Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale

Last Updated

December 12, 2022

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Purpose

The CDSE measures belief in ability to successfully complete tasks necessary to making career decisions.

Link to Instrument

https://www.mindgarden.com/79-career-decision-self-efficacy-scale#horizontalTab3

Acronym CDSE

Area of Assessment

Occupational Performance
Self-efficacy

Assessment Type

Performance Measure

Administration Mode

Paper & Pencil

Cost

Not Free

Actual Cost

$15.00

Cost Description

• Manual $50 (Includes details on reliability, validity and scoring; includes review only copy of CDSE form)
• Individual report $15 (Builds a report interpreting an individual’s CDSE original form scores)
• Group report original form $200 (interpretation and report on CDSE short form scores)
• License to reproduce $2.50 (Minimum purchase of 20 tests)

Non-Specific Patient Population

Indicates an individual's confidence in completing tasks related to career decision making competencies.
The original scale comprises 50 items. Responses are scored on a 10-point scale, ranging from Complete Confidence (9) to No Confidence (0). It consists of five subscales, each containing 10 items, that measure the five career choice competencies:
