Middle Class Families Research Paper

Social class influences the experience of growing up. Middle-class and working-class parents hold different values and expectations for their children. In working class families children tend to spend their time at home or with extended family. They are more likely to grow up in neighborhoods that are less safe for children. Parents have to worry about them getting involved in gangs, getting into fights, or getting into trouble with the law. ”Their children have long periods of unstructured time where they shoot the breeze with neighbors and cousins, roam around the neighborhood, and watch TV with their large, extended families. Parents give orders to the children, rather than soliciting their opinions”(McKenna 1). This quote shows that children

While children from middle families raise their children in way where they know exactly what their child is doing at all times. These differences in growing up translate into differences in expectations for what adolescents do in order to become adults. Working class children may not have high expectations in order to become adults from the environment they grew up in. While middle class families have high expectations into becoming adults, like becoming a doctor, or entrepreneur. Ruby Payne talks about hidden rules on how all social classes grow up in. She explains how hidden rules are about the salient, unspoken understandings that cue the members of the group that this individual does or does not fit. For example, three of the hidden rules in poverty are the following: The noise level is high (the TV is always on and everyone may talk at once), the most important information is nonverbal, and one of the main values of an individual to the group is an ability to entertain. This is important because many children around the world are affected by the impact of the social class they grown up