According to social cognitive career theory, decisions to pursue a
career may be influenced by self-efficacy expectations and anticipated
career outcomes, thus we examined the incremental validity of these
constructs beyond gender and personality. 179 undergraduate college
students completed a survey, the Career Decision Scale (CDS), and the
NEO Five-Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI). The survey included ratings of the
importance of career-related outcomes (e.g., high income) and whether
careers of choice or preference would provide such outcomes, in addition
to self-efficacy ratings for completion of educational requirements,
getting a job, job success, and advancement. Results indicated
incremental validity of three domains of the five-factor model,
neuroticism, agreeableness, and conscientiousness; self-efficacy for
getting a job and job success, importance ratings of job outcomes, and
job outcome expectations ([R.sub.2] = .25). Our results support
hypotheses of social cognitive career theory in terms of the importance
of self-efficacy and outcome expectations in predicting career planning.
**********
Social cognitive career theory has much utility for understanding
career interest and career choice. It explains interest and choice by
including background characteristics (e.g., gender, personality),
sociocognitive mechanisms (e.g., self-efficacy, outcome expectations,
and goals), and contextual influences (e.g., support for career
interests and choices). The theoretical model builds on earlier models
and thus includes features of previous models (Lent, Brown, &
Hackett, 1994, 2002).
A key concept of the theory is self-efficacy, which is defined as
the perceived level of confidence in one's ability to perform
various activities related to career planning and development (Lent et
al.). It can be specific to processes involved in career planning, and
it can be specific to completion of educational requirements and job
success. When women and men think about possible career choices, the
likelihood of choosing a particular career is influenced by expectations
for success in those occupations (Betz & Hackett, 1981; Brooks &
Betz, 1990). Women report higher levels of self-efficacy for job success
for careers that are female dominated, and men report higher levels of
self efficacy for job success when considering careers that are male
dominated (Betz & Hackett: Brooks & Betz).
In addition to self-efficacy, outcome expectations are considered
to be critical for career interest and career choice. Outcome
expectation is defined as an expected consequence of a behavior or
action, thus engaging in Behavior X will result in Outcome Y as a
consequence. Outcome expectations may be specific to outcomes of
academic performance, for example, "'If I get good grades, I
will be able to have the career of my choice" (Betz & Voyten,
1997, p. 189). Other outcome expectations may be specific to career
planning and career choice, for example, "If I learn more about
different careers, I will make a better career decision" (Betz
& Voyten, p. 189). Research indicates outcome expectations to be
prominent for predicting career indecision and college persistence.
Results of one study indicated that measures of self-efficacy and
outcome expectations predicted career indecision in women (Betz &
Voyten). Outcome expectations related to perceived utility of a college
education combined with the goal of completing college have incremental
validity for predicting persistence beyond the first year of college
(Kahn, Nauta, & Gailbreath, 2002).
Authors of social cognitive career theory (Lent et al., 2002) have
acknowledged the contribution of Vroom's (1982) theory to
understanding career interest and career choice. In order for one to
develop an interest or preference for a particular occupation, one must
consider important outcomes, termed outcome valence (e.g., high income)
and perceive that having such an occupation will be instrumental in
providing the outcome (instrumentality). For example, becoming an
engineer will result in a high income. When considering several outcomes
and instrumentalities, higher values will result in greater interest.
For actually making an occupational choice, another concept of
importance is expectancy, the subjective probability that a given act
will lead to an outcome. For example, if engineering is a possible
choice, what is the subjective probability that one will successfully
complete educational requirements (Brooks & Betz)?
For the purpose of our research, we believe that outcome
expectations can be better understood by considering specific career or
job outcomes such as job satisfaction, income, variety of
responsibilities, social status, etc. The advantage of examining
specific job outcomes in the analysis of outcome expectations is to
increase our understanding of an individual's specific desired
outcomes of a chosen career and the perception that the career will
provide such outcomes. For example, the following differ in specificity
of outcome: (a) "If I choose engineering, then I will get what I
want.'" (b) "If I choose engineering, then I will have a
high income" (Betz & Voyten, p. 189). The latter example
provides a more detailed understanding of an individual's desired
outcomes.
