Researchers have suggested that general self-efficacy (GSE) can substantially contribute to organizational theory, research, and practice. Unfortunately, the limited construct validity work conduct...

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Validation of a New General Self-Efficacy Scale:

Social cognitive career theory (SCCT) currently consists of 4 overlapping, segmental models aimed at understanding educational and occupational interest development, choice-making, performance and persistence, and satisfaction/well-being. To this point, the theory has emphasized content aspects of career behavior, for instance, prediction of the types of activities, school subjects, or career fields that form the basis for people's educational/vocational interests and choice paths. However, SCCT may also lend itself to study of many process aspects of career behavior, including such issues as how people manage normative tasks and cope with the myriad challenges involved in career preparation, entry, adjustment, and change, regardless of the specific educational and occupational fields they inhabit. Such a process focus can augment and considerably expand the range of the dependent variables for which SCCT was initially designed. Building on SCCT's existing models, we present a social cognitive model of career self-management and offer examples of the adaptive, process behaviors to which it can be applied (e.g., career decision making/exploration, job searching, career advancement, negotiation of work transitions and multiple roles).

Social cognitive model of career self-management: Toward a unifying view of adaptive career behavior across the life span.

In this multiple regression model, self-efficacy beliefs are the best predictor of career indecision, and outcome expectations are the best predictor of exploration intentions. When indecision was entered as a predictor, it also was a significant predictor of exploration intentions—students who were less decided were also more likely to plan career exploration. Career efficacy and outcome expectations relate significantly more strongly within the group of college men than within the group of college women. Implications for social cognitive career theory and practice are discussed.

Efficacy and Outcome Expectations Influence Career Exploration and Decidedness.

Efforts to test hypotheses derived from social cognitive theory require sound measures of the theory’s constructs. Because the theory is concerned with domain-specific aspects of human functioning,...

On Conceptualizing and Assessing Social Cognitive Constructs in Career Research: A Measurement Guide

To test whether general self-efficacy and self-esteem relate differently to motivational and affective constructs, we collected data from samples in academic and work settings. Results suggest that general self-efficacy is more highly related to motivational variables than is self-esteem, whereas self-esteem is more highly related to affective variables than is general self-efficacy, as hypothesized. Furthermore, results support the notion that motivational and affective states differentially mediate the relationships of general self-efficacy and self-esteem with task performance. These results confirm the theoretical distinction between general self-efficacy and self-esteem and suggest that failure to distinguish between them might exact a price in terms of precision, validity, and understanding of determinants of performance. Implications for research and practice in organizations are discussed. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

General self-efficacy and self-esteem: toward theoretical and empirical distinction between correlated self-evaluations

This study describes the development and evaluation of a short form of the widely used Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy Scale (CDMSE; Taylor & Betz, 1983). The psychometric characteristics and ...

Evaluation of a Short Form of the Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy Scale:

This study involved the examination of relationships among behavior-domain-specific measures of career self-efficacy and measures of generalized self-efficacy and global self-esteem. Correlations o...

Relationships Among Measures of Career Self-Efficacy, Generalized Self-Efficacy, and Global Self-Esteem:

A measure of unconditional self-regard (USR) derived from Rogerian (client-centered) theory was evaluated in four studies. Results indicated that USR was highly reliable and was strongly related to other measures of self-esteem and negatively related to depression, anxiety, and symptoms of psychological distress. The measure was significantly related to the control and commitment dimensions of psychological hardiness but not to its challenge dimension. Evidence for discriminant validity was provided by findings that USR was unrelated to social desirability or private self-consciousness. Finally, female students'self-regard was significantly related to the unconditional positive regard they reported receiving from their mothers. Other correlations between self-regard and perceived regard from others, although nonsignificant, were often large in absolute value. Implications for counseling interventions are discussed.

Karla L. Klein

Papers

Evaluation of a Short Form of the Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy Scale:

Relationships Among Measures of Career Self-Efficacy, Generalized Self-Efficacy, and Global Self-Esteem:

Evaluation of a Measure of Self‐Esteem Based on the Concept of Unconditional Self‐Regard