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Initial Scale Development of the Contextual Support for Post-Secondary Planning Scales

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Title: Initial Scale Development of the Contextual Support for Post-Secondary Planning Scales
Language: English
Authors: Ali, Saba Rashe, Martens, Jessica Kelly, Button, Christopher
Source: Journal of Career Development. Apr 2011 38(2):128-146.
Availability: SAGE Publications. 2455 Teller Road, Thousand Oaks, CA 91320. Tel: 800-818-7243; Tel: 805-499-9774; Fax: 800-583-2665; e-mail: journals@sagepub.com; Web site: http://sagepub.com
Peer Reviewed: Y
Physical Description: PDF
Page Count: 19
Publication Date: 2011
Document Type: Journal Articles
Reports - Research
Education Level: High Schools
Descriptors: High School Students, Rural Schools, Career Planning, Context Effect, Psychometrics, Measures (Individuals), Test Construction, Family Influence, Peer Influence, Friendship, School Personnel, Community Influence
DOI: 10.1177/0894845310372375
ISSN: 0894-8453
Abstract: Vocational psychologists and career theorists have articulated the importance of social support in the development of career plans for high school youth. More recently, Lent, Brown, and Hackett carefully articulated the location of contextual supports in the Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT) framework. However, there is a paucity of research examining contextual supports in relation to career outcomes due to a lack of adequate measures. The current article describes the initial development of the Contextual Support for Post-Secondary Planning Scales. These six scales were designed to assess support for postsecondary career planning for high school students from six sources (i.e., mother, father, sibling, peers, school personnel, and community). A study was conducted to determine the underlying factor structure of measure (n = 316 high school students), and exploratory factor analyses revealed a one-factor solution of general support across the six scales. The implications for the use of these measures in research and practice are discussed. (Contains 4 tables.)
Abstractor: As Provided
Number of References: 19
Entry Date: 2011
Accession Number: EJ920956
Database: ERIC
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  Value: <anid>AN0059955399;[2yf6]01apr.11;2011Apr15.09:00;v2.2.460</anid> <title id="AN0059955399-1">Initial Scale Development of the Contextual Support for Post-Secondary Planning Scales </title> <p>128</p> <p>Initial Scale Development of the Contextual Support for Post-Secondary Planning Scales</p> <p>SAGE Publications, Inc. 201110.1177/0894845310372375</p> <p>© Curators of the University of Missouri 2011 2011 Curators of the University of Missouri</p> <p>Saba Rasheed Ali University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA, saba-ali@uiowa.edu</p> <p>Jessica Kelly Martens University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA</p> <p>ChristopherButton McConnell AFB, United States Air Force, Kansas City, KS, USA</p> <p>Nicholas C.Larma Federal Bureau of Prisons, Washington, DC, USA</p> <p>Abstract</p> <p>Vocational psychologists and career theorists have articulated the importance of social support in the development of career plans for high school youth. More recently, Lent, Brown, and Hackett carefully articulated the location of contextual supports in the Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT) framework. However, there is a paucity of research examining contextual supports in relation to career outcomes due to a lack of adequate measures. The current article describes the initial development of the Contextual Support for Post-Secondary Planning Scales. These six scales were designed to assess support for postsecondary career planning for high school students from six sources (i.e., mother, father, sibling, peers, school personnel, and community). A study was conducted to determine the underlying factor structure of measure (n = 316 high school students), and exploratory factor analyses revealed a one-factor solution of general support across the six scales. The implications for the use of these measures in research and practice are discussed.</p> <p>high school students social cognitive career theory test reliability/validity</p> <ulist> <item>129 Within the career development literature, one area that has gained more attention in recent years is the impact that environmental resources have on the facilitation of the career decision-making process (Robitschek & Woodson, 2006). Social support is an important environmental resource that has demonstrated influence on the career development and planning of high school students and has been given attention in many of the major vocational or career development theories. Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT; Lent, Brown, & Hackett, 1994, 2000) is a relatively recent theory that explains the career choice process by describing how cognitive (e.g., self-efficacy and outcome expectations), contextual (e.g., social support and career barriers), and person variables (e.g., ethnic background and disability status) interact to enhance or inhibit one’s career choice process. In an update, the authors of this theory further explicated how contextual variables, such as perceived support (also termed contextual support) from significant others, can influence cognitive mechan- isms that lead to the development of career interests and goals (Lent et al., 2000). Lent et al. (2000) suggest that social support for career plans can be among the most powerful of the contextual aspects that influence the career development process and can enhance an individual’s access to opportunities. They define social support as the aspects of an individual’s environment and the individual’s appraisal of the environment that facilitate career choice and development. Although the pres- ence of adequate social support has the potential to enhance career development, SCCT also posits that the lack of actual or perceived social support in an individual’s environment can be detrimental to deciding upon and pursuing a viable career. Thus, it is crucial for researchers and practitioners