Our research extends that of Betz and Voyten by examining the
incremental validity of self-efficacy and outcome expectations for
predicting career indecision, however, we utilize outcome expectations
that include specific career or job outcomes, consistent with
Vroom's construct of instrumentality. In addition, we include
importance ratings, which is consistent with Vroom's construct of
outcome valence. Consistent with social-cognitive career theory, we
include input variables such as gender and personality domains of the
five-factor model (McCrae & John, 1992; Digman, 1990) known to be
related to career decidedness and antecedents of career indecision
(Chartrand, Rose, Elliott, Marmarosh, & Caldwell, 1993; Lounsbury,
Tatum, Chambers, Owens, & Gibson, 1999). We also include importance
of job outcomes and the perceived relationship between job outcomes and
the expectancy that a considered career will provide such outcomes. We
see this as consistent with informational antecedents of career
indecision (Chartrand et al.), i.e., knowing enough about an occupation
of interest and whether the occupation is likely to provide valued
outcomes. We hypothesized that self-efficacy for four aspects of career
development and advancement (completing educational requirements,
getting a job, job success, and earning promotions), importance of
specific career outcomes, and specific career outcome expectations would
show incremental validity after accounting for gender and personality.
Method
Participants
A total of 179 undergraduate students (141 women and 38 men)
participated. Mean age for women and men was 20.35 years (SD = 4.48) and
21.21 years (SD = 4.88), respectively (p > .05). The number of
first-year students, sophomores, juniors, and seniors was 91,22, 37, and
29, respectively.
Instruments
Participants completed three different instruments. The first was a
questionnaire used to report demographic information and a chosen or
preferred career. In addition, we used a 7-point rating scale to assess
expectations for completing educational requirements, getting a
career-related job, being successful in the career, and advancing
through promotions (Brooks & Betz): 1 (very unlikely) to 7 (very
likely). The survey also included two 7-point rating scales, one for
judging the degree of personal importance of 16 career-related outcomes,
1 (very unimportant) to 7 (very important), and the other for judging
how likely the career would be instrumental in providing each of the 16
outcomes, 1 (very unlikely) to 7 (very likely). The list included
variety in job responsibilities, job security, high income, high
prestige and social status, intellectual stimulation, job satisfaction,
opportunities for leadership, interesting work, achieve high level of
performance, opportunity for personal development, opportunity for
part-time or flexible work hours, avoidance of disapproval of the
same/opposite sex, ability to manage home and family life, time to
engage in satisfying leisure activities, fit of job to personality,
opportunities to serve others, opportunities to attain promotions, and
work cooperatively with coworkers (Bartol & Manhardt, 1979; Brooks
& Betz; Heckert et al., 2002; Jackson, Gardner, & Sullivan,
1972; Manhardt, 1972).
Career Decision Scale (CDS). The CDS (Osipow, Carney, Winer,
Yanico, & Koschier. 1976) indecision scale consists of 16
objectively-scored items and 1 open-ended item to measure degree of
indecision about career choice. We used the 16-item sum of ratings as
the measure of career indecision. Reliability is about .90 for the scale
(Osipow, 1987).
NEO-Five Factor Inventory (NEOFFI). The NEO-FFI (Form S, Adult)
(Costa & McCrae, 1991) is a 60-item instrument that provides
trait-based assessment of the following domains of the five-factor model
(Digman, 1990: McCrae & John, 1992): neuroticism, extraversion,
openness to experience, agreeableness and conscientiousness. Reliability
ranges from .75 to .83 across the five factors (Costa & McCrae,
1992).
Procedure
Participation was completely voluntary; students were recruited in
several general education classes. After completion of a consent form,
participants completed the questionnaire, the CDS and the NEO-FFI. The
procedure required approximately 20-25 min.
Results
Descriptive statistics for CDS indecision score, NEO-FFI domain
scores, and self-efficacy ratings are displayed in Table 1. Descriptive
statistics for importance ratings and outcome-expectation ratings are
displayed in Table 2. We observed gender agreement regarding most
important items, with agreement on four of the top five in rank, which
included job satisfaction, job security, interesting work, and manage
home and family life. In addition, there was extensive agreement across
gender in job characteristics considered least important, with agreement
on six of the least important job outcomes, which included avoidance of
disapproval of the opposite sex, high prestige and social status,
opportunity for part-time or flexible work, high income, opportunity to
attain promotions, and variety in job responsibilities.
We used principal components analysis with Varimax rotation on
importance ratings to identify underlying outcome factors, and we used a
criterion of a minimum factor loading of .40 to determine which outcomes
were significantly loaded on specific factors. Results indicated that
five factors accounted for 58.61% of the variance. Loadings for the
rotated matrix are reported within parentheses and also in Table 2.
