Social stratification, life chances and inequality
Explain how societies rank groups, how inequality shapes life chances, and how class, gender, ethnicity and age can intersect.
Exam scope and assessment notes
This lesson is written for Cambridge IGCSE Sociology 0495. It maps section 3.1 in the 2025–2027 Version 3 and 2028–2030 Version 1 syllabuses; Cambridge reports no significant teaching changes for 2028–2030. Use current, credible and age-appropriate examples from more than one society. Check local law and school policy before discussing sensitive or legally restricted family, marriage, crime or punishment examples. Do not ask learners to disclose personal experiences. These lessons present sociological explanations for analysis, not endorsements of political positions or stereotypes.
Before you begin
Work on paper. Try each question before revealing help, and explain why your method works.
Quick readiness check
Before you start: What is a self-fulfilling prophecy?
What you will learn
- Compare open and closed systems, achieved and ascribed status, mobility, meritocracy, wealth, poverty, power, caste and modern slavery.
- Apply age, gender, ethnicity and class to life chances in education, employment, health, housing and life expectancy.
- Use intersectionality to explain combined effects without treating identities as interchangeable.
- Explain labelling and Marxist accounts of inequality, including master status, self-fulfilling prophecy, exploitation, ideology, poverty traps and reserve labour.
How societies rank people
Stratification is the structured ranking of groups and resources. Open systems allow more movement between positions than closed ones, although mobility is never guaranteed. Achieved status is attained through action; ascribed status is assigned or inherited. Wealth is accumulated assets, income is a flow, and poverty may be measured in absolute or relative terms.
Power is the ability to influence decisions. Meritocracy is the idea that rewards follow ability and effort; sociologists test whether opportunity is actually equal. Caste is a more closed status system. Modern slavery involves severe coercion and exploitation, not merely poor employment conditions.
Life chances and explanations
Life chances are opportunities and outcomes such as education, employment, health, housing and life expectancy. Age, gender, ethnicity and social class can shape them, and their effects may intersect rather than operate separately.
Labelling can create a master status that overshadows other identities; a self-fulfilling prophecy occurs when expectations influence behaviour in ways that help confirm them. Marxist explanations focus on exploitation, ideological control, poverty traps and a reserve army of labour. These theories highlight mechanisms but need evidence and comparison with alternatives.
Sources for this lesson
Pause and explain
Which is a life-chance outcome named in the syllabus?
Worked example
Two applicants have similar qualifications but different access to housing, professional networks and unpaid work experience. Explain how social class may affect life chances and one limit of the explanation.
Show the worked solution
- Housing and networks can affect time, location, advice and access to opportunities.
- Unpaid experience may be easier for people with financial support, influencing later employment chances.
- The pattern should be compared with other factors such as discrimination, qualifications and local labour demand.
Answer Class can shape resources and opportunities without determining every individual's outcome.
Try a topic test
Choose Easy, Normal or Difficult. Save your answers and open worked review after finishing.
Test this topic →From guided practice to a new situation
Write your answer and reasoning first. Use a hint only if you are stuck. The model solution is for self-checking; your written work is not automatically marked.
A scholarship expands access to university, but unpaid internships remain common. Explain how this may affect social mobility and evaluate the claim that the system is now meritocratic.
Give me a hint
Identify an opened route and a remaining resource barrier.
Compare my reasoning
- The scholarship can reduce one financial barrier to higher education.
- Unpaid internships may still favour people who can afford to work without income, limiting access to some jobs.
- Assess who receives opportunities and outcomes; one policy does not show that all barriers have disappeared.
The scholarship may increase mobility, while unpaid work can preserve class differences in access. Whether the system is meritocratic depends on wider evidence about selection, resources and outcomes.
Look for these in your work
- Explains a mobility mechanism
- Identifies a remaining inequality
- Evaluates with evidence needs
A teacher repeatedly describes one student as 'unmotivated'; the student is then given fewer challenging tasks. Explain a possible labelling process and one alternative explanation to test.
Give me a hint
Connect label to treatment and opportunity without assuming the outcome is certain.
Compare my reasoning
- The label may become a master status that shapes the teacher's expectations.
- Fewer challenging tasks may reduce opportunities to participate or show ability, potentially reinforcing the original expectation.
- Check other evidence such as task access, student views, learning needs and how similar students are treated.
The sequence could create a self-fulfilling prophecy, but it is a hypothesis. Evidence should test other explanations and avoid treating one observation as proof of a student's character.
Look for these in your work
- Explains the mechanism
- Keeps the claim conditional
- Names relevant evidence and alternatives
Use intersectionality to explain why an average employment statistic may hide differences within a broad ethnic group.
Give me a hint
Show how class, gender, age or other dimensions can shape experiences together.
Compare my reasoning
- An average can combine people with different ages, genders, class positions and migration histories.
- These dimensions may affect access to qualifications, networks, care responsibilities or discrimination in different ways.
- Disaggregate data carefully and protect privacy while avoiding claims that any subgroup is uniform.
Intersectional analysis asks how social positions interact, so a single group average can conceal different patterns. More detailed evidence helps, but categories still need careful interpretation.
Look for these in your work
- Explains a hidden within-group pattern
- Shows interacting factors
- Notes evidence and privacy limits
Common mistakes
- Using meritocracy as evidence that outcomes are fair
- Equating wealth with income
- Explaining a group difference as an innate trait
- Treating intersectionality as simply adding labels
What can you explain now?
Which is a life-chance outcome named in the syllabus?
Compare with the explanation
Access to housing
A person's favourite colour
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Make it stick
Distinguish achieved from ascribed status and define a life chance in one syllabus area.
If you needed the solution, close it and solve the problem again from a blank page. A correct answer is stronger when you can explain the reason for each step.