to better understand the construct of social support. This is especially true when working with those at the beginning of the career decision-making process because they are vulnerable to rejecting career paths based on lack of social support. Although there is a great deal of research that has been generated on the cognitive aspects of SCCT (i.e., self-efficacy and interests), there is relatively little research that examines the contextual aspects of the model, such as social support. Lent et al. (2000) suggested that more research may be generated, if there were more developmentally appropriate contextual measures that tap the construct of social support in relation to career planning and development. In addition to more research productivity in this area, Lent and colleagues argue that focusing on the social support construct within SCCT would assist in the implementation of career interventions that center on helping individuals (a) to marshal available contextual assets (e.g., identifying role models or funding sources in one’s existing support system), or (b) to alter their envir- onments in order to access currently unavailable resources (e.g., developing new peer support systems). (p. 42) 130 Despite the dearth of research studies that examine social support within the context of SCCT, numerous research studies have demonstrated that social support is important in the career decision-making process for high school students (e.g., Lapan, Hinkelman, Adams, & Turner, 1999; McWhirter, Hackett, & Bandalos, 1998). For the current study, the researchers looked to the career decision-making research and SCCT theory (Lent et al., 2000) to determine high school students’ sources of social support. A thorough review of the literature indicated that stu- dents rely on five primary sources of social support: mother, father, sibling, peer, and school personnel (Ali, McWhirter, & Chronister, 2005; Constantine, Wallace, & Kindaichi, 2005; Helwig, 2008; Metheny, McWhirter, & O’Neil, 2008; Paa & McWhirter, 2000; Schultheiss, 2002). In addition, community sup- port, an individual’s appraisal of the values and resources for career develop- ment afforded by his or her community, was identified by the authors as another form of support that had the potential to greatly influence high school students. Hence, social support is operationally defined as an individual’s appraisal of the persons and community aspects of his or her environment that facilitate career choice and promote career goal attainment. Because current lit- erature provides no measures of community support for postsecondary career planning, despite the fact that community has been discussed as part of many research studies (e.g. rural vs. suburban, faith groups, ethnic community, etc.), the current study sought to develop six scales measuring the five primary sources of social support and community support. The following sections will present an overview of social support through a SCCT lens and a rationale for the development of the six measures. Subsequently, the development and the initial psychometric analyses will be presented and discussed. SCCT and Social Support According to SCCT (Lent et al., 1994), children and adolescents develop specific skills, set their own performance standards, develop varying levels of confidence in specific types of career activities and tasks, and form expectations about the future outcomes of their performance through repeated activity, modeling, and feedback from important others. Lent and colleagues (2000) suggest that career supports can influence access to learning experiences (i.e., role models, vicarious learning oppor- tunities, and performance abilities), which in turn influence the development of self- efficacy beliefs and ultimately, an individual’s career choice and attainment. This can happen relatively early in the career development process and then continue to affect an individual’s career development trajectory. Lent et al. further postulate that career supports may mitigate the impact of career barriers or obstacles to career progress. That is, individuals may experience career barriers but feel more effica- cious to overcome them, given appropriate support from significant others and com- munity resources. 131 The Need for Context-Specific Support Measures in SCCT Within the career literature, adolescent social support for career planning has been assessed using measures designed for different purposes, which presents problems related to consistency in the research. The majority of studies have used broad social support measures that are not necessarily tied to specific career outcomes. For example, Kenny, Blustein, Chaves, Grossman, and Gallagher (2003) found that career barriers and supports affected high school students’ future career aspirations and commitment to school. However, the researchers used the Kinship Support Scale (Taylor, Casten, & Flinkinger, 1993) and the Social Provisions Scale (Cutrona & Russell, 1987) which are global measures of family and social support. Without a theoretically driven measure of the different types of support in the students’ lives, the researchers were unable to predict the extent to which each type of social support would influence career aspirations and commitment to education. Because research has shown that family members and peers differen- tially influence the development of career plans among high school students (Ali et al., 2005), research in this area would be more informative if the impact of the support provided by each support person were known. In addition, no investigations to date have tried to understand the impact of community support on the career development of adolescents. A measure of the influence of signif- icant others and an individual’s community would be useful in identifying indi- vidual students’ specific areas of need for support. Vocational psychologists and career counselors and researchers may be able to expand their understanding of the career development process for high school students, if they were able to use social support measures tied specifically to the career development process. Further, measures need to assess multiple aspects of support such as