Factor 1 included variety of job responsibilities (.60), intellectual
stimulation (.71), interesting work (.64), and job satisfaction (.58) (4
items, 13.13%, [alpha] = .59). Factor 2 included opportunities for
leadership (.43), opportunities to serve others (.74), fit of job to
personality (.64), and work cooperatively with others (.74) (4 items,
12.95%, [alpha] = .68). Factor 3 included high income (.82), high
prestige and social status (.68), opportunities for leadership (.40),
and opportunities to attain promotions (.72) (4 items, 12.31%, [alpha] =
.69). Factor 4 included job security (.62), ability to manage home and
family life (.76), time to engage in satisfying leisure activities
(.60), and job satisfaction (.44) (4 items, 11.36%, a = .61). Factor 5
included opportunity for part-time or flexible work hours (.78), time
for leisure (.46), and avoid disapproval from the opposite sex (.65) (3
items, 8.76%, ct = .46). Three job outcomes were loaded on two factors:
job satisfaction, opportunity for leadership, and time for satisfying
leisure activities.
We employed hierarchical multiple-regression analysis to examine
the incremental validity of each component of the social cognitive model
that we measured. Linearity, normality, and homoscedasticity assumptions
were tenable. In addition, we found no evidence of multicollinearity
among predictors. We entered predictors in the following order: gender,
personality domains, expectations for success, factor scores for
importance ratings of outcome variables, and outcome expectations.
Results are displayed in Table 3. For CDS indecision, R2 was incremented
by each of the following variables: gender; five-factor domains of
neuroticism, agreeableness, and conscientiousness; expectancies for
getting a job and being successful at the job, importance ratings on job
outcomes for Factors 1 and 2, and outcome expectations for Factors 1 and
2. [R.sub.2] for the final model was [R.sub.2] -.27 (medium effect
size). Results were analyzed for subsamples of participants, which
included participants who reported a specific career choice (n = 100) as
opposed to participants who reported a preferred career rather than a
career choice (n = 79). [R.sub.2] for those who reported a career choice
versus those who reported a preference was .26 and .25, respectively. In
spite of the loss of power on tests of regression coefficients, such
tests of outcome expectations were statistically significant for both
groups (p < .01), thus supporting the incremental validity of outcome
expectations whether students had explicitly reported a choice or a
preference.
Discussion
We intended to provide evidence for the incremental validity of
outcome expectations of the underlying dimensions of career or job
outcomes, rather than to simply confirm the underlying structure of such
outcomes. We employed principal-component analysis with Varimax
rotation, which was consistent with those of previous researchers
(Bartol & Manhardt, 1979; Heckert et al., 2002; Jackson et al.,
1992; Manhardt, 1972). We hypothesized that a predictive model that
included importance ratings of career-related outcomes and expectations
of the outcomes would result in significant increments in [R.sub.2].
Results supported our hypotheses for some, but not all, principle
components concerning "intrinsic" qualities of work (i.e., job
satisfaction, intellectual stimulation, variety of responsibilities, and
interesting work) and outcomes that are associated with cooperation with
others and service to others, opportunities for leadership, and
personality-job fit. Results suggest that inclusion of some specific
career outcome expectations increases our understanding of career
indecision. The factors included in the model are not surprising, given
the high proportion of women in our sample who were pursuing
service-oriented careers (education, nursing, and social work).
Although the construct of perceived importance of importance of job
or career outcomes is not explicitly identified in social cognitive
career theory, the construct is relevant to our analysis in that
outcomes must be valued in order for perceived relationship between
interest or choice and outcome to influence career indecision. One
advantage of including it is to identify possible sources of indecision,
for example, expecting opportunities to serve others may be deemed
important, yet one is not certain that a career of interest or choice
will provide such opportunities, thus influencing commitment to the
choice and indecision regarding a possible choice. In addition,
inclusion of career-specific outcomes in the analysis allows counselors
to evaluate the degree of match between what individuals value and what
they expect as outcomes of a career choice, in addition to degree of
realism of their expectations. As individuals acquire additional
information about potential occupational choices, they may consider new
choices.
