Marginalized youth's development occurs in contexts rife with racialized, gendered, and socioeconomic social identity threats and barriers to social mobility. An emergent line of inquiry suggests critical action--a component of critical consciousness, defined as engaging in individual or collective social action to produce social change--may…

Although social class plays a salient and significant role in career development and occupational attainment, social class is underrepresented in vocational psychology theory, scholarship, and practice. Vocational psychologists are in a unique position to meet the career development needs of persons from all social classes by integrating a fuller…

The formation of future occupational expectations is a critical career-development task for adolescents that has a significant impact on adult occupational attainment. However, sociopolitical barriers constrain the occupational expectations and attainment of poor youth of color. Extant research has suggested that sociopolitical development, the…

A clear sense of vocational interests may facilitate high school students' capacity to connect current interests to congruent educational and occupational environments. This is particularly important for youth who experience external constraints on career development and college attendance. This study examined how well vocational interests,…

Structural barriers constrain marginalized youths' development of work salience and vocational expectations. Sociopolitical development (SPD), the consciousness of, and motivation to reduce, sociopolitical inequality, may facilitate the negotiation of structural constraints. A structural model of SPD's impact on work salience and vocational…

The well-documented aspiration-expectation gap refers to lower socioeconomic status (SES) adolescents of color expecting to attain occupations with lower pay and status than the occupations to which they aspire. Sociopolitical inequity, such as structural racism and asymmetrical access to resources, may explain this gap. This article examines the…

Emancipatory communitarian perspectives advocate for theory, research, and action that address the needs of oppressed groups, such as urban adolescents. Considering the dearth of instruments sensitive to the career development needs of urban adolescents, this study examined the component structure of three indices of career development with 220…

Critical career development tasks for adolescents include developing vocational expectations and a connection to the world of work. Given the sociopolitical barriers to the career development of poor Youth of Color, it is vital to identify contextual resources facilitative of their career development. The present study examines the impact of…