The transition from youth to adulthood and the importance of hope and life goals

It is widely accepted among scholars (Erikson, Levinson, Arnett, Marcia) that the transition from childhood to adulthood is a life-period in its own right and with its own developmental efforts and tasks. It is therefore obvious that hope and life goals must play an important role in this period. The presentation examines the possible links between hope defined as ‘a positive motivational state’, the major life goals young adults have set themselves and their socioeconomic background.
The presentation is based on the longitudinal study “The West Jutland Cohort Study”, a birth cohort study of all adolescents born in 1989 (n=3,054) living in Ringkjøbing County, Denmark in 2004. The third wave of the study included the Trait Hope Scale (Snyder 2002) as well as several items tapping into the major life goals that the young adults were pursuing at age 20/21.
The results show clear socioeconomic differences: young adults with a family of origin with low parental education have a lower score on the trait hope scale. What appears to be most important for high-hope score is feeling energetic and full of life and being admired and having a good sex life also show relatively strong associations with hope. The presentation argues that it is not irrelevant what major life goals young adults strive to achieve, and that their ability to perceive a path to realize these goals (i.e. being in a hopeful state) depends not only on the goals they strive for but also their socioeconomic background.