The Career Indecision Profile (CIP; Brown et al., 2012) is an empirically derived measure tapping common sources of career indecision: interpersonal conflict, neuroticism/negative affect, lack of readiness, and choice/commitment anxiety. We adapted the social cognitive model of career self-management (Lent & Brown, 2013) to provide a theoretical structure for these sources of indecision, focusing on how they interrelate and jointly predict career decision progress. Supplementing the CIP's focus on negative decisional influences, the social cognitive model included positive sources of career decidedness, in particular, self-efficacy, mastery experiences, and positive emotions related to decision-making. Three hundred sixty-five college students completed the short form of the CIP (Xu & Tracey, 2017), along with measures of career decision self-efficacy, prior experiences with career decision-making, social barriers, trait conscientiousness and neuroticism, and career decidedness. Factor analytic findings indicated that the CIP's interpersonal conflict, negative affect, and lack of readiness items loaded together with conceptually similar social cognitive, barrier, and personality scales, with lack of readiness items divided between self-efficacy and conscientiousness factors. A path analysis, couching the CIP factors in terms of the career self-management model, provided good fit to the data and accounted for substantial portions of the variance in decisional discomfort (choice/commitment anxiety) and levels of career decidedness. We consider implications of the findings for the study of career decision-making and for practical ways to promote it. Public Significance StatementWe tested a theoretical framework for the Career Indecision Profile, finding that its scales parallel common constructs in the social cognitive model of career self-management. The findings suggest the ways in which several negative and positive factors may operate together in the career decisionmaking process.
We applied the social cognitive model of career self-management (CSM) to the study of proactive career behavior, referring to workers’ active attempts to guide their own career development. Within the CSM framework, proactive behavior is conceived as a key agentic ingredient linking cognitive, social, and personality mechanisms with a variety of career advancement and sustainability outcomes. A sample of 511 early to mid-career adult workers in the U.S. completed an online survey including measures of proactive career behavior, self-efficacy, and outcome expectations; proactive personality; supervisory support; and three positive career self-management outcomes (perceived career success, growth in work rewards, and job marketability). We tested measurement and structural models, respectively, examining the factor structures of, and hypothesized paths among, the constructs. These models offered good overall fit to the data and were found to be invariant across gender. We consider the implications of the findings for future inquiry on career sustainability from a social cognitive perspective.
We investigated therapist interpretations (Ints) and probes for insight (PIs) in relation to changes in client collaboration and insight for 1 male client paired with 3 successive doctoral student therapists in psychodynamic psychotherapy for 192 sessions over 5 years. Judges coded client collaboration and insight in the antecedent and subsequent 3 min for all Ints and PIs in each of 6 middle sessions for each treatment. Qualitative analyses showed that PIs were more helpful than Ints for this defended client. More gains in collaboration were found when antecedent client collaboration was high, antecedent client insight was low, and therapists gave PIs instead of Ints, but no differences were found among therapists. More gains in insight were found when antecedent insight in a given session was higher than in other sessions with the same therapist, with Therapist 3 facilitating more insight than Therapist 1; no differences were found between Ints and PIs. Clinical Impact StatementPsychodynamic theorists consider client collaboration and insight to be desirable, but minimal evidence exists about what skills therapists should use to facilitate these processes. Question: We examined whether therapist interpretations (Ints) and probes for insights (PIs) facilitate client collaboration and insight. Findings: When the client was initially collaborative but not insightful and the therapist gave PIs, the client was likely to be more collaborative. When the client was more insightful than usual with the therapist, the client was likely to gain insight. Meaning: Therapists need to be aware of the client level of collaboration and insight when deciding about giving Ints and PIs, and PIs are more likely than Ints to facilitate collaboration, but both are equally likely to facilitate insight. Next Steps: Researchers could examine other cases, whether other therapist interventions facilitate client collaboration and insight and whether Ints and PIs facilitate other client outcomes.
Studying abroad during college is an educational choice that has significant implications for students’ career, academic, and personal development. This study adapted the social cognitive models of career choice (Lent et al., 1994) and self-management (Lent & Brown, 2013) to examine predictors of study abroad interest and choice intentions. The psychometric properties of new and revised domain-specific measures of self-efficacy, outcome expectations, supports, and barriers were first assessed with an initial sample of 325 college students. The measures yielded an 8-factor structure and adequate reliability and validity estimates. The factor structure was cross-validated in an independent sample of students (N = 277). Support was also found for a higher order model of study abroad self-efficacy, with a single second order factor and three first order factors corresponding to cultural adjustment, decision-making, and administrative task self-efficacy. A structural path model offered good fit to the data and support for most of the paths predicting study abroad interests and intentions. We discuss directions for future research extending social cognitive career models to engagement in the study abroad experience and related academic/career behaviors.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
customersupport@researchsolutions.com
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Copyright © 2025 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.