ABSTRACT 

This study investigated the Parental Socio-Economic status and career aspirations of secondary school students in Umuahia Education Zone, Abia State. The study was guided by five research objectives, as five research questions were posed for the study and five corresponding null hypotheses were tested at 0.05 level of significance. The study adopted the Correlation Research Design. The population of the study was 2467 Senior Secondary School Two (SSS II) students which comprised 1,084 male and 1,383 female students in Twelve Government owned Secondary schools in Umuahia Education Zone of Abia State in the 2019/2020 academic session. The sample of the study was 400 respondents.  Two instruments which were the “Parents socio-economic status questionnai0re” (PSESQ) and “career aspirations questionnaire” (CAQ) were developed by the researcher for data collection. The two instruments were validated by three experts. The internal consistency of the instruments was 0.83 and 0.78 respectively for the PSESQ and CAQ while the stability of the instrument was 0.75 and 0.86 for the PSESQ and CAQ respectively. The data for the study was collected through the administration of 400 Copies of the PSESQ and CAQ. The research questions were answered using Simple Linear Regression and the P-value of ANOVA of the Simple Linear Regression was used to test the five null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. Findings of the study revealed that there is a significant high positive correlation between the Parents’ socioeconomic status such as parental educational level, parental occupation, parental income and family structure) and students career aspiration. Based on the findings, it was recommended that Parents should employ the assistance of professional career counsellors in helping their children to make intelligent career decisions in line with their aptitude and abilities. Lastly, Teachers, career guidance and counsellors should realize that a high-level of parental education influences students’ career choice and should therefore pass the importance of higher level of education to the students in relation to their careers and future.