Career decision-making self-efficacy

October 8, 2019

From Bandura’s social cognitive theory, individuals are agents of their lives. They intentionally exercise influence on their functioning and life circumstances instead of simply being witnesses. According to Stajkovic and Luthans (1998), self-efficacy is an individual’s convictions about (or confidence in) his or her ability to mobilize cognitive resources, motivation, and courses of action needed to successfully execute a specific task within a given context. Further Taylor and Betz (1983) state that self-efficacy is gained through engagement in activities building self-knowledge and an overall self-perception. Career decision-making self-efficacy is basically self-efficacy used for career decisions. The social cognitive career theory (SCCT) (Lent, Brown, & Hackett, 2000) expands the social cognitive theory in career domains and explains the career decision-making self-efficacy as a core construct in career development. In the SCCT frame, career decision-making is an unfolding process with multiple influences and choice points. Choice actions lead to certain performance or achievement experiences (success or failure), which can either strengthen or waken original self-efficacy beliefs and leads to adjusted career choices (Xin & Rojewski, 2018). Those individuals who have explored and understand natural abilities have an advantage due to raising their self-awareness and have made choice actions based on their self-knowledge. Knowing more about yourself allows you to make better decisions and goals which are likely in line with an individual’s understanding of who they are. Therefore, they know their limitations and gifts and complete goals they know they are capable of completing which in turn, boost their career decision-making self-efficacy. Individuals who have completed career-relevant tasks, such as aptitude testing, are found to be more decisive and less uncertain about their career paths (Lent, Paizao, da Silva, & Leitao, 2010). The take away from this blog is the more an individual knows about himself/herself, the better decisions and practical goals they can make. The more positive outcomes from those realistic decisions and goals raise self-efficacy and confidence for future career-decision self-efficacy needs. ~Dr. Shari