financial support, support for overcoming barriers, modeling, and goal setting. Furthermore, support measures should investigate the relationship between these aspects of support and career outcomes. Recent investigations have further articulated the role of support within the SCCT model, which has helped to clarify and define aspects of support that are not addressed in current measurement. For example, Lent et al. (2002) found that post- secondary students identified many types of support that were helpful in the imple- mentation of their career choices: encouragement, role modeling/mentoring, financial resources, goal setting, self-support (i.e., cognitive restructuring or efforts to keep a positive attitude, take a futuristic-oriented approach, and reframing), self/ career exploration activities, expected outcome (i.e., beliefs about job opportunities or rewards), and support for overcoming barriers. This study further elucidated the many ways in which support may facilitate career development and the need for a comprehensive evaluation of an individual’s contextual support. Given the impor- tance of support in career development and the SCCT model, the purpose of the cur- rent study was to develop six theoretically driven measures to assess the construct of support from significant others. 132 Method Development of Items The following sections describe the development of items and an initial exploratory factor analysis. In this study, multiple sources were used to generate a list of items for the measures. The initial list was generated in accordance with classic test theory, as recommended by Crocker and Algina (1986), by (a) reviewing the literature on contextual supports for postsecondary plans of rural high school students; (b) using local high school teachers, administrators, guidance counselors, students, and expert SCCT researchers; and (c) conducting a small focus group session and one trial administration of the items to a group of high school students. Sources of support were defined as follows: Mother and father were defined as the biological or adoptive parents or legal guardians who have served the role of mother and father. Sibling was the biological or adoptive brother or sister that had the most influence on the student. A student who had no siblings or had siblings whom the student deemed too young to be influential was asked to omit the items in the sibling scale. Friend was defined as someone close to the student’s age, who has had the most influence on the student. School personnel was one adult working at the student’s high school, who has had the most influence on the student. Commu- nity was defined as the environment in which the student lived. Examples of com- munity (town, city, group of towns combined to form the student’s high school, and religious community) were provided, and prior to answering items on the com- munity scale, students were asked to identify the types of occupations/positions in which people in their community work. An initial list of items was generated by the authors for the six scales (Mother, Father, Sibling, Peer, School Personnel, and Community). This was accomplished through an extensive review of the literature that covered journal articles, books, book chapters, and dissertations by scholars and researchers who have used contex- tual supports in their investigation of the career and educational plans of high school students. Additionally, the conceptual literature outlining SCCT was thoroughly reviewed to ensure the development of items that were consistent with SCCT. Seven dimensions were identified that defined the construct of support for career planning for the Mother, Father, Sibling, Peer, and School Personnel scales. An initial list of 80 items was generated (approximately 10–12 for each dimension) for the six scales. These dimensions included and were defined as (a) cognitive guidance, that is help- ing formulate one’s thinking and reasoning processes regarding one’s pursuit of their postsecondary plans (e.g., goal setting); (b) financial support, which was defined as providing one directly with the monetary means or the ability and insight to procure monetary support for one’s postsecondary plans; (c) role modeling, or providing one with a standard or representation of behaviors, thoughts, or emotions that can enhance one’s success in postsecondary pursuits; (d) verbal encouragement, or providing emotional and verbal support; (e) support for overcoming barriers, or assisting one in surmounting any perceived or actual obstacles to postsecondary</item> <item>133 plans; (f) involvement with school/home from significant others; and (g) information /resources about the world of work, defined as a provision of relevant knowledge, prospects, assets, and other means that enhance one’s postsecondary pursuits. For the Community scale, an initial list of 40 items from the following dimen- sions were identified (a) values and beliefs, which are the overriding principles, mor- als, ideals, attitudes, or generally accepted social doctrines regarding acceptable career paths; (b) opportunities and resources, or the types of career information and opportunities within one’s community; and (c) modeling, or the types of jobs that community members hold and how involved the community is in helping students make decisions. After generating the initial list of items, the authors evaluated the appropriateness of each item for its possible inclusion in each of the first five measures (mother, father, sibling, peer, and school personnel). For example, if an item read ‘‘talks to me about my future plans,’’ then the relevancy of this item was evaluated for its potential inclu- sion in the Mother, Father, Sibling, Peer, and School Personnel scales. If the item was deemed appropriate, it was added to the list of suitable items for a given scale. Items that were determined to be redundant, confusing, or did not fit with the measure were deleted. Twenty items from the first five scales were eliminated mostly because they were redundant. The Community scale items were generated in a separate process similar to the process used for the other scales. Approximately, 21 items were elim- inated from the Community