We observe gig workers' retrospective sense-making of their career development, from creating an account on online labor platforms to managing gigs successfully. Our data reveals that gig workers advance through three career stages in their initial career learning cycle. We identify each stage as characterized by stage-specific emotions and that they react with specific behaviors to gig work challenges. Gig work challenges that occur in the platform environment are namely the , the g , and the , which workers need to overcome in order to transition to the next stage. In line with contemporary career and protean career theory on career learning cycles, gig workers need to build a set of specialized skills and meta-competencies to successfully navigate their careers. As an outcome of the here-described career learning cycle, gig workers develop an entrepreneurial identity aspiration, as they are empowered and can use the platform as a playground or stepping stone for entrepreneurial activities. Our paper, thus, develops an understanding of gig workers' initial career learning cycle by examining the factors that enable gig workers to kick off a career and allow them to thrive and advance on the platforms professionally.

This study tested whether trajectories of career decision difficulties identified in Milot-Lapointe and Le Corff (2023) predict outcomes of a manualized individual career counseling intervention 12 months after the intervention. Participants were 248 individuals who received an average of 7.79 sessions at a career counseling clinic and were reassessed 12 months after the intervention. Results showed that clients who experienced an optimal (Classes 1 and 2; 66% of clients) or a positive change but suboptimal (Class 3; 21% of clients) change during career counseling had negligible career decision difficulties 12 months after the intervention and were satisfied with their career decision, career situation and with counseling. Clients in Class 4, who did not experience any change during counseling (13% of clients), had significantly higher decision difficulties, were less satisfied with their career decision, career situation, counseling, and had lower life satisfaction at the 12-month follow-up compared to clients in the other classes. Results demonstrate the long-term utility of individual career counseling in producing, on average, sustainable positive outcomes for a large proportion of clients (87%). They also offer insights into the longitudinal consequences associated to variability in career counseling as clients who did not experience any change during counseling achieved poorer outcomes on the long run.

This paper highlighted the diverse voices of 84 female-identifying professors in STEM fields who responded to a series of open-ended questions regarding work, family, and tenure experiences in the context of the current global pandemic. The current paper is part of a longitudinal study of the vocational experiences of tenure-track women in STEM that has examined the "leaky pipeline" in women's academic careers. Consensual Qualitative Research-Modified (CQR-M; ) was implemented to analyze the data. The findings suggested that participants perceived the precarious balance between work and family to have increased in difficulty in the face of COVID-19. Among untenured female faculty with children, an added layer of challenge was noted related to loss of childcare in the wake of the pandemic. The pre-existing, pervasive barriers (i.e., institutional, systemic, and psychological) were further exacerbated by familial barriers for female STEM faculty seeking tenure during COVID-19. Overall, the results indicated missed opportunities within higher education to implement supportive policies for untenured female faculty in STEM. Clinical implications, future research directions, and social advocacy interventions in the context of COVID-19 are discussed.

This study tested the Strengths-Based Inclusive Theory of Work (S-BIT of Work), a vocational theory that emphasizes positive psychological and cultural factors, among a sample of service industry workers during COVID-19. Service industry workers ( = 320) were recruited via social media sources across the United States, and structural equation modeling was used to examine the model. This model included privilege and COVID-19 impact as contextual variables; organizational support and workplace dignity as promotive workplace variables; hope, strengths use, adaptability, empowerment, and perceived COVID-19 threat as individual variables; and fulfilling work and psychological distress as outcome variables. Privilege and workplace dignity were identified as particularly important variables; results suggested privilege was positively associated with a promotive work context and negatively related to psychological distress. Additionally, the greater the amount of privilege and dignity the service industry workers experienced, the greater their positive individual characteristics were able to flourish.

