of school. This parenting style, known as "accomplishment of natural growth" differs from the style of middle-class and upper-class parents, with at least one parent having higher education, known as "cultural cultivation".<ref>{{Cite book|title=Unequal Childhoods: Class, Race, and Family Life|last=Lareau|first=Annette|publisher=University of California Press|year=2011}}</ref> 

More affluent social classes are able to spend more time with their children at early ages, and children receive more exposure to interactions and activities that lead to cognitive and non-cognitive development: things like verbal communication, parent-child engagement and being read to daily. These children's parents are much more involved in their academics and their free time; placing them in extracurricular activities which develop not only additional non-cognitive skills but also academic values, habits, and abilities to better communicate and interact with authority figures. Enrollment in so many activities can often lead to frenetic family lives organized around transporting children to their various activities. Lower class children often attend lower quality schools, receive less attention from teachers and ask for help much less than their higher class peers.<ref name="Haveman2006">{{cite journal | vauthors = Haveman R, Smeeding T | title = The role of higher education in social mobility | journal = The Future of Children | volume = 16 | issue = 2 | pages = 125–50 | date = 1 January 2006 | pmid = 17036549 | doi = 10.1353/foc.2006.0015 | jstor = 3844794 | s2cid = 22554922 }}</ref>

The chances for social mobility are primarily determined by the family a child is born into. Today, the gaps seen in both access to education and educational success (graduating from a higher institution) is even larger. Today, while college applicants from every socioeconomic class are equally qualified, 75% of all entering freshmen classes at top-tier American institutions belong to the uppermost socioeconomic quartile. A family's class determines the amount of investment and involvement parents have in their children's educational abilities and success from their earliest years of life,<ref name="Haveman2006" /> leaving low-income students with less chance for academic success and social mobility due to the effects that the common parenting style of the lower and working-class have on their outlook on and success in education.<ref name="Haveman2006" />

===Class cultures and social networks===

These differing dimensions of social mobility can be classified in terms of differing types of capital that contribute to changes in mobility.  [[Cultural capital]], a term first coined by French sociologist [[Pierre Bourdieu]] distinguishes between the economic and cultural aspects of class. Bourdieu described three types of capital that place a person in a certain social category: [[Capital (economics)|economic capital]]; [[social capital]]; and [[cultural capital]].  [[Capital (economics)|Economic capital]] includes economic resources such as [[cash]], [[credit (finance)|credit]], and other material [[assets]]. Social capital includes resources one achieves based on group membership, networks of influence, relationships and support from other people.<ref name=Bourdieu/>

Cultural capital is any advantage a person has that gives them a higher status in society, such as [[education]], skills, or any other form of knowledge. Usually, people with all three types of capital have a high status in society. Bourdieu found that the culture of the upper social class is oriented more toward formal reasoning and abstract thought. The lower social class is geared more towards matters of facts and the necessities of life. He also found that the environment in which a person develops has a large effect on the cultural resources that a person will have.<ref name=Bourdieu>{{cite book |last=Bourdieu |first=Pierre |title=Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste |year=1984 |publisher=Routledge |location=London |isbn=978-0-415-56788-6 }}{{page needed|date=January 2020}}</ref>

The cultural resources a person has obtained can heavily influence a child's educational success. It has been shown that students raised under the concerted cultivation approach have "an emerging sense of entitlement" which leads to asking teachers more questions and being a more active student, causing teachers to favor students raised in this manner.<ref name="Lareau2003">{{cite book|title=Unequal Childhoods: Class, Race, and Family Life|url=https://archive.org/details/unequalchildhood00lare|url-access=registration|publisher=University of California Press|last1=Lareau|first1=Annette|year=2003}}</ref> This childrearing approach which creates positive interactions in the classroom environment is in contrast with the natural growth approach to childrearing. In this approach, which is more common amongst working-class families, parents do not focus on developing the special talents of their individual children, and they speak to their children in directives.<ref name="Lareau2003"/>

Due to this, it is rarer for a child raised in this manner to question or challenge adults and conflict arises between childrearing practices at home and school. Children raised in this manner are less inclined to participate in the classroom setting and are less likely to go out of their way to positively interact with teachers and form relationships.  However, the greater freedom of working-class children gives them a broader range of local playmates, closer relationships with cousins and extended family, less sibling rivalry, fewer complaints to their parents of being bored, and fewer parent-child arguments.<ref name="Lareau2003"/>

In the United States, links between minority underperformance in schools have been made with a lacking in the cultural resources of cultural capital, social capital and economic capital, yet inconsistencies persist even when these variables are accounted for. "Once admitted to institutions of higher education, African Americans and Latinos continued to underperform relative to their white and Asian counterparts, earning lower grades, progressing at a slower rate and dropping out at higher rates. More disturbing was the fact that these differentials persisted even after controlling for obvious factors such as SAT scores and family socioeconomic status".<ref>{{cite book|title=The Shape of the River : Long-Term Consequences of Considering Race in College and University Admissions|last1=Bowen|first1=William |last2=Bok |first2=Derek | name-list-style = vanc | author-link2=Derek Bok | publisher=Princeton University Press|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fCy2CwAAQBAJ|isbn=9781400882793 |date=20 April 2016}}{{page needed|date=January 2020}}</ref>

The theory of capital deficiency is among the most recognized explanations for minority underperformance academically—that for whatever reason they simply lack the resources to find academic success.<ref name="Massey2011">{{cite book|title=The Source of the River: The Social Origins of Freshmen at America's Selective Colleges and Universities |last1=Massey |first1=Douglas |last2=Charles |first2=Camille |last3=Lundy |first3=Garvey |last4=Fischer |first4=Mary | name-list-style = vanc |publisher=Princeton University Press|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=o-PYX6pox7wC|isbn=978-1400840762 |date=27 June 2011}}</ref> One of the largest factors for this, aside from the social, economic, and cultural capital mentioned earlier, is [[human capital]]. This form of capital, identified by social scientists only in recent years, has to do with the education and life preparation of children. "Human capital refers to the skills, abilities and knowledge possessed by specific individuals".<ref>{{cite book |title=Human Capital: A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis, with Special Reference to Education |url=https://archive.org/details/humancapitaltheo0000beck |url-access=registration |last1=Becker |first1=Gary |year=1964 |location=New York |publisher=Columbia University Press }}</ref> 

This allows college-educated parents who have large amounts of human capital to invest in their children in certain ways to maximize future success—from reading to them at night to possessing a better understanding of the school system which causes them to be less deferential to teachers and school authorities.<ref name="Massey2011" /> Research also shows that well-educated black parents are less able to transmit human capital to their children when compared to their white counterparts, due to a legacy of racism and discrimination.<ref name="Massey2011" />