scale because they were also deemed redundant. A total of 206 suitable items were included across the scales. After all of the items were compiled and assigned to the appropriate scale, they were sent for evaluation by seven SCCT theorists and researchers (heretofore referred to as experts). The experts were identified through their publications and research in the SCCT area, and all of the experts had at least three publications related to SCCT. The experts were sent a packet that included a letter explaining the project and its dimensions, as well as a list of the items. They were asked to rate each of the items on two scales, readability and applicability to a particular domain. The experts rated these dimensions on 6-point Likert-type scales, with 1 = least readable/ applicable and 6 = most readable/applicable. Readability referred to whether the item was written at a seventh/eighth grade reading level and whether it would make sense to a high school student. Applicability referred to whether the item was repre- sentative of the type of support that might influence a high school student’s postse- condary career planning. Additionally, the SCCT experts were asked to indicate whether an item was more related to another dimension than the authors indicated. For example, an expert may have considered a particular item as more applicable to the dimension of goal setting than to the dimension of role modeling. Experts were also asked to indicate whether they believed that an item was best clarified with an example and they were asked to suggest an example. All of the original items were retained, as all experts rated their applicability and readability above the criterion rating of four. Experts were also asked to provide feedback on any aspect of the items from their own area of 134 expertise. For example, three of the experts had been high school teachers and were able to provide information on the ways in which questions were phrased. Two of the experts had expertise in measurement and were able to provide feedback about items and response options. Four of the SCCT experts provided feedback on the wording of the items and suggested examples to clarify items. After the experts’ feedback was incorporated into the first version of the measures, four high school personnel (i.e., two teachers, one guidance counselor, and one high school administrator) and eight recent graduates from local high schools were asked to critique the items using the same method as the experts. Again, all items were retained, as the groups rated the applicability and readability of all of the items above a four. The six measures were then scrutinized by a small group of high school students (i.e., two males and one female) who critiqued the items in a similar manner to the SCCT experts in a small focus group session with their high school guidance coun- selor. The students indicated that two of the items pertaining to community support were not appropriate, and these items were removed from the scale. The remaining 16 items were deemed appropriate and included in the scale. After the high school students’ critique, the measures were formatted into a ques- tionnaire that consisted of a title page that defined the six sources of support (mother, father, sibling, peer, school personnel, community) and subsequent pages with each of the items paired with a Likert-type scale. Responses included six options includ- ing (a) strongly disagree = 1 point, (b) disagree = 2 points, (c) slightly disagree = 3 points, (d) slightly agree = 4 points, (e) agree = 5 points, and (f) strongly agree = 6 points. Additionally, for the School Personnel, Sibling, and Community scales stu- dents were given a categorical question asking them to choose the specific source of support for which they were responding, and students were instructed to keep the specific support person in mind as they completed the items on the scale. For the Sibling scale, students were asked to choose from four different sibling options (e.g., older brother, older sister, younger brother, or younger sister). They were also instructed to leave sibling scale items blank, if their brothers or sisters were too young to be influential or if they did not have brothers or sisters. Similar construction was used for the School Personnel scale and included the following school mentor choice options (a) teacher, (b) guidance counselor, (c) athletic coach, (d) organiza- tion sponsor or advisor, (e) administrative assistant, or (f) other. For the Community items, students were asked to identify the type of positions in which people in their community were employed. Students were asked to choose one or more of the following response options: (a) farming, (b) factory, (c) professional, (d) clerical, (e) trade, (f) domestic work, or (g) service positions. After formatting was complete, a senior faculty and measurement expert critiqued the items once more and his feed- back and suggestions were incorporated into the formatted measure. This version of the measure resulted in the following number of items for each of the six support scales: 47 items for the Mother scale, 47 items for the Father scale, 46 items for the Sibling scale, 52 items for the Peer scale, 43 items for the School Personnel scale, and 16 items for the Community scale. 