The family backgrounds of successful Asian students were examined to generate testable hypotheses about the socialization of exemplary school achievement of these students. Structured interviews were conducted with 15 Asian students, all of whom would be considered in the top 5% of achievement nationally. These were Harvard University undergraduates, high school summer students at Harvard, or siblings of Harvard students. The sample contained roughly equal numbers of Chinese, Japanese, and Korean youth. All were immigrants' children, some born in the United States and others not. With two exceptions, the parents' schooling level in Asia and their occupational level in the United States were both relatively high; a number of parents came to the United States on scholarship. The more uniform factor in the home environment was a positive feedback loop between strong family feelings and parent emphasis on education. A constellation of factors labeled "academic socialization" were identified that includes authoritative families, high expectancies, effort emphasis in attributions, oversight of children's time utilization, priority allocation of tutorial or other resources for acceleration or remediation, and reinforcement of beliefs and behaviors conducive to instruction. (SW)