Relationships of Career Self-Efficacy and Personality Variables with Status of Academic and Career Choice among Arab Students

The present study was done to explore the predictive utility of self-efficacy expectations in career decision-making, vocational indecision, occupational preference and self-efficacy expectations, external orientation and instrumentality in the status of academic and career choice. A set of questionnaires was administered to 95 Qatari men, 145 Qatari women, and 89 Kuwaiti women and each sample was examined separately. Analysis indicated that, compared with women, men had higher mean preference and self-efficacy expectations regarding nontraditional occupations and they had lower preference and self-efficacy expectations regarding traditional occupations. Also, students who had decided on an academic major or career, compared with those who had made tentative decisions and the undecided, had higher scores on self-efficacy expectations in career decision-making, occupational self-efficacy expectations, and instrumentality, and lower scores on vocational indecision and external orientation. Results and implications are discussed in the context of the Arabian environment.

Career Indecision of Demobilized Soldiers in Israel

The primary concern was to evaluate the career indecision of Israeli demobilized soldiers who attended a workshop designed to help them in making an educational-vocational choice. Toward this end the Career Decision Scale was given. The workshop was effective in reducing educational and vocational indecision of 39 who completed the scale two times by comparison with those of a control group of 53 soldiers. With respect to the different factors of the scale, the workshop provided solutions for the participants' need to gather more information and the enhancement of confidence in approaching the task of vocational decision making. The workshop was not useful in dealing with problems such as approach-approach conflicts, external barriers, and personal conflicts which also can reduce ability to decide.