135 The measures were then subjected to a small pilot study that served as a trial administration. Thirty-six high school students in a local high school were instructed to complete the questionnaire in the above format and provide feedback about the length and content of the measure. Suggestions were made regarding the instructions for completing the measures and changes were incorporated to clarify the instruc- tions. After the suggestions were integrated, a study was conducted to determine the underlying factor structure of measure. A description follows. Participants Participants were 316 (153 males, 159 females, and 4 who did not identify their gen- der) high school students (10th–12th graders) who attended two rural high schools in a midwestern state with student bodies of 350 and 330 students. The grade breakdown was as follows: 117 were in Grade 10, 112 were in Grade 11, 84 were in Grade 12, and 3 did not identify their grade level. The participants’ ages ranged from 14 to 18 years (M = 16.30, SD = .94). The ethnic breakdown for participants included Caucasian American (73.7%), Hispanic/Latino American (19.6%), Multiracial (2.5 %), Asian American (2.2%), African American (0.6%), and Native American (0.3%). Questionnaire The questionnaire used consisted of two parts. Part one included a demographic measure that asked for information related to sex, age, and grade level. Part two included the six preliminary scales comprising the Contextual Support for Post Sec- ondary Plans Scales (CSPSPS). Procedure The first author mailed parental packets 2 weeks prior to administration of the CSPSPS. The parental packets included an informed consent form, a letter explain- ing the project, and a postcard to be returned to the first author, if the parents did not wish for their high school student to participate in the project. A total of 15 parents returned postcards and these students were provided with an alternative activity dur- ing the survey administration. Classroom teachers were given detailed standardized instructions for administration of the CSPSPS. Classroom teachers administered the questionnaire to students for approximately 35–40 min during ‘‘advisory’’ periods (time generally reserved for advising and future planning). Results and Discussion Exploratory Factory Analyses A series of six exploratory factor analyses (one for each scale), using the principal axis method using an oblique rotation, were conducted with SPSS 17.0 software to 136 discover the underlying facture structure of each of the six support scales. Oblique rotation was chosen because SCCT would suggest that support domains (assumed factors) would be highly correlated. Table 1 displays the items and standardized factor loadings for the Mother, Father, Sibling, Peer and School Personnel scales. Table 2 displays the items and factor loadings for the Community scale. For all the scales, an eigenvalue greater than 1.00 and an examination of the scree plots were used to identify the factors for each of the six scales. Because the explora- tory factor analysis was executed to establish meaningful factors underlying each of the scales, two criteria were used to identify the preliminary structure of each of the six scales. We retained items with a factor loading of .45 or above (see Tables 1 and 2 for the specific items that were dropped) and retained factors that had at least three items loaded onto the factor. In the third set of analyses, a coefficient alpha for each of the six scales was computed and these are reported in Table 3. For each scale, an original factor solution was identified (see Table 3 for specific information for each scale). For all the scales, the first factor accounted for the majority of the variance and an examination of the scree plots, clearly indicated an obvious break between the first factor and the second and subsequent factors. The eigenvalue for the first factor for each of the scales were as follows: Mother (21.87), Father (25.00), Sibling (24.32), Peer (22.05) School Personnel (21.51), and Commu- nity (15.95). Thus, we determined that a one-factor solution was the most theoreti- cally and statistically meaningful fit for these data across all of the measures. In other words, each of the scales (Mother, Father, Sibling, Peer, School Personnel, and Community) assesses general support for the postsecondary career plans of high school students. Although all of the measures include items from each of the dimen- sions described previously (e.g., goal setting and cognitive guidance), the data from this study indicate that different forms of support are not necessarily perceived as distinguishable for high school students. However, the individual scales were corre- lated to varying degrees indicating that some types of support are more related than others (see Table 4 for correlations between all scales). The Mother and Father scales were highly correlated (r = .784) while the all other scale pairings had mod- erate or low correlation (.429 ≤ r ≤ .567). Additionally, reliability analyses were conducted for each scale. The Cronbach’s alphas and descriptive statistics for each scale are reported in Table 3. A brief description of the unique contribution of each scale follows. Father and Mother Scales The Father and Mother scales both assess support for a student’s career plans related to the six domains of identified support described previously. Parental support is assessed using separate Mother and Father scales because previous research sug- gested that mothers and fathers can have differential influence on their children’s career plans (Farmer, 1985; McWhirter et al., 1998; Paa & McWhirter, 2000). 137 l o o h c S d n a , r e e P , g n i l b i S , r e h t a F , r e h t o M ( s e l a c S s n a l P y r a d n o c e S - t s o P r o f t r o p p u S l a u t x e t n o C e h t f o 1 r o t c a F r o f s g n i d a o L d n a s m e t )I l e. n1c e n ol b s r ea T P 138 s s e l d e d a o l y e h t e s u a c e b d e p p o r d o s l a s m e t i d e t h g i l h g i h e h t e r e W . e l a c s m o r f d e p p o r d m e t I a . s e l a c S s n a l P y r a d n o c e S t s o P r o f t r o p p u S l a u t x e t n o C =I S P S P . S ~ 5 4C . . e t n o a h N t 139 Table 2. Items and Loading for Factor 1 of the Community Scale of the Contextual Support for Post-Secondary Plans Scales Note. CSPSPS = Contextual Support for Post Secondary Plans Scales. a Item dropped from scale. In addition, separate scales allow students who only have one parent involved in their lives to identify the support they receive from the involved parent only. Sibling and Peer Scales In the current sample, the breakdown for influential sibling was as follows: 11.4% younger brother, 8.9% younger sister, 24.1% older brother, 24.7% older sister, 5.7% indicated they did not have brother or sisters, 19.3% indicated that their sib- lings were too young to be influential, and 5.9% did not indicate any of the choices. Research indicates that young adults and adolescents perceive siblings as an important source of career information. For example, qualitative investigations of the influence of siblings