Career Research Articles

Goal orientation of regular and working undergraduate students in the first year of college: A phenomenological study

Purpose: Working individuals pursue higher education for various reasons, including improving qualifications, developing expertise, increasing income, career change, fulfilling personal aspirations, and adapting to technological advancements. Goal orientation is crucial for students to manage time, and stress, and achieve goals. This study aims to determine differences in goal orientation between regular and working students and to conduct further research on this topic. Methods: phenomenological qualitative research with a semi-structured interview method. Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) analysis technique. Subjects of this research are students and female students of University "X" in the early semester (1-2 semester) with an age range of 19-40 years old. The subjects of this study were students who met the criteria set by the researcher and were willing to be respondents to the study, obtained a total of 6 people, and were willing to be respondents to the study. Results: The study reveals that regular students prioritize obtaining achievements and a better career, while working students focus on mastering science for their profession and facilitating career promotion, highlighting the differences in undergraduate education. Conclusion: goal orientation owned by regular and working students in continuing their studies is divided into two, namely performance orientation and mastery orientation.

Entrepreneuring as existential transformation: a review of entrepreneurial identity with a typology of career and personal change

Entrepreneuring as existential transformation: a review of entrepreneurial identity with a typology of career and personal change

“But They Only Came Once!” The Single Session in Career Counselling

Clients often come only once to a counsellor. As a practitioner, Rosemary wondered what happens next when clients only attend a single counselling session. Does career counselling work, even if there is just one session? Do people make changes? This article reports on a small study of clients from a career counselling service who came for a single session, usually with concerns about career choice or change. Results indicate that virtually all of them found the session helpful and most made short- or long-term changes as a result. Their comments provide insight into the potential value of even a single counselling session.

Chronicles of Involuntary Career Changes: A Qualitative Longitudinal Analysis

Although extensive research on career transitions exists, little is known about the challenges and processes of involuntary career change. Building on Savickas’s theoretical framework of objective and subjective careers, we investigated the subjective experiences of involuntary career changes while apprehending their objective unfolding. Following a longitudinal qualitative design, we conducted two waves of semistructured interviews with 18 participants who had been forced to change careers due to health issues, migration, or saturated labor market in Switzerland. A four-step temporal thematic analysis covering case description, case comparison, case processes analysis, and processes comparison highlighted a spectrum of career change processes. At one end, individuals experienced synchronous progressions and regained meaning and control over their career combined with a rather linear status sequence. Conversely, some individuals underwent asynchronous developments consisting of either modest objective steps that instigated meaningful subjective experiences or status stagnation, leading to a loss of control and meaning. These findings underscore the variety of involuntary career change processes and unveil synchronicity as a key temporal element in involuntary career change processes. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

Career change teachers: solving the teacher shortage?

ABSTRACT Teacher shortages are a global problem. One solution to this problem, offered in Australian policy, is the notion of the career change teacher (CCT). This study analyses the responses from 23 teacher educators who were asked what they themselves thought might enable and/or constrain this cohort entering teaching as well as those they saw for the pre-service teachers and the systems of both the university and the school. Data were analysed inductively and then deductively using Margaret Archer’s emergent properties as a robust theoretical frame. Findings highlight the range of programmes, models, and strategies that higher education providers are adopting to support these career-change pre-service teachers. Data suggests that schools are neither able to provide workplace flexibility and support that career change teachers are looking for nor the recognition of their prior skills, expertise, and experience. New approaches for school–university partnerships are suggested to better address some of these issues.

Roger Kirk (1930-2023).