Generalizability of our results may be limited because our sample
was predominately comprised of Caucasian women with service-oriented
professional career plans (education, nursing, social work, and
counseling psychology). However, the results do show that knowledge of
ratings of importance of career outcomes and outcome expectations, in
addition to self-efficacy, may help us to better understand antecedents
of career indecision. This research should help to guide subsequent
research in which the constructs of social cognitive career theory are
tested. Future work demands with more diverse samples and with other
career interests (e.g., business, biology, engineering). In addition,
the analysis should include measures of the degree of discrepancy
between importance and outcome expectations to determine whether a
reliable relationship exists between amount of discrepancy and career
indecision. For example, when one considers leadership opportunities to
be important, yet expect little opportunity given the career of
interest, career indecision may be a consequence. When such
discrepancies are present with several important outcomes, the degree of
career indecision may increase.
Author Note
This study was supported by funding from the R. J. McElroy
Student/Faculty Research Program. Correspondence should be sent to
Ronald C. Feldt, Department of Psychology, Mount Mercy College, Cedar
Rapids, Iowa, 52402. E-mail: rfeldt@mtmercy.edu
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RONALD C. FELDT
CHERYL WOELFEL
Mount Mercy College
Table 1
Descriptive Statistics for CDS Indecision Score, Personality Domains,
and Self-Efficacy Ratings
M SD r
Career Indecision (CDS) 27.59 8.61
Five-Factor Domains (NEO-FFI)
Neuroticism 22.34 7.67 .16 *
Extraversion 31.33 5.48 -.03
Openness 27.05 5.93 -.03
Agreeableness 33.03 5.81 -.19 **
Conscientiousness 32.72 6.52 -.15 *
Self-Efficacy
Complete Education 6.38 1.00 -.11
Find a Job 5.80 1.16 -.32 ***
Job Success 6.09 0.96 -.22 **
Advancement 5.78 1.12 -.13
* p <.05, ** p<.01, *** p <.001
Table 2
Descriptive Statistics for Importance and Outcome-Expectation Ratings
and Factor Loadings (a)
Outcome Ratings (b)
Importance Expectation
M SD M SD
Variety 5.50 1.04 5.59 1.17
Job Security 6.45 0.71 5.66 1.15
High Income 5.19 1.31 4.68 1.57
Prestige/Status 4.45 1.36 4.43 1.45
Intellectual 5.69 1.00 5.70 1.09
Satisfaction 6.59 0.66 6.08 0.88
Leadership 5.63 1.04 5.68 1.16
Interesting 6.49 0.67 6.35 0.76
Work Schedule 4.82 1.50 4.12 1.67
Disapproval 3.91 1.97 4.35 1.76
Home/Family 6.41 0.90 5.41 1.25
Leisure 5.87 1.09 5.19 1.14
Personality Fit 6.21 0.83 6.05 0.95
Serve Others 5.98 1.19 6.32 1.08
Promotions 5.53 1.15 5.11 1.24
Cooperation 6.09 0.99 6.04 0.98
Rotated Component Loadings
1 2 3 4 5
Variety .60 .11 .17 -.16 .25
Job Security .23 .07 .19 .63 -.09
High Income -.04 -.13 .82 .25 -.01
Prestige/Status .14 .33 .69 -.15 .04
Intellectual .71 .16 .05 .06 -.07
Satisfaction -.62 -.13 .08 -.41 -.02
Leadership .37 .43 .40 .01 .13
Interesting .64 .13 .05 .11 .03
Work Schedule .23 -.13 -.04 .10 .79
Disapproval -.20 .29 .23 .03 .66
Home/Family .06 -.24 -.11 -.77 -.10
Leisure .09 .08 .07 .60 .45
Personality Fit .33 .65 .11 .11 .00
Serve Others .13 .75 .06 .09 -.02
Promotions .10 .11 .71 .34 .17
Cooperation -.08 -.73 -.02 -.20 -.10
(a) Extraction Method: Principal Component Analysis with orthogonal
rotation (Varimax)
(b) Outcome Ratings include 7-point rating scales
Table 3
Results of Hierarchical Multiple-Regression Analysis for Prediction of
Career Indecision
Step Predictor [R.sup.2] [DELTA][R.sup.2] [DELTA]F
1 Gender .02 .02 3.96 *
2 Personality Domains (a) .07 .05 2.88 *
3 Self-Efficacy (b) .19 .12 6.40 ***
4 Factor Scores (1 & 2 .22 .03 3.07 *
Importance Ratings)
5 Job Outcome Expectations .27 .05 6.14 **
(Factors 1 & 2)
(a) Includes neuroticism, agreeableness, and conscientiousness
(b) for getting a job and job success
* p<.05, ** p<.01, *** p<.001