<p>What is the education level of your parents? Are you farther or behind your parents? Do you feel that you got "good genes" from them, or do you believe that other factors contributed to your position in life?</p>
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<li>I think it's pretty safe to say that those who have parents with PhDs/advanced degrees are more likely than average to get PhDs/advanced degrees themselves. However, the advantage is not overwhelming - and the mere fact that there are so many intelligent students who don't have parents with PhDs is probably enough to influence the graduate student population in such a way that many of the students don't have parents with, say, double PhDs. From my anecdotal observations, if parents have PhDs, it's unlikely that their children will go as far as they do (this seems to be especially true for the Chinese students I know who are the children of Chinese immigrants who got their PhDs in the US).</li>
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<p>Dad wanted to get an engineering degree but burned his eye so he has a B.A (worked really hard for that... with swollen watery eyes and fever <em>cries</em> <em>huggles daddy</em>) and mom had to drop out of school before sitting for her B.A exams.</p>
<p>Bachelor's, both.
But they want me to go further. I'll have to think about that. </p>
<p>I don't think you can generalize that way. People have different personalities and external/internal forces that will decide how far they go in terms of education.</p>
<p>My dad has two masters - one in Hydrogeology, and the other in something else. :p I believe his B.A. was in Soil Science. My mom has a B.A. in Public Administration [or something like that :D].</p>
<p>I think I got more of my maternal grandpa's genes though; he was really cerebral and he always tried to stay informed about all kinds of stuff. Defintely benefited from good genes though.</p>