External

• Feminism


  Has raised women's expectations and self-esteem
• Feminism's changes


  Partially reflected in media images and messages
• McRobbie's study of girl's magazines in the 1970s


  • Emphasised the importance of getting married and not being left on the shelf
  • Nowadays contain images of an assertive independent women
• Changes encouraged by feminism


  May affect girls' self-Imogen ambitions, with regards to feminine career
• Changes in the family since the 1970s


  • Increased divorce rate
  • Increasing cohabitation and a decrease in the number of first marriages
  • Increase in the number of lone parent families
  • Smaller families
• Changes in the family


  Affecting girls' attitude towards education in several ways
• Increased number of female parent families


  Women need to take the breadwinner role, creating a new adult role model for girls - the financially independent woman
• Increase in divorce rate

  May suggest it is unwise to rely on a husband to be their provider
• 1970 equal pay act


  Makes it illegal to pay women less than men for the same work of equal value
• 1972 sex discrimination act


  Outlawed discrimination at work
• Since 1975, the pay gap between men and women has halved from 30% to 15%
• The proportion of women in employment has risen from 53% in 1971 to 67% in 2013
• Glass ceiling


  The invisible barrier that keeps women out of high-level professional and managerial jobs
• Greater opportunity and better pay for women


  Creates role models of success for the younger generations
• In the 1970s, girls had low aspirations, believed educational success was unfeminine, and prioritised love, marriage, husband, children's job and career
• In the 1990s, girls were ambitious and wanted to be independent to support themselves
• In 2006, marriage and children were not the main priority for 14- to 17-year-old girls
• To achieve independence and self-sufficiency


  Many girls recognise they had to get a good education
• Educational success was a central aspect of the girls' identities, who saw themselves as the creators of their own future
• Some working-class girls


  Continue to have gendered stereotype aspirations for marriage and children
• Working-class girls' limited aspirations


  Reflective of the limited job opportunities they perceive as being available to them
• Working-class girls are more likely to face a precarious position in the labour market and see motherhood as the only visible option for their future
• As a result, working-class girls


  Place less value in achieving educational success