on college students’ career development have found that siblings served as a source of career information, role modeling, relational security, and support for work and career-related decisions (Schultheiss, Kress, Manzi, & Glasscock, 2001; Schultheiss, Palma, Predragovich, & Glasscock, 2002). Addition- ally, Ali et al. (2005) found that sibling and peer support were predictive of voca- tional/educational self-efficacy for a group of ninth-grade students from groups with low socioeconomic status. The Sibling scale described in the current study has 140 Table 3. Psychometric Properties and Descriptive Statistics of CSPSPS Note. ~ ~ is reflective of scale with items eliminated. CSPSPS = Contextual Support for Post Secondary Plans Scales. Table 4. Correlations Between CSPSPS Scales</item> </ulist> <p>Note. CSPSPS = Contextual Support for Post Secondary Plans Scales. * Significant at the .01 level. the potential to further this line of inquiry because it covers a broader range of items related to career planning that tap specific aspects of support (e.g., role modeling and verbal encouragement). The psychometric properties of the Peer support scale are also summarized in Table 3. Similar to the Sibling scale, the Peer Support scale allows researchers and counselors to identify the importance and relative contribution of peer support in the development of career plans and outcomes for high school students. School Personnel Scale With this scale, the breakdown for influential school personnel was as follows: 43% teacher, 18% athletic coach, 12% guidance counselor, 2.2% administrator, 2.2% organization sponsor or advisor, 1.9% administrative assistant or secretary, 13.3% indicated someone other than these choices (e.g., cafeteria worker, janitor, and librarian), and 7.4% did not indicate any of the choices. Past research in this area has assessed the importance of teacher support on career plans (Farmer, 1985; McWhirter et al., 1998), but the measures used in these studies 141 did not allow students to identify the specific person that influenced them. It may be possible to increase the explanatory power of the construct of support from school personnel by broadening the range of persons in a student’s school environment that they can endorse as supportive of their career plans. As evidenced by the results of the current study, a large number of students indicated that teachers were influential, but for over half of the students in this study coaches, guidance counselors, and oth- ers were selected as more influential in the career development process. Community Scale The Community scale is the most distinctive of the six scales, as it is the first scale developed to assess the support that a student may experience from their community. In the current study, the students indicated the following community positions on the 15-item Community scale: 31.6% farming, 23.1% factory, 6% clerical, 5.7% ser- vice, 4.7% trade/construction, 3.5% domestic worker, 3.5% professional, and 21.9% did not indicate any of the choices. Subsequent items ask students to rate their responses on a Likert-type scale with options similar to those on the scales previously described. Sample items include ‘‘My community has many members in the job/career in which I am interested.’’ These items were designed to capture the nuances of communities in which students live to understand the types of support (e.g., services, jobs, and educational oppor- tunities) that are available to students as they decide upon different postsecondary career opportunities. Summary and General Discussion The purpose of this investigation was (a) to describe the development of items for six measures to assess the construct of support from a SCCT perspective from six sources (i.e., mother, father, sibling, peer, school personnel, and community) and (b) to provide evidence of the initial psychometric properties of the six scales. In general, the most interesting finding was that contextual support for postsecondary career plans seemed to be a unidimensional construct, regardless of the source (father, mother, sibling, peer, school personnel, and community), despite the fact that the measures were developed to capture different dimensions of support. These results implied a dominant construct of contextual support (from each of the six sources) among high school students. This broader concept was so dominant, with the majority of the variance accounted for by the first factor in all six scales (ranging from and 62% in the Father scale to 41.7% School Personnel scale in Study 2), that the idea of multidimensionality was not confirmed. These results support findings from researchers in the health and medical disciplines, who have found that social support seems to be a unidimensional construct (e.g., Brown, 1986). 142 Limitations Although adequate internal consistency and factorial validity evidence for the CSPSPS were reported in this investigation, there are several limitations of the CSPSPS that warrant mentioning. First, while the six scales of the CSPSPS appear to measure one generic aspect of contextual support for career plans from each source, they were originally designed to capture different dimensions of the con- struct of support (e.g., role modeling and encouragement). Based on previous liter- ature and the SCCT model, it was believed that these aspects of support were distinguishable and could actually have differential utility in predicting career out- comes. The varying degrees of correlation between scales also indicate that certain sources of support are more similar than others and that students may be able to dis- tinguish sources of support. More research exploring the factor structure with differ- ent samples is needed to ensure that these scales are accurately assessing contextual supports for career plans of various subgroups of high school students. Possible future studies could focus on confirmatory factor analytic procedures that would force items onto factors associated with the initial dimensions proposed. Moreover, on all scales, students were asked to nominate individuals or groups to serve as their representatives of each type of support and to keep that representative