Roger Kirk, renowned for his many contributions to psychological research methods, passed away on December 30, 2023, in Waco, Texas, at the age of 93. Born in Indiana on February 23, 1930, Roger spent most of his childhood in Kentucky and Ohio. He developed an interest in the trombone as a teenager, so planned a musical career when he enrolled at The Ohio State University. After earning bachelor's and master's degrees in music, however, he came to realize he was "just an average trombone player." Some vocational guidance led him to Ohio State's experimental psychology doctoral program, which he started in 1952. Roger summed up his substantial career change as follows: "God gives all of us talents, it just took me longer than most people to find mine." Roger's doctoral research focused on psychoacoustics, so after completing his dissertation in 1955, he took a job as a psychoacoustical engineer at the Baldwin Piano and Organ Company. Roger was an accomplished author and received a multitude of accolades during his career; including Baylor's highest teaching designation (Master Teacher, 1993) and highest scholarship designation (Distinguished Professor, 1995). Roger is survived by "the love of my life," Jane Abbott-Kirk, whom he married in 1983. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Collaborative strategies for designing employability curriculum in a liberal arts context

In Australian higher education, the push for curriculum innovation to enhance graduate employability is crucial but faces contention and debate. While the importance of integrating employability skills is widely recognised, perspectives on how and whether to incorporate these as curricular objectives vary, especially in liberal arts programs. This paper explores a multidisciplinary academic team’s experiences of embedding employability units into the Bachelor of Arts and undergraduate Communication and Creative Arts degrees at one Australian university. It addresses the challenges of diverse disciplinary perspectives on employability, career education, and work-integrated learning (WIL), and the design for a diverse student cohort, including career starters, career advancers, and career changers from multiple disciplinary contexts. Utilising Tuckman’s ‘forming, storming, norming, and performing’ model, the paper evaluates the team’s dynamics, offering insights and guidance for academics and institutions undertaking similar curriculum innovation projects to enhance graduate employability. This case study highlights the institutional support necessary for fostering sustainable curriculum reforms and the positive effects of collaborative curriculum design on the professional development and teaching capabilities of the educators involved.

Exploring new opportunities

Emma Wilson discusses how career change trends are impacting dental nurses.

A Novel Job Similarity Index for Career Transition in the Mining Industry

In this study, with the primary goal of capturing ongoing digital transformation and automation impacts on the mining industry and its workforce, we conduct several interviews with mining industry experts in the USA and analyze our survey reports qualitatively and quantitatively through exploratory analysis. After the interpretation of the insights of industry experts, we proceed to generate a personalized and customized data analysis through a novel metric based on skills, knowledge, competencies, and occupational requirements, which quantifies the job similarities for occupations in the mining industry based on the publicly available database of the United States Department of Labor. We utilize text analytics to tokenize and classify the interviews to capture a better understanding of major response categories. The temporal analysis shows that the critical competency needs in the data science and autonomy category increases from 28% in current demands to 43%. In defining our metric, we also calculate Kullback–Leibler (KL) divergence for each job profile that enables determining whether and to what extent that job is transitionary in our test set based on the mean, standard deviation, and kurtosis of each job of interest. Our analysis reveals that the in-group job transitions are significantly easier than the between-group transitions, proving our initial assumptions and common sense. The generated heat maps provide the opportunity to present the gap between the current job and desired job profiles that provide feasible career change options, among others, offering individualized career paths for job seekers and promoting potential job transitions. Through the collection of industry-specific individual employee data, the AI system is envisaged to continue to learn as end users engage with the system, thus creating a central data hub specifically for the future workforce in the mining industry. Although the study has limitations on generalizability for qualitative assessments, it presents itself as a valuable application of how qualitative and quantitative approaches could be of value for future worker training in the mining sector.

Impacts of keratoconus on quality of life: a qualitative study.

To identify the domains of quality of life (QoL) in people with keratoconus. Semi structured in-depth in person and telephone interviews were conducted with participants diagnosed with keratoconus and recruited from the Sydney Eye Hospital, Sydney, Australia. Thematic analysis of interview content was conducted using inductive and deductive processes. Data was collected until thematic saturation was obtained. 33 patients with keratoconus with median age 37 (range 18 to 65) years and majority male (n = 25; 75.8%) were interviewed and a total of 2551 quotes coded. Thematic analysis resulted in 7 broad themes, Driving (199 references), Career (259 references), Symptoms (647 references), Enjoyment (149 references), Relationships (250 references), Financial (104 references) and Healthcare (881 references). Most references described a negative relationship between keratoconus and these 7 domains. The diverse QoL issues expressed included frustration with treatment effectiveness, fear of disease progression, inconvenience with contact lenses, forced career changes and job loss, cost of contact lenses, and feelings of isolation and discrimination. Themes and subthemes described a complex and varied relationship between keratoconus and QoL. Severe quality of life impairment was experienced by keratoconus patients despite treatment. Keratoconus diminishes various aspects of individual's QoL. Therapies able to improve QoL are still needed for keratoconus.

