Interaction Effects of Gender,SES, and Race‐Ethnicity on Postsecondary Educational Choices of U.S. Students

The authors present data for a subsample of the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS:88; 1996). All participants in the study had attended a postsecondary institution within 2 years of graduation from high school and had selected a field of study. Educational choices were categorized by predominant Holland types (e.g., Realistic, Social, Conventional). There was a 3‐way Gender × SES × Race‐Ethnicity interaction. Race‐ethnicity effects were strongest for men at lower SES levels and weakest for women at high SES levels. The nature of gender and SES effects differed across racial‐ethnic groups.