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Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal – Vol. 9, No. 1
Publication Date: January 25, 2022
DOI:10.14738/assrj.91.11639. Yongmei, H., & Runjia, C. (2022). The Relationship Between Parenting Style and Career Decision Making Self-Efficacy in
Undergraduates: Mediating Effect of Work Values. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 9(1). 464-474.
Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom
The Relationship Between Parenting Style and Career Decision
Making Self-Efficacy in Undergraduates: Mediating Effect of Work
Values
Hou Yongmei
Department of Psychology, School of Humanities and Administration
Guangdong Medical University, China
Chen Runjia
Department of Psychology, School of Humanities and Administration
Guangdong Medical University, China
ABSTRACT
Objective: To explore the characteristics of parenting style, work values and career
decision making self-efficacy in undergraduates and analyze the relationship
among the above 3 variables. Method: Eight hundred and forty-nine
undergraduates were selected by stratified random sampling from 7 universities in
Guangdong province. Short-Form Egna Minnen av Barndoms Uppfostran (s-EMBU),
Work Values Scale for College Students (WVS) and Career Decision Making Self- Efficacy Scale (CDMSES) were administred to them. Results: (1) The score of parental
control was at a low level; The scores of parental care, social promotion, ease and
stability, salary and reputation, benifits and welfare, total scores and five
dimensions of CDMSES belong to the medium level; The scores of the other 6
dimensions of WVS belong to high scores. (2) Purposeful values play a partial
mediating role in the relationship between parental care and career decision
making self-efficacy, and the mediating effect accounts for 33.9% of the total effect;
Instrumental values play a partial mediating role in the relationship between
parental care and career decision making self-efficacy, with the mediating effect
accounting for 11.1% of the total effect; Work values play a partial mediating role
in the relationship between parental care and career decision making self-efficacy,
and the mediating effect accounts for 30.4% of the total effect. Conclusion: Parental
care can not only directly predict college students' career decision making self- efficacy, but also indirectly affect it through work values.
Keywords: College Students, Parenting Style, Work Values, Career Decision Making Self- Efficacy, Mediating Effect
Work values are the individuals’ criteria for career evaluation and selection, and the value
orientation reflected in individual career selection. It reflects the work-related goals pursued
by individuals, including their internal needs and the work characteristics or attributes they
pursued [1]. Most scholars agree that work values directly affect the effect of individuals’ job
hunting and career development [1].
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Yongmei, H., & Runjia, C. (2022). The Relationship Between Parenting Style and Career Decision Making Self-Efficacy in Undergraduates: Mediating
Effect of Work Values. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 9(1). 464-474.
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/assrj.91.11639
At present, college students' work values are generally positive and enterprising. However,
under the influence of social transformation and foreign thoughts, college students' work
values also have some problems, which are mainly reflected in the fuzziness of work values, the
shortsightedness of professional goals, the contradiction of professional value orientation, and
so on [2-5], resulting in their insufficient career planning [6], confusion, anxiety, a lack of
confidence, and blind conformity when hunting a job [7], infeasibility of the job-selection
schemes [8], daring not and being not good at entrepreneurship [9]. Due to the conflict between
job and values, their career adaptation is often difficult and job hopping is frequently, which
directly hinders their career development and brings losses to employers [10-11].
Career decision making self-efficacy is individuals' self-perception of the ability required to
complete job-hunting related tasks and the belief in the ability to implement and adhere to job- hunting related behaviors [12]. Career decision making self-efficacy is not a kind of ability, but
individuals' confidence in whether they can find a suitable job and adhere to job-hunting
behavior. Career decision making self-efficacy not only directly or indirectly affects job-hunting
behavior and enthusiasm and success rate of employment, but also has a far-reaching impact
on individuals’ career development. A large number of studies [7, 8, 13] have found that college
students' career decision making self-efficacy is at a medium level, and college students with
low career decision making self-efficacy have lower employability, higher anxiety in job- hunting and lower success rate of employment [14-15].