An Umbrella Review of Body Image Concerns, Disordered Eating, and Eating Disorders in Elite Athletes.

Background/Objectives: Several systematic reviews and meta-analyses have been conducted to date indicating a high prevalence of disordered eating in elite athletes and associated risk factors. However, the substantial time burden associated with locating and comparing these reviews, which are varied in methodology and sampling focus, may be a barrier for informing policy and best practice as well as directing future research. This umbrella review aimed to provide a summary of evidence across published reviews regarding the prevalence and risk factors for disordered eating (including body image concerns and eating disorders) in elite athletes. Methods: Five databases (CINAHL, PsycINFO, MEDLINE, Scopus, and SPORTDiscus) were systematically searched for peer-reviewed systematic reviews and meta-analyses that met the following inclusion criteria: (1) investigated prevalence and risk factors for disordered eating, (2) included a sample of elite athletes, and (3) available in English. The included studies underwent data extraction and risk of bias assessment using the AMSTAR 2. Results: The initial search identified 1828 articles that were screened for title and abstract and then full text, leaving 24 systematic reviews (including 10 meta-analyses). Disordered eating was prevalent across elite athletes, including males and females and across sport type. Elite athletes were at elevated risk for disordered eating and eating disorders but at lower risk for body image concerns versus non-athlete controls. Several risk factors were identified, including female gender, competing in lean sports, and experiencing career changes. Few reviews or meta-analyses examined perceived pressures within the sporting environment, and most had substantial risk of bias concerns. Conclusions: Elite athletes are at risk for the spectrum of disordered eating, and all should be considered for primary prevention and screening. Further research is needed regarding sport-specific versus general pressures and mediators of risk to better inform interventions.

Challenging gender stereotypes: Young women's views on female role models in secondary school science textbooks

International Women's Day highlights both women's achievements and ongoing efforts toward global gender equality. Gender disparities in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) affect a country's innovation and ability to tackle global challenges. Therefore, recent national education policies have looked for ways to promote gender equality, particularly in the STEM subjects. One problem is that teaching materials often lack female representation and recognition of female achievements and contributions to STEM subjects, affecting how female students perceive science. The study examines how female students aged 15 to 18 are impacted by gender disparity in their physics teaching materials and what importance they place on female role models. It encompasses 20 group interviews with female students (n = 80) in Switzerland, which were analyzed using qualitative content analysis. Results show that, aside from Marie Curie, female scientists are largely unknown to female students, contributing to the perception of physics as a male domain. Female role models are crucial for fostering interest, motivation, and self-esteem in STEM subjects. However, internalized gender stereotypes and fears of negative reactions from male peers counter the demand for greater visibility of female scientists. Despite these challenges, most female students advocate for more female role models in STEM to inspire future generations of female students to pursue a STEM career and foster positive social change.

Work-related stressors and psychological distress predict career change ideation among Lithuanian healthcare workers.

The study aimed to assess the mental health and well-being of Lithuanian healthcare workers by gathering demographic information, identifying common stressors affecting the work environment, evaluating mental health, and exploring directions for psychosocial care. Additionally, the research explored the prevalence of considering a career change among respondents. The study included 1618 responders who completed an online survey in December 2021 - January 2022. Participants included in this study: physicians, nurses, residents and other healthcare workers. It evaluated their demographics, most common stressors affecting their work environment and mental health on the Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale - 21 (DASS-21) scale. Lastly, all responders asked if they had considered changing their occupation to a non-medical job. Univariate analysis was performed using χ2 and Student's t test, and binary logistic regression evaluated career change predictors. Career change was considered by 1081 (66.8%) responders. The main career change predictors were poor working conditions (OR 1.91, p < 0.001), direct contact with patients (OR 1.84, p < 0.001), lack of career perspectives (OR 1.95, p < 0.001), mobbing (OR 1.67, p = 0.001) and exhaustion (OR 1.51, p = 0.005). After evaluating DASS-21 scores, it was found that 23% of respondents had severe and extremely severe depression symptoms, 27.4% severe and extremely severe anxiety, and 21.4% had severe and extremely severe stress levels. Lithuanian healthcare workers are in high distress and have poor mental health. They are in need psychosocial assistance to avoid burnout and staff loss. Int J Occup Med Environ Health. 2024;37(3):287-99.

