Reflections on Week 3 In-class Assigned Task - Present and discuss one theory for your area of research (what do you expect and why?)

Having conducted a few pilot interviews for my research project and attended a series of consultations with Kerry, I have managed to step out of my comfort zone and tread in "unsafe" waters - all in the name of good research. Taking some risks, experiencing uncertainties, and pushing the boundaries have helped me greatly in the process of theorisation. As I was looking through the "theory" (" " because I wouldn't really considered it a theory on hindsight) which I proposed in the maiden draft of my proposal, I decided to revisit it to compare and contrast the progress I have made thus far.

Week 3

Theoretical Framework:

The overarching idea is that mastery experiences, vicarious experiences, verbal persuasion, and psychological state collectively shape an individual's self-efficacy beliefs, which subsequently lead the individual to perceive a range of career options that are suitable for him/her, the influence of which is affected by the indivdual's gender and cultural background. 

Hypothesised Theoretical Process:

Essentially, what I proposed was that an individual's gender and cultural background will influence his/her level of self-efficacy beliefs (high/low level) as well as the range of career options he/she deems suitable and within his/her capabilities (wide/narrow range).

Clearly, in the above example, I have yet to propose a theory which explains how self-efficacy beliefs effect perceived career options. I have merely described the antecedents and outcomes of self-efficacy beliefs, as well as the possible mediators/moderators of the relationship. Kerry remarked that such a theoretical framework is overly quantitative, and neglects the theoretical nuances which account for how self-efficacy beliefs form an individual's perceived career options.

Week 4

After gathering feedback from my peers and Kerry, I made some adjustments to the theoretical model which I have proposed in the previous week, with the primary aim of explaining how self-efficacy beliefs shape an individual's perceived career options.

Theoretical Framework:

Hypothesised Theoretical Process:

Based on the four tenets of self-efficacy beliefs, we know that self-efficacy is developed from external experiences and self-perception, which are influential in determining the outcomes of many events – and among the outcomes, perceived career options. I propose two pathways, based on the two pillars – self-perception and external experiences, that link self-efficacy beliefs to perceived career options:

(1) Self-expansion: The idea of self-perception is that individuals tend to incorporate certain successful attributes relevant to another individual’s behaviour into their own self-concepts, leading participants to then modify their own behaviours. One way through which students may actually expand their range of career options is that they actually include another person’s attributes or choices, and include them as their own career choices.

(2) Boundary-setting: Another way that people form their career choices is based on external experiences which they have encountered or witnessed, and having been scarred by a previous bad experience, they scale back their career options, or set limits to what they believe they can achieve.

Both pathways will be investigated, taking into consideration the interplay of class, gender, and race/ethnicity, as shown here:

The interplay of gender, class, and race/ethnicity yields the following 18 interview cases:

Kerry explained that while I have managed to propose a theory linking self-efficacy beliefs to perceived career options, I have not identified the overarching issue - to which he referred to as the "social-psychological paradox". Both Ann and Kerry pointed out that self-perception is a psychological construct, while external experiences are social constructs. As I had not viewed the research issue from this perspective previously, I decided to read up more about the aforementioned paradox.


Week 8

Fast forward to this week, I now have a better understanding of what constitutes a theory, and what it means to propose a theory within the realm of qualitative research. I have always been more familiar with quantitative research, because my Honours thesis will be adopting quantitative research methods. What I found out later as I delved deeper into qualitative research is that both types are quite similar in their own ways. As with quantitative research, qualitative research relies heavily on theories (usually drawn from the social sciences and humanities) to guide their research process and illuminate their findings (Reeves, 2008).

Literature on self-efficacy suggests that the self-efficacy beliefs–perceived career options relationship is impacted more strongly by socio-economic status (SES) than by gender differences (contrary to many previous studies), and occasionally affected by race/ethnicity if the individual is from a country or background that discriminates against or grants privileges to a certain race/ethnicity (for example, the Malays are the privileged race in Malaysia). In particular, I propose that:

Self-efficacy beliefs: influence how people feel, think, motivate themselves, and
behave (Bandura, 1993)

Sources of self-efficacy:

• Mastery Experiences
• Vicarious Experiences
• Social Persuasion
• Physiological Factors

lead to

Career self-efficacy: the belief that an individual can accomplish his/her career goals

leads to

Perceived career options

based on a person's socio-economic background. Essentially, an individual's parents' educational background will set a minimum benchmark which the individual hopes to achieve, and his/her parents' income will help determine if the chances of him/her obtaining tertiary education will be higher or lower, which ultimately detemines whether the individual's range of career options is wide, narrow, specific, high-paying, mid-paying, and so on.

While Kerry remarked that I have attempted to explain how self-efficacy beliefs effect perceived career options, it was still not considered a theory mainly because what I have theorised is based purely on my assumptions, without reference to literature and theory backing the social-psychological paradox as well as the theoretical process. Hence, Kerry recommended Bordieu's work on classes and classifications, and suggested that I consider social capital as opposed to socio-economic status.

Bourdieu and Wacquant (1992) defined social capital as:

... the sum of the resources, actual or virtual, that accrue to an individual or a group by virtue of possessing a durable network of more or less institutionalised relationships of mutual acquaintance and recognition.

Based on the above definition, Bourdieu explained the realities of social inequality. He suggested that "it's not what you know, but who you know" that matters. He pointed out that the top jobs tend to go to well-connected and wealthy people, who could afford to attend elite schools. This is ascertained by numerous research on social mobility. Additionally, Bourdieu proposed that the volume of social capital possessed by an individual depends on the size of the network of connections he/she can effectively mobilise and the volume of capital (economic, cultural, or symbolic) possessed by each of those to whom he/she is connected to. There is an emphasis on access to connections, which are considered as resources. The unequal distribution of social capital is the principal source of class struggle/conflict. When applied to educational attainment, Bourdieu explained that the economic or social yield of educational qualifications depends on social capital, which can be inherited and used to support the attainment of educational goals.

Based on the three pilot interviews which I have carried out thus far, the idea that connections play an important role in shaping self-efficacy beliefs and subsequently influencing the individual's perceived career options does not seem like a robust explanation. Two of my interviewees mentioned that they were able to attend university because their parents could afford tuition fees, and their intention to pursue a range of or a few careers after graduation (they have not graduated) has nothing to do with their parents' wishes, although the fact that their parents spent quite a bit of money to send them to college would mean that they would prefer to pursue "decent" careers with mid- to high-salaries. The last interviewee attributed her narrow range of career options (she limited her career options to the insurance industry) to her love for mathematics and numbers, none of her immediate or extended family members were actuaries and both her parents were in Academia.

Despite the weak connection linking social capital to self-efficacy beliefs and perceived career options, a deeper exploration of the demographic differences has allowed me to gain a well-rounded and detailed understanding of the complexities linking both constructs. I am quite confident of formulating a good theory within the next two weeks.

References

Bandura, A. (1993), "Perceived self-efficacy in cognitive development and functioning",
Educational Psychologist, Vol. 28, No. 2: pp. 117—148.

Bourdieu, P., & Wacquant, L. J. D. (1992), An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL.

Reeves, S., Albert, M., Kuper, A., & Hodges, B. D. (2008), "Qualitative research: Why use theories in qualitative research?", BMJ: British Medical Journal, Vol. 337, No. 7670: pp. 631—634.