ADULTHOODon the marker in question. For example, in the
United States, a person has the right to vote and
serve in the military at the age of eighteen, but
must be twenty-one to purchase alcoholic bever-
ages. At age sixteen, a young person can leave
school and work in paid jobs without federal re-
striction on hours of work. (However, restrictions
on work hours of sixteen and seventeen year olds
exist in many states; see Committee on the Health
and Safety Implications of Child Labor 1998). The
legal age of marriage varies widely across U.S.
states, from none to twenty-one (The World
Factbook 1998), but the age of consent is sixteen
to eighteen in most states (www.ageofconsent.com).
However, many eighteen, and even twenty-
one year olds in the United States and other
modern countries would not be socially recog-
nized as ‘‘adults,’’ since they have not yet accom-
plished other key markers of transition. The law
only sets minimum standards, and may have little
relation to the age at which young people actually
make the various transitions in question. Despite
prohibitions on the use and purchase of alcohol
until the age of twenty-one, ‘‘it is more normative
to drink during adolescence than it is not to drink’’
(Maggs 1997, p. 349). The majority of young peo-
ple in the United States stay in school beyond the
age of sixteen; they graduate from high school and
receive at least some postsecondary education.
With the extension of formal education, contem-
porary youth in modern countries delay the acqui-
sition of full-time employment, and remain eco-
nomically dependent for longer periods of time.
Moreover, the legal age of marriage hardly reflects
the average age of first marriage. Since the 1950s,
it has been increasing (from 20.3 for women and
22.8 for men in 1950 to 24.4 for women and 26.5
for men in 1992; Spain and Bianchi 1996).
HISTORICAL AND SOCIETAL VARIATION
IN THE TRANSITION TO ADULTHOODNeither the timing nor the process of becoming
adult are universalistic or biologically determined.
Throughout Western history, there has been in-
creasing differentiation of early life stages, post-
ponement of entry to adulthood, and change in
the status positions from which adulthood is
launched (Klein 1990). Some scholars argue that
in medieval times persons moved directly from a
period of infancy, when small size and limited
strength precluded productive work, to adulthood,
at which time younger persons began to work
alongside their elders (Ariés 1962).A new stage of childhood, between infancy
and adulthood, arose with the emergence of
schools. As economic production shifted from
agriculture to trade and industry, persons increas-
ingly entered adulthood after a stage of appren-
ticeship or ‘‘child labor.’’ By the beginning of the
twentieth century, with schooling extended and
child labor curtailed, adolescence gained recogni-
tion as the life stage preceding adulthood (Hall
1904). The adolescent, though at the peak of most
biological and physiological capacities, remained
free of adult responsibilities.With more than 60 percent of contemporary
young people obtaining some postsecondary edu-
cation (Halperin 1998), a new phase of ‘‘youth’’ or
‘‘postadolescence’’ has emerged, allowing youth
in their mid-to-late twenties, and even older youth,
to extend the preadult ‘‘moratorium’’ of contin-
ued exploration. This youth phase is characterized
by limited autonomy but continued economic de-
pendence and concern about the establishment of
adult identity (Keniston 1970; Coleman and Husen
1985; Buchmann 1989).Various forms of independent residence are
now common in the United States before marriage
(Goldscheider and Goldscheider 1993). Youth’s
residence in dormitories (or, less commonly, mili-
tary barracks) allows independence from familial
monitoring, while a formal institution assumes
some control (Klein 1990). Even greater freedom
from supervision occurs when young people, still
economically dependent on parents, live in their
own apartments. For contemporary young people
in the United States who enter the labor force after
high school, a continuing period of ‘‘moratorium’’
(Osterman 1989) lasts several years. During this
time, youth hold jobs in the secondary sector of
the economy to satisfy immediate consumption
needs. They experience high unemployment and
job instability (Borman 1991). At the same time,
employers express preference for low-wage work-
ers who do not require fringe benefits and are not
likely to unionize. When filling adultlike ‘‘prima-
ry’’ jobs, such employers seek evidence of stability
or ‘‘settling down.’’