in mind while answering the items in the representative’s category. Because the stu- dents were told to think of the person or group that was ‘‘most influential’’ when pro- viding each type of support, the items across the first five scales may have actually been constructed to measure the more unitary concept of primary support. Future research should examine the effects of more broadly defined categories of social support. Additionally, research that assesses criterion-related validity is needed to deter- mine whether the individual scales of the CSPSPS actually predict postsecondary career plans of high school students. Finally, the samples used in these studies were all drawn from small, rural high schools in the Midwest with a high percentage of Caucasian American students. Endorsement of the items may vary based on school, community setting (i.e., urban vs. rural), ethnic background, and geographical region of the country (e.g., Midwest vs. Northeast), so additional research is needed to determine whether variability in perceptions of contextual support exists. Implications for Career Counseling Research and Practice Despite these limitations, the CSPSPS can be a useful tool for researchers who are interested in examining the relationships between contextual supports and career outcomes for high school students. Lent et al. (2000) argue that in the context of SCCT, contextual supports have received little attention in comparison to career bar- riers. The researchers further advocate the examination of the differential contribu- tions of career barriers and career supports to career goals and outcomes. Because the CSPSPS is steeped in SCCT and includes dimensions of support for career plans 143 not previously assessed, the scales may prove to be useful for researchers who are interested in understanding the relationships between both academic support and nonacademically related support (e.g., financial support, role modeling, and support for overcoming barriers) and career outcomes. Researchers may be able to use this measure to gather additional information on the influence of support on other con- structs within the SCCT model. For example, a model testing using the support mea- sures may clarify the role of contextual support in the development of self-efficacy beliefs. These measures may be used in research studies to further investigate the SCCT proposition that self-efficacy moderates the relationship between contextual support and career interests, which may provide information about the differential impact of the various sources of support on the development of self-efficacy beliefs. It could be that sibling or community support may play a larger role in the develop- ment of self-efficacy beliefs and outcome expectations than the other sources of sup- port. Additionally, researchers can use the measures individually, if they are interested in assessing support from only one or two of the sources (e.g., from only mother and/or father). In addition to future research studies, the scales of the CSPSPS can be used by high school personnel and career counselors who are involved in career education. Within career intervention programs, the CSPSPS can be used to help students iden- tify and clarify who they depend on to assist them in their career planning process. These scales can also provide information about who students look to for role mod- eling. The process of identifying important individuals can lead to meaningful con- versations concerning how to help students marshal support from significant others and how to initiate conversations about specific areas in which students do not feel supported (e.g., financial planning). By discussing students’ perceived lack of sup- port, psychologists, counselors, and high school personnel may be able to target those areas and design interventions that will meet students’ needs (e.g., financial planning workshops for parents and students). According to SCCT, understanding the conditions that enable students to pursue the types of careers in which they are interested is as crucial as understanding those factors that impede their career development (Lent et al., 2000). The CSPSPS pro- vides a valuable way to assess the construct of contextual support for the postsecond- ary plans and goals of high school students. These scales are theoretically driven and therefore may provide useful information about the differential importance of vari- ous support persons in the career decision-making process of high school students. These scales also have the potential to advance our understanding of how the con- struct of contextual support functions with other SCCT mechanisms to influence the career interests and goals of these students. Declaration of Conflicting Interests The author(s) declared no conflicts of interest with respect to the authorship and/or publication of this article.</p> <p>144 Funding The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research and/or authorship of this article: A grant from the Iowa Measurement Research Foundation at the University of Iowa. References</p> <p>Ali, S.R., McWhirter, E.H., & Chronister, K.M. (2005). Self-efficacy and vocational outcome expectations for lower SES adolescents: A pilot study. Journal of Career Assessment, 13, 40-58. Brown, M.A. ( 1986). Social support during pregnancy: A unidimensional or multidimensional construct? Nursing Research, 35, 4-9. Constantine, M.G., Wallace, B.C., & Kindaichi, M.M. (2005). Examining contextual factors in the career decision status of African American adolescents. Journal of Career Assessment, 13, 307-319. Crocker, L., & Algina, J. ( 1986). Introduction to classical and modern test theory. Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. Cutrona, C.E., & Russell, D.W. ( 1987). The provisions of social relationships and adaptation to stress. In W. H. Jones & D. Perlman (Eds.), Advances in personal relationships (Vol. 1, pp. 37-67). Greenwich, CT : JAI Press. Farmer, H.S. ( 1985). Model of career development and achievement motivation for women and men. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 3, 363-390. Helwig, A.A. ( 2008). From childhood to adulthood: A 15-year longitudinal career development study. The Career Development Quarterly, 57, 38-50. Kenny, M.E., Blustein, D.L., Chaves, A., Grossman, J.M., & Gallagher, L.A. (2003). The role of perceived barriers and relational support in the educational and vocational lives of urban high school students. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 50, 142-155. Lapan, R.T., Hinkelman, J.M., Adams, A., & Turner, S. ( 1999). Understanding rural adolescents’ interests, values, and efficacy expectations. Journal of Career Development, 26, 107-124. Lent, R.W., Brown, S.D., & Hackett, G. ( 1994). Toward a unifying social cognitive theory of career, and academic interest, choice and performance. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 45, 79-122. Lent, R.W., Brown, S.D., & Hackett, G. ( 2000). Contextual supports and barriers to career choice: A social cognitive analysis. Journal of Counseling Psychology , 47, 36-49. Lent, R.W., Brown, S.D., Talleyrand, R., McPartland, E.B., Davis, T., Chopra, S.B., ... Chia-May, C. ( 2002). Career choice barriers, supports, and coping strategies: College students’ experiences. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 60, 61-72. McWhirter, E.H., Hackett, G., & Bandalos, D. ( 1998). A causal model of the educational plans and career expectations of Mexican American girls. Journal of Counseling Psychology , 45, 166-181. 145 Metheny, J., McWhirter, E.H., & O’Neil, M.E. (2008). Measuring perceived teacher support and its influence on adolescent career development. Journal of Career Assessment, 16, 218-237. Paa, H.K., & McWhirter, E.H. (2000). Perceived influences on high students’ current career choices. The Career Development Quarterly, 49, 29-44. Robitschek, C., & Woodson, S.J. ( 2006). Vocational psychology: Using one of counseling psychology’s strengths to foster human strength. The Counseling Psychologist , 34, 260-275. Schultheiss, D.E.P., Kress, H.M., Manzi, A.J., & Glasscock, J.M.J. (2001). Relational influences in career development: A qualitative inquiry. The Counseling Psychologist, 29, 214-239. Schultheiss, D.E.P., Palma, T.V., Predragovich, K.S., & Glasscock, J.M.J. (2002). Relational influences on career paths: Siblings in context. Journal of Counseling Psychology , 48, 302-310. Taylor, R.D., Casten, R., & Flickinger, S.M. (1993). Influence of kinship social support on the parenting experiences and psychosocial adjustment of African American adolescents. Developmental Psychology, 29, 382-388. Bios Saba Rasheed Ali earned her doctoral degree from the University of Oregon in counseling psychology and currently is an associate professor in the counseling psychology department at the University of Iowa. Her research interests are related to career development of under- served rural adolescents and she is particularly interested in the design, implementation, and evaluation of career education programs implemented in K-12 education settings. Most recently, she was awarded a grant by the Carver Charitable Trust to design, implement, and evaluate a career education program for three rural high schools with sizable communities of Latino immigrants. She also teaches the career interventions course and multicultural coun- seling course within the counseling psychology program at the University of Iowa. In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her family, cooking, and running. Jessica Kelly Martens is a counseling psychology doctoral student at the University of Iowa. She is a teaching assistant for the educational psychology program, and her research interests include career intervention development, rural and community mental health, and health psychology. In her free time, she enjoys running, volleyball, and spending time with family and friends. Christopher Button holds a PhD in Counseling Psychology from the University of Iowa. He is currently serving in the United States Air Force as the Mental Health Flight Commander for the 22d Medical Group at McConnell AFB, Kansas. In addition to his leadership duties, he currently provides individual, group, and family clinical services to active duty military mem- bers, their families, and military retirees. His research and professional interests include edu- cational attainment and social mobility, career development, suicide, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and military-related transitions. When not at work, he enjoys spending time with his family, reading nonfiction books, completing projects around his home, running, and volunteering in his wife’s elementary classroom. 146 Nicholas C. Larma earned his doctoral from the University of Iowa and is currently working as a psychologist and is involved with helping to run the drug treatment program at the Yank- ton Federal Prison Camp. He provides counseling and group services for inmates serving time in this facility. In his spare time, he enjoys sport activities and spending time with his family.</p> <aug> <p>By Saba Rasheed Ali; Jessica Kelly Martens; Christopher Button and Nicholas C. Larma</p> </aug>
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  Data: Vocational psychologists and career theorists have articulated the importance of social support in the development of career plans for high school youth. More recently, Lent, Brown, and Hackett carefully articulated the location of contextual supports in the Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT) framework. However, there is a paucity of research examining contextual supports in relation to career outcomes due to a lack of adequate measures. The current article describes the initial development of the Contextual Support for Post-Secondary Planning Scales. These six scales were designed to assess support for postsecondary career planning for high school students from six sources (i.e., mother, father, sibling, peers, school personnel, and community). A study was conducted to determine the underlying factor structure of measure (n = 316 high school students), and exploratory factor analyses revealed a one-factor solution of general support across the six scales. The implications for the use of these measures in research and practice are discussed. (Contains 4 tables.)
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