Psychosocial and Contextual Predictors of Educational and Occupational Self-Efficacy among Hispanic Inner-City Adolescents

Abstract

This study investigated psychosocial and contextual predictors of self-efficacy beliefs about educational and occupational attainment among Hispanic adolescents living in the inner-city. Participants were 107 adolescents ages 10 to 13 (mean=11.3 years) recruited from two inner-city elementary schools in Los Angeles via active parental and student consent. Three psychosocial predictors (previous performance; vicarious experience; social persuasion), based on Bandura’s theory ofself-efficacy, and two contextual predictors (neighborhood resources and neighborhood safety) were hypothesized to predict self-efficacy beliefs. Results showed that social persuasion most strongly predicted both educational and occupational expectations. Previous academic performance, represented by reading score, was related to educational but not occupational expectations. Vicarious experience in the form of family attainment did not predict educational nor occupational expectations. Contextual predictors were also unrelated to both domains of expectations. Results suggest that self-efficacy beliefs of adolescents growing up in inner-city environments can be influenced by the messages they receive from significant others as well as by their prior experiences.