High School Students Career Choice and Unified State Exam Subject's Choice: The Role of Parenting Style and Motivation | Sibirskiy Psikhologicheskiy Zhurnal – Siberian Journal of Psychology. 2025. № 97. DOI: 10.17223/17267080/97/7

High School Students Career Choice and Unified State Exam Subject's Choice: The Role of Parenting Style and Motivation

Recent surveys show that a third of Russians don’t work in their profession, which means both significant economic losses for the state, which spends money on training specialists who subsequently do not choose a job in their specialty, and serious personal problems for many young people who cannot find themselves and work in accordance with their vocation. The purpose of this study is to understand what psychological processes are behind a thoughtful, meaningful and independent choice of profession, what is the role of motivation and parenting style. The study involved 497 high school students (10th- 11th grade, M = 16.50; SD = 0.66). The questionnaires measuring different types of motivation for choosing a profession, satisfaction and quality of choice, the perceived parenting style (autonomy support and parental control in childhood, P-PASS), and incomplete sentences test were administered. Using structural equation modeling, it is shown that parental autonomy support (offering choice within certain limits, explaining the reasons behind the demands, rules, and limits, accepting, and recognizing the child’s feelings) is a predictor of autonomous motivation for choosing a profession, which in turn is associated with satisfaction and the quality of the choice made. On the contrary, parental control measured as threats of punishment, causing feelings of guilt, encouraging productive goals and achievements at any cost, is a predictor of introjected motivation, external motivation and amotivation, while external motivation and amotivation are also associated with reduced quality and satisfaction of career choice. A qualitative analysis of respondents' responses to incomplete sentences confirmed the role of autonomy support in choosing a profession, as well as the reasons for choosing a profession and the relevant subjects of the Unified State Exam. High school students experiencing low parental autonomy support are more likely to find it difficult to choose a profession and subjects for the USE, are less likely to rely on their own interests, hobbies, the importance of the profession for society, are less sure about the future. The practical implication of the study is primarily to substantiate the importance of parental autonomy support to ensure optimal motivation for older adolescents to choose a profession/career that is satisfying.

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Keywords

motivation for choosing a profession, self-determination theory, professional self-determination, parenting style, parental autonomy support and control, satisfaction with the career choice

Authors

Name	Organization	E-mail
Gordeeva Tamara O.	Lomonosov Moscow State University; Federal Scientific Center for Psychological and Interdisciplinary Research	tamgordeeva@gmail.com
Kononova Margarita G.	Lomonosov Moscow State University	margo.kononova.psy@yandex.ru
Sychev Oleg A.	Biysk Branch of the Altai State Pedagogical University; Federal Scientific Center of Psychological and Multidisciplinary Researches; Moscow Institute of Psychoanalysis	osn1@mail.ru

Всего: 3

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