The current study was conducted in order to confirm how the unemployed and married women who desire to get a job but face a difficulty in making a career decision perceive about career barriers and what effects do these perceptions of career barriers ...
The current study was conducted in order to confirm how the unemployed and married women who desire to get a job but face a difficulty in making a career decision perceive about career barriers and what effects do these perceptions of career barriers and social support have on making their career decisions.
In order to achieve this objective, we chose the following as research questions.
First, how do individual traits (age, work experience, and etc.) influence the level of career decision of an unemployed married woman?
Second, how does the subfactor of career barriers influence the level of career decision of an unemployed married woman?
Third, how does social support subfactor influence the level of career decision of an unemployed married woman?
Fourth, does the perception of social support mediate the influential relationship between career barriers and career decision level?
This research collected questionnaires from 150 women who visited Women Resources Development Center in cities A and C and "New-Job Center" in cities K and G. Out of 150 participants, 17 had to be left out from the analyses because of their insincere responses. Thus, the following results were drawn from the analysis of 133 questionnaires.
First, the correlation between individual traits (age, period of work experience, period of retirement, income, educational background, etc) and level of career decision was not significant. On the other hand, the level of career decision was relatively lower when a person did not have a work experience than when a person had a prior work experience.
Second, in order to investigate the effect of career barriers subfactor on career decision level, we conducted a factor analysis and multiple regression analyses. As a result, we confirmed that career barriers subfactor significantly influences the level of career decision (F=20.030, p<.001).
Also, explanation value of influence of the overall factors on career decision was 48,8%, indicating that career barriers have a great amount of influence on career decision level.
Third, in order to investigate the influence of subfactor of social support on career decision level, we conducted multiple regression analyses. As a result, we confirmed that the overall social support significantly influences the level of career decision (F=2.720, p<.05). That is, when there was a social support, career decision level increased. However, when the effect of four subfactors of social support (emotional support, evaluative support, material support, informational support) was analyzed separately, only the evaluative support showed its effect (t=2.798, p<.01). That is, when there was an evaluative support, career decision level increased.
Fourth, in order to examine if the influential relationship between career barriers and career decision level has mediating effect in accordance with social support, we conducted mediating effect analysis. One was analysis of mediating effect of total career barriers toward social support. Another was mediating effect analysis of each subfactor of career barriers toward social support. However, both analysis did not indicate any mediating effect of social support in the relationship between career barriers and career decision level.
The results indicated that the variable that influenced career decision of married women was whether the person had a work experience or not. Also, career barriers and some subfactors of social support influenced career decision level. However, social support did not mediate the influential relationship between career barriers and career decision level. That is, even though career barriers and social support influence career decision level independently, social support did not mediate the relationship between career barriers and career decision level. These results suggest that in making a career decision, the effect of career barriers is powerful to the extent that even the presence of social support would not change the effects of career barriers.