PRIVATE MATERIALISM, PERSONAL SELF-FULFILLMENT, FAMILY LIFE, AND PUBLIC INTEREST THE NATURE, EFFECTS, AND CAUSES OF RECENT CHANGES IN THE VALUES OF AMERICAN YOUTH

From the early seventies through 1986-87, private materialism as a life goal increased greatly in importance among American youth, goals relating to family life increased somewhat, public interest concerns diminished modestly, and the goal of personal self-fulfillment declined sharply. Accompanying this shift in values was a change in young people's college majors and career plans toward those leading to higher paying jobs and a marked increase in the attractiveness of working in large corporations. Jobs offering money and status became more preferred relative to those with opportunities for self-fulfillment or public service. Support grew for capitalist institutions such as profit making and advertising. At the same time, there was a retreat from political involvement, and a conservative shift in political beliefs. Explanations of the shift in values in terms of the impact on the young of major political and social events or the emergence of a feeling of economic insecurity among the young are RICHARD A. EASTERLIN iS professor of economics at the University of Southern California. EILEEN M. CRIMMINS is associate professor of gerontology and sociology at the University of Southern California. The authors are equally responsible for this article. Lead authorship is alternated in successive articles. The authors are grateful to Donna Hokoda, Christine Macdonald, and Yasuhiko Saito for excellent research and technical assistance. This research was supported by the University of Southern California Faculty Research and Innovation Fund. The Monitoring the Future survey data were originally collected by Jerald G. Bachman, Lloyd D. Johnston, and Patrick M. O'Malley of the Survey Research Center, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan. The collectors bear no responsibility for the analyses or interpretations presented here. These data were made available through the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR). The authors would like to thank Jerald G. Bachman, David Heer, and an anonymous referee for helpful comments and Andrew Kohut, Dawn Oberman, and Bickley Townsend for providing unpublished data. Public Opinion Quarterly Volume 55 499-533 ? 1991 by the American Association for Public Opinion Research All rights reserved 0033-362X/91/5504-0001/$02.50. This content downloaded from 157.55.39.92 on Wed, 22 Jun 2016 06:45:43 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 500 Richard A. Easterlin and Eileen M. Crimmins not supported by the evidence. Nor are a number of hypotheses relating to changes in young people's family structure or socialization experience. The shift in values of the young does, however, apparently correspond to a similar change in the values of adults generally and, thus, may reflect changes in the values transmitted to young people as they were growing up. We speculate that the shift in values among adults was, in turn, caused by a growing feeling of economic deprivation in the post-1973 period as real wage rates declined and material aspirations continued to rise. In the last few years, the shift in the life goals of the young appears to have ended and may even have started to reverse, but young people today are still much different from those 15 years ago. Although much has been written about the values of today's youth, there is little consensus even on the facts of recent trends. In studies published in the same year, Levine and Yankelovich reached diametrically opposed conclusions. Yankelovich, in an approach influenced by the Maslovian hierarchy-of-needs framework, asserted that personal self-fulfillment was increasingly coming to the fore (Maslow 1954; Yankelovich 1981). Levine, in an almost despairing paean, When Dreams and Heroes Died, saw a return to private materialism, along lines suggested by Altbach (Altbach 1974; Levine 1981). These conflicting views echo the more general literature on changing values of the American population described by Hammond (1986). Hirschman (1982) and Schlesinger (1986) have claimed, like Levine, that there is an on-going shift from public concerns to private materialism. Bellah and his associates (1985) see, similar to Yankelovich, a growing emphasis on personal self-fulfillment. Inglehart (1977, 1981, 1985) is able to have the best of both worlds. Although he also sees through Maslovian eyes a long-term trend from materialism to postmaterialism (the latter embracing both public interest concerns and personal self-fulfillment), he allows for materialistic lapses from trend in periods of physical or economic insecurity.' This article draws on two national sample surveys of American youth in an attempt to clarify: (1) the nature of recent trends in private materialism, personal self-fulfillment, family life, and public interest as life goals of American youth, (2) possible effects of these trends on the personal plans and attitudes of American youth, and (3) the causes of trends in life goals. As shall be seen, the evidence suggests a sharp shift toward private materialism from the seventies through 1986-87, with important effects on plans and attitudes. The causes of the shift 1. Indeed, Bellah and his associates (1985) too mention this possibility (p. 285), although they do not suggest that it is relevant to their period of study. This content downloaded from 157.55.39.92 on Wed, 22 Jun 2016 06:45:43 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms Changes in the Values of American Youth 501 appear to be linked to the impact on the values of the American population generally of declining real wage rates and rising material aspirations in the post-1973 period. Concepts, Data, and Measurement