A recent study of more than 2,000 early-career adults found that young people whose parents were still very closely involved in their lives tended to have occupations with less “prestige” than young people whose parents were less involved.

“It is well-established that parental investment during their children’s childhood and adolescence has positive outcomes,” says Anna Manzoni, co-author of a paper on the work and a professor of sociology at North Carolina State University. “However, our study points to a shift in parental role as young people mature into early adulthood – ages 18-28.

“Specifically, our findings suggest that parents who are heavily involved with their children – spending lots of time advising them, sharing many activities, etc. – actually hinder the child’s ability to launch.”

Two key concepts in the study are “family social capital” and “occupational prestige.” Family social capital refers to the norms, information and support parents provide through everyday interactions with their children. Occupational prestige is measured by assessing the average education and income for a given occupation.

“We know that parents play an important role in shaping their children’s occupational outcomes, but we wanted to study specifically the effects of family social capital on early occupational attainment of young adults,” says Tom Leppard, co-author of the paper and a postdoctoral researcher in NC State’s Data Science and AI Academy.

For the study, the researchers analyzed data from the nationally representative Transition to Adulthood Supplement survey from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. The survey asked U.S. adults between the ages of 18-28 a range of questions every other year for up to 10 years. Because some participants aged into or out of the study, the researchers ultimately had access to data from 7,899 surveys given to 2,680 individuals.

“The key finding was that low levels of family social capital positively influence adolescent occupational prestige while strongly tied family social capital negatively influences it,” says Leppard. “In other words, too much parental involvement was associated with a negative impact on the occupational attainment of emerging adults.

“This absolutely took us by surprise,” says Manzoni. “We checked our measures time and time again to make sure the results were correct. There is so much scholarship demonstrating how family social capital positively impacts everything from school performance to healthy behaviors, our findings at first seemed contradictory.

“But what the findings suggest is that, during the transition to adulthood, there can be too much of a good thing. This is an age in which young people need to make the transition to independence. And failure to do so is associated with professional constraints early in their careers.”

So, what’s the takeaway message for parents?

“As young people move into early adulthood, the parental role may need to shift away from intensive guidance and toward a more hands-off, supportive posture that allows children to develop autonomy, make mistakes, and navigate the labor market on their own,” Manzoni says.

The study also raises several new questions for researchers.

“For example,” asks Leppard, “why do some parents remain highly involved during early adulthood while others step back? Are these patterns shaped by class, race, gender or family expectations about independence? Additionally, do the negative effects of strong family social capital persist over time, or do they fade as careers mature? It is also possible that strong family ties may pay off later in adulthood, even if they slow early occupational attainment.”

The paper, “Bonding Ties That Get Ahead?: Family Social Capital and Early Occupational Attainment,” is published in the Journal of Youth Studies.