Parenting style refers to the collection of all words and deeds such as ideas, attitudes, and
emotions embodied by parents in the process of raising children [16]. Because parents are the
important others of their children, parenting style is very important to their children's healthy
growth. Empirical research shows that parenting style is a predictor of many mental health
indicators such as college students' self-confidence, self-esteem, sense of self-worth, sense of
security, sense of social responsibility, interpersonal trust, resilience, learning engagement,
internet addiction, suicidal attitude and ideation [17-22].
Previous studies have shown that there is a significant correlation between work values and
career decision making self-efficacy, parenting styles and work values, parenting styles and
general self-efficacy [7, 11, 20, 23], and career decision making self-efficacy is the embodiment
of general self-efficacy in the field of job hunting. We can assume that there may be an
intermediary variable in the three variables of work values, career decision making self-efficacy
and parenting style. From the connotation of the above three variables, career decision making
self-efficacy shows a series of explicit behavior and emotional reactions, which belongs to the
result variable; parenting style is the external (family) influence, which belongs to the remote
variable; work values are internal psychological quality which are proximal variables affected
by distal variables (parenting style) and ultimately affect the expression of outcome variables
(career decision making self-efficacy). In other words, career decision making self-efficacy
should be mediated by work values. Therefore, we can assume that work values play an
intermediary role between parenting style and career decision making self-efficacy, and the
influence path is shown in Figure 1:
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Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal (ASSRJ) Vol. 9, Issue 1, January-2022
Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom
OBJECTS AND METHODS
Objects
A stratified random sampling is used to selected 1000 college students from 7 universities in
Guangdong Province, including Guangzhou University, South China Agricultural University,
Guangdong University of Technology, Guangdong Medical University, Guangzhou Academy of
Fine Arts, Guangzhou Institute of Physical Education and Zhuhai College of Beijing University
of Technology. Eight hundred and fourty-nine valid questionnaires were collected, with an
effective rate of 84.9%. The age ranged from 18 to 24 years (mean 20.61 ± 2.08 years). Among
them, there are 419 boys and 430 girls; 207 freshmen, 191 sophomores, 181 junior, 185 senior
and 85 fifth-year students.
Tools
Career Decision Making Self-Efficacy Scale, CDMSES
It is compiled by Peng Yongxin et al. (2003) [24]. CDMSES has 39 items which are divided into
five dimensions: self-evaluation (SE), information collecting (IC), goal screening (GS), plan
making (PM) and problem solving (PS). Likert 5-point scoring method is used to score from 1
to 5 points corresponding to "no confidence" to "full confidence". The higher the score, the
stronger the sense of career decision making self-efficacy. A dimension or item score ≤ 2.5
indicates that the subject is at a low level in this dimension or item; 2.5 < a dimension or item
score ≤ 3.5 indicates that the subject is at a medium level in this dimension or item; A dimension
or item score > 3.5 indicates that the subject is at a high level in this dimension or item. In this
study, the Cronbach'α coefficient of the total questionnaire is 0.822, and the Cronbach'α
coefficient of each dimension is 0.721- 0.773.
Work Values Scale for college students, WVS
It is compiled by Jin Shenghua et al (2005) [25]. WVS has 34 items divided into two subscales:
purposeful values (PV) and instrumental values (IV). Furthmore, 16 items of the purposeful
values subscale are divided into four dimensions: family maintenance (FM), status pursuit(SP),
achievement realization (AR) and social promotion (SPT), and 18 items of the instrumental
values subscale are divided into six dimensions, including ease and stability (ES), interest and
personality (IP), norm and morality (NM), salary and reputation (SR), career prospects (CP)
and benefits and treatment (BT). Likert 5-point scoring method is used to score from 1 to 5
points corresponding to "very unimportant" to "very important". the higher the score of a
subscale (dimension or item), the stronger the tendency of the subjects in the subscale
(dimension or item). The score of a subscale, dimension or item ≤ 2.5 indicates that the subject
is at a low level in the subscale, dimension or item; 2.5 < the score of a subscale, dimension or
item ≤ 3.5, indicates that the subject is at a medium level in the subscale, dimension or item; If
the score of a subscale, dimension or item is more than 3.5, it indicates that the subject is at a
Work Values
Parenting style Career decision making self-efficacy
Fig 1 The mediating path of work values in the relationship between parenting style and career decision making self-efficacy