Career Decision Ambiguity Tolerance and Career Decision-Making Difficulties in a French Sample: The Mediating Role of Career Decision Self-Efficacy

Abstract

In the current work, we investigated the relationship between career decision ambiguity tolerance (CDAT) and career decision-making difficulties among French-speaking university students. In a preliminary validation study (N = 246), we examined the psychometric properties of the CDAT Scale. Our results showed that the French CDAT Scale had satisfactory levels of scale score reliability, that its factor structure was consistent with the original three-factor structure, and that it had incremental predictive power over general ambiguity tolerance when predicting career decision self-efficacy and career adaptability. In a second study (N = 412), building on social cognitive career theory, we hypothesized that career decision self-efficacy mediates the relationship between CDAT and career decision-making difficulties. Results were consistent with our hypotheses. Theoretical and practical implications of the results are discussed.