This is anecdotal so take it with a huge grain of salt. Being first generation American born, most of my friends were also first-gen basically from all over the world. Our parents had high expectations of us academically. But not just in terms of going to college, but usually with focus on a degree with a directly obvious career path. So we all became doctors, lawyers, pharmacists, engineers, accountants. I think it's because they probably worked twice as hard for half our opportunity. And even though we all kind of came from humble backgrounds, it's not like students loans aren't an obvious vehicle to reach those white collar careers.
Meanwhile, a lot of the native friends I had in college, especially from a more well-off background, majored in things like History with no real career plans or aspirations. I'm not saying that's necessarily bad, but a guy I knew spent 40k to get a psychology degree to just end up working at his dad's company. In fact, most of my peers during my psych undergrad had absolutely no plan. No grad school, which is a requirement to work in that field, so ending terminally on a B.A or B.S. in psych just seemed short-sighted.
Im a first gen immigrant as well and this is pretty much exactly like my experiences. My parents pushed me really hard academically and were really strict. Lot of it was their culture and some of it was the fact they see the opportunity I have that they never had and they didnt want me to blow it because a lack of effort. Meanwhile I saw my friends and classmates didnt care as much about their grads as I did, they werent punished as severely by their families and lot of kids had either one parent or both parents more occupied with their work. I will be honest, sometimes I wished I had my friends parents because American love to their kids through words, there was to much tough love in my culture and I didnt like that
Its not all about culture.
Huh did someone post that its all about culture and nothing else? You must quote it for me, cant find it ---