| This study examined the effectiveness of the computer-assisted career guidance system, FOCUS-2, on first-year college students' social cognitive career development. Specifically, career decision self-efficacy (CDSE) and assessment of attributions for career decision-making (AACDM) was assessed using repeated measures ANOVAs with a sample of 420 first-year college students. Results demonstrated that FOCUS-2 increased participants' confidence in their ability to make career decisions and altered their assessment of attributions to a less optimistic style for career decision-making. Results also revealed that the amount of time spent using FOCUS-2 was not significantly related to CDSE and AACDM. Furthermore, no gender differences were found for CDSE; however, women had adopted a more optimistic attributional style for career decision-making than men after using FOCUS-2. African American participants also reported significantly greater CDSE and more optimistic AACDM in comparison to Asian American participants after using FOCUS-2. Lastly, participants with declared majors had significantly greater CDSE than those participants who were undecided about their academic major, and those who indicated that they had a declared major, but were uncertain in their choice of major. There were no significant differences found for academic major and AACDM in this study. Implications for counseling and career professionals are discussed. |
