Investigating the factors influencing professional identity on first-year university students: an exploratory study

Identifier:  TDX:2505

Handle: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11797/TDX2505

Authors:  Barbarà Molinero, Alba

Abstract:
Taking into account that Professional Identity acts as a mediator to the decision to choose a specific professional path, the present thesis aims to contribute to the knowledge about this phenomenon, in the Higher Education context, through the construction of an integrative conceptual framework of the factors that affect the process of Professional Identity construction of the first-year university students. Firstly, the different factors that influence Professional Identity has been identified, through an exhaustive literature review and a qualitative study with university students from Tourism and Geography, using Focus Groups. Secondly, a new instrument that let to measure these factors (External Motivation Conditionals, Personal Motivation Conditionals, Educational Experience Conditionals) has been constructed and validated. Thirdly, the influence that the identified factors exert on student’s Professional Identity strength has been analysed by using multiple hierarchical regression analyses. Finally, fourthly, with the gathered information, a final conceptual framework has been constructed. This integrate the multiple factors that influence first-year university student’s Professional Identity, as well as the influence exerted by each of these factors, considering, separately, the bachelor degree, the disciplines and the whole sample. From this research, multiple implications for the university, in areas such as recruitment and counsellor guidance, arise