Social Cognitive Career Theory (Lent et al., 1994) is a useful framework for understanding educational attainment and reducing educational inequities. A key construct for middle and high school students is college-going self-efficacy. The College-Going Self-Efficacy Scale (CGSES; Gibbons & Borders, 2010a) has been used to measure secondary students' confidence in their abilities to attend and persist in post-secondary education, but with 30-items, it may be too lengthy for use with other measures in SCCT-grounded research in school settings. Using two independent samples of rural Appalachian high school students, we develop and validate the College-Going Self-Efficacy Scale-Short Form (CGSES-SF). This 14-item measure retains the full breadth of content from the original CGSES, demonstrates measurement equivalence across gender and prospective college generation status, and demonstrates good reliability and validity in these samples. Suggestions for future use of the CGSES-SF are provided.

Social cognitive career theory indicates that perceived barriers negatively affect career and educational self-efficacy beliefs and may also impact interests, goals, and actions. However, measurement of barriers has produced mixed results, and few quantitative studies explore the perceived barriers of rural Appalachian students. In this series of studies, we explored the perceived educational and career barriers of rural Appalachian high school students. Our goal was to identify perceived barriers, but as initial results were analyzed, we then shifted to how best to measure barriers and how culture impacted the reporting of barriers by rural Appalachian students. The results of our mixed-method series of studies offer ideas on how cultural values and beliefs may skew reporting of contextual influences on career and education.

Workplace climate matters significantly for lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer, or other sexual minority (LGBQ) employees, given that the presence of workplace hostility or support can affect well-being. The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Climate Inventory (LGBTCI) is a measure of workplace climate for LGBQ individuals, intended to capture the full range of workplace climate from hostility to support. The purpose of this article is to provide evidence that the recommended scoring approach of the LGBTCI needs to be reconsidered. We used latent class analysis to estimate classes of work-related experiences in our sample of 442 LGBQ employees who completed the LGBTCI. A four-class solution fit the data best. Characteristics of each class were identified and consequently labeled: supportive work climate, tolerant work climate, ambiguous work climate, and hostile work climate. Findings suggest that a more accurate measure of workplace climate would include independent scales for support and hostility.

Integrating predictions from the theory of human values with the theory of planned behavior (TPB), our primary goal is to investigate mechanisms through which individual values are related to entrepreneurial career intentions using a sample of 823 students from four European countries. We find that openness and self-enhancement values relate positively to entrepreneurial career intentions and that these relationships are partly mediated by attitudes toward entrepreneurship, self-efficacy, and, to a lesser extent, by social norms. Values and TPB constructs partially mediated cross-country differences in entrepreneurial intentions. Spanish students showed lower entrepreneurial intentions as compared to Dutch, German, and Polish students, which could be traced back to lower self-enhancement values (power and achievement), less positive attitudes toward entrepreneurship, and differences in social norms.

Competency in forms of scientific communication, both written and spoken, is essential for success in academic science. This study examined the psychometric properties of three new measures, based on social cognitive career theory, that are relevant to assessment of skill and perseverance in scientific communication. Pre- and postdoctoral trainees in biomedical science (N = 411) completed online questionnaires assessing self-efficacy in scientific communication, career outcome expectations, and interest in performing tasks in scientific writing, oral presentation, and impromptu scientific discourse. Structural equation modeling was used to evaluate factor structures and model relations. Confirmatory factor analysis supported a 22-item, 3-factor measure of self-efficacy, an 11-item, 2-factor measure of outcome expectations, and a 12-item, 3-factor measure of interest in scientific communication activities. Construct validity was further demonstrated by theory-consistent inter-factor relations and relations with typical communications performance behaviors (e.g., writing manuscripts, abstracts, presenting at national meetings).

The purpose of this study was to examine the relation of several individual and contextual difference factors to the perceived educational barriers of rural youth. Data were from a broader national investigation of students' postsecondary aspirations and preparation in rural high schools across the United States. The sample involved more than 7,000 rural youth in 73 high schools across 34 states. Results indicated that some individual (e.g., African American race/ethnicity) and contextual (e.g., parent education) difference factors were predictive while others were not. Extensions to, similarities, and variations with previous research are discussed. Implications, limitations, and suggestions for future research are also discussed.