How HR managers develop ideas about HR reform: the role of inter-corporate knowledge exchange in Japan

Following a call for actor-centric research in HRM, we look at the modes how HR managers acquire HR knowledge. Our interview study with HR managers of large established companies in Japan finds a clear preference for direct inter-corporate knowledge exchanges instead of the engagement of outside consultants. Discussing our findings, we explain the reasons for this preference. ing from the case of Japan, we then propose with reference to institutional theory and isomorphism that the way HR knowledge is spread is linked to the nature of employment systems. In external labour markets, HR knowledge has been reported to be predominantly spread through business consultants, educational institutions, and career changes of HR professionals, resulting in normative isomorphism. We propose that in internal labour markets, like Japan’s, companies resort to direct inter-corporate knowledge exchange, which leads to mimetic isomorphism.

Australian women's motherhood aspirations: I've always wanted to be a mum. But at the same time, I wanted the career and everything too

AbstractTo better understand the discrepancy between women's motherhood aspirations and outcomes, this study explored the impact of socio‐cultural structures of gender. Taking a qualitative phenomenological approach, interviews were conducted with 24 Victorian women aged between 25 and 45 years. Three themes resulted from data analysis, reflecting the meaning women gave to their lived experiences: Motherhood is central to womanhood; motherhood ambivalence; and the tension of navigating motherhood and career aspirations. Most women aspired to be valued as women who could balance motherhood with a rewarding career. However, hegemonic gender, particularly in the workplace, continues to ensure that these roles remain incompatible, forcing women to anticipate career pauses, changes and/or absences. Overall, these themes demonstrated how socio‐cultural structures of hegemonic gender continue to shape women's lived experiences of gender inequality and constrain their ability to achieve their aspirations for their future lives.

Career Change: Are there options after failing at the first attempt?

For university students, the choice of a career represents a fundamental step in what will be their professional and personal life once they graduate. Before the beginning of a school cycle, the student faces one of the most important processes of analysis and choice in his life, which, if not done conscientiously, will lead to disappointment, frustration and low morale, asking himself if the career he has chosen was really the best option or if he had a last chance to change his plans. Studying an academic career implies that after finishing it, the student is faced with the possibility of improving his knowledge by studying a postgraduate degree that will improve his skills and raise his self-esteem. Higher education institutions present in their entrance schemes a series of educational programs, but if the student for some reason cannot advance from the beginning, he/she has a last option to change careers. Therefore, the present research is carried out in a university in the southeast of Mexico. Its purpose is to show the statistics of career alternatives that the student would have as a second opportunity in the case that in the career that was his first option he has not satisfactorily covered the academic requirements. A statistical methodology is applied that would help the school services area to recommend a second opportunity.

The Influence of COVID on Emergency Medicine Career Choice: A Survey of Medical Students.

