Does Spatial Mobility in Young Adulthood Matter? Indirect and Direct Effects of Spatial Mobility During Education on Occupational Status

Spatial mobility after leaving high school for further education is a dominant part of the transition to adulthood and accounts for a large proportion of total internal migration dynamics. Yet, it has been neglected in studies of social mobility. This study explores the link between spatial mobility during post-secondary education (for distances of at least 50 km) and occupational status acquired three years after finishing education, once young adults have had time to settle in the labor market. Starting from a path model, the goal is to identify the average indirect effect of spatial mobility operating though the mediator education, situated on the path between spatial mobility and occupational status as well as the (unmediated) direct effect. Direct and indirect effects are estimated via a novel inverse probability weighting (IPW) approach to account for the fact that selection into spatial mobility as well as into the mediator education is non-random and may bias the direct and indirect effect estimates. Analyses are based on nine waves of the Adult Cohort of the German National Educational Panel Study (NEPS), a representative, multi-cohort sample of German residents containing complete retrospective and prospective multidimensional information on individual life-courses. Contextual information on district-levels are matched with the data reflecting local educational opportunities when leaving high school as well as the degree of urbanization. Findings show that the mobile population is a highly selective group predestined towards career success, because they are achievement-oriented from the beginning and because they enjoyed pro-educational family environments. Yet, an unmediated direct effect of spatial mobility on occupational status remains, even after accounting for confounding factors. Thus, this study indicates that taking advantage of educational opportunities at distant locations may be beneficial to the social mobility of young people beyond educational advancement. Moreover, the results point towards effect heterogeneity in that spatial mobility increases socio-economic positions especially for those with disadvantageous starting positions

Determinanten der mobilitätsspezifischen Selbstwirksamkeit bei internationaler Entsendungsmobilität und ihre Bedeutung im Familienkontext

Das von Albert Bandura in den 1970er Jahren entwickelte Konzept der Selbstwirksamkeitserwartung – das subjektive Vertrauen in die eigenen Kompetenzen – hat  sich als geeignet erwiesen, um zu erklären, warum bestimmte Personen schwierige oder herausfordernde Situationen erfolgreicher meistern als andere. Vor diesem Hintergrund analysiert der Beitrag den Einfluss mobilitätsspezifischer Selbstwirksamkeitserwartungen auf die Bewältigung von berufsbezogener internationaler Mobilität. Am Beispiel der Beschäftigten im diplomatischen Dienst sowie deren Angehörigen wird analysiert, ob die mobilitätsspezifischen Selbstwirksamkeitserwartungen der Beschäftigten einen Einfluss auf die Wahrnehmung von Konflikten zwischen Familien- bzw. Privatleben und beruflicher Mobilität haben. Darüber hinaus wird untersucht, ob innerhalb von Partnerschaften die Selbstwirksamkeitserwartungen eines/einer Partners/Partnerin einen eigenständigen Einfluss auf die Konfliktwahrnehmung des/der anderen Partner/-in haben. Schließlich wird geprüft, welche individuellen und kontextuellen Faktoren die Selbstwirksamkeitserwartungen stärken können. Die Analysen zeigen, dass die mobilitätsspezifischen Selbstwirksamkeitserwartungen der mitziehenden Partner/-innen dominieren und den Beschäftigten dabei helfen, Mobilität erfolgreich zu bewältigen. Individuelle Kompetenzüberzeugungen im Umgang mit intensiver Mobilität erscheinen daher als weiter zu verfolgendes Konzept im Kontext der Mobilitätsforschung

Who benefits? Heterogeneous effects of international student mobility on occupational attainment

It is well documented that students with favourable socio-economic and educational characteristics more often take advantage of international mobility opportunities. We explore whether the effect of ISM on professional success depends on selection into ISM (educational achievements, family background, etc.). Analyses are based on data from the German National Educational Panel Study (NEPS), which is a representative sample of the population living in Germany born between 1944 and 1986. Respondents who spent at least one month abroad during a higher education spell are considered internationally mobile. We use propensity score matching and stepwise stratification methods to analyse the potential heterogeneity of treatment effects. We find that higher education graduates with low propensity to be internationally mobile realize substantially greater occupational status benefits than graduates with higher propensity. This may work against social inequality in times of mass higher education

IMIS-Beiträge Heft 41

Claudia Hartmann-Hirsch and Fofo Amétépé: Luxembourg‘s Corporatist Scandinavian Welfare System and Incorporation of Migrants; Elisabeth Musch: Models of Integration in Research and Politics: A Case Study of the Netherlands; Lena Friedrich and Stine Waibel: Local Integration Concepts in Germany - Diffusion of an Integration Model?; Dirk Halm und Marina Liakova: Integrationsverweigerer? Sozialintegration bei jugendlichen Migranten; Peter Schimany und Hermann Schock: Migrations- und Integrationsforschung im Spiegel der Datenbanken "Sozialwissenschaftliches Forschungsinformationssystem" (SOFIS) und "Sozialwissenschaftliches Literaturinformationssystem" (SOLIS