Background The COVID-19 pandemic has led to substantial changes in the delivery of healthcare and medical education. Little is known about how the pandemic has altered medical students' perceptions in regard to career choice. Methods The authors developed and implemented a multi-center survey that evaluated medical students' preferred career choice before and during the coronavirus pandemic, as well as the influence of pandemic-related factors on that choice. The survey was distributed to all levels of medical students (MS) at nine medical schools across the country from November 2020 to January 2021 and represented a convenience sample. Preferred career choice was assessed through the use of a Likert scale and additional factors affecting career choice were solicited.The degree of interest before and during the pandemic, as well as factors influencing the shift, were treated as ordinal variables and compared using chi-squared testing. Cohen's Kappa statistic was calculated to assess the degree of shifts of interest in Emergency Medicine among students. The study was deemed exempt by the Institutional Review Board at the host institution, Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University, and all participating sites. Results A total of 1431 of 6710 (21.3%) eligible students completed the survey. The COVID pandemic was cited as a reason for a changed interest in specialty by 193 (13.5%) students.The most common reason for specialty change was the students' clinical experience, followed by a desire to be on the front lines, and personal/family health concerns. There was a significant association between career change and degree of interest among students interested in emergency medicine (EM) as their future specialty before the COVID pandemic as well as during the COVID pandemic. Living with an immunocompromised individual had a significant association with a reducedinterest in EM. There was a significant association between EM rotation completion and how interested students were in EM as their future specialty before the COVID pandemic and during the COVID pandemic. Among EM-interested students whose specialty interest was changed by the COVID pandemic, 34 (41.5%) became less favorable to EM, 28 (34.2%) stayed the same, and 20 (24.4%) students became more favorable to EM. Conclusions The impact of COVID-19 on medical students' career choice is a complicated matter that involves both personal and professional factors. It appears that there is a trend towards less interest in the field of EM with multifactorial influences, some of which are related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Navigating an Intercollegiate Athletes’ Transition Related to the Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) Interim Policy

On July 1, 2021, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) announced the Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) Interim Policy, permitting most student-athletes across the U.S. to monetize their NIL through participation in various branding activities, having a transformative effect throughout intercollegiate athletics. The purpose of this manuscript is to conceptualize NIL as a career change event and share an intervention supporting an intercollegiate student-athlete in navigating this NIL-related transition. This includes the client’s challenges related to the stress of negotiating contracts, decisions about transferring or remaining at an institution, and a lack of clarity around regulations of NIL engagements. Using the Scheme of Change for Sport Psychology Practice (SCSPP; Samuel & Tenenbaum, 2011a) as a framework, the authors conceptualize NIL as a change-event and overall career transition in which student-athletes are transitioning to businesspeople, as highlighted through the case study of Jamal (pseudonym). This manuscript offers applied considerations for sport psychology practitioners supporting intercollegiate student-athletes through this unprecedented transition.

Drivers of Involuntary Career Changes: A Qualitative Study of Push, Pull, Anti-Push, and Anti-Pull Factors

Although research on work transitions is extensive, little is known about the specific challenges of involuntary career changes. This study focused on how people articulate push, pull, anti-push, and anti-pull factors when facing an involuntarily triggered career change. We conducted 19 semistructured interviews with people forced to change careers due to health issues, migration, or unemployment in Switzerland. Through a consensual qualitative analysis, we showed that career changes were driven (i.e., facilitated or inhibited) by participants’ interests, values, or skills. This resulted in five types of processes of career change, depending on whether participants were aiming to maintain their values, update their values, transpose their interests, resuscitate forgone interests, or valorize their skills despite the involuntary nature of the change they were undergoing. Overall, findings stressed individuals’ struggle to regain a sense of control when having to face a career change. Limitations and implications are discussed.

Career decisions in artistic professions during the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany—an experimental study

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on the professional situation in artistic professions. Repeated lockdowns resulted in the cancellation of cultural events and exacerbated economic challenges, depriving artists and people working in the culture industry of their primary source of income. Such drastic conditions could lead to important professional decisions, including career changes. This study aimed to determine the factors that could influence career decisions among artistic professionals during a second pandemic lockdown period in Germany. To examine whether health concerns or financial struggles are more important in shaping artistic professionals’ decisions to change or stay in their profession, a vignette experiment was conducted in an online survey (n = 788) in the winter of 2020–2021. In the experiment’s 2*3-factorial randomised design, all respondents were asked to put themselves in the role of artists and make decisions about career changes under different income conditions or with different health prospects. The vignette experiment revealed that income losses related to career changes decreased the willingness to change careers, whereas health prospects (hypothetical differences in vaccine efficacy) did not affect the decisions. In addition, other variables were found to explain career decisions; female gender and signs of a depressive disorder were associated with greater willingness for career turnover, whereas a higher educational level and status of earning one’s livelihood in the culture industry were associated with a diminished tendency for career turnover. The latter impact factor was interpreted as a kind of “don´t give up effect” that is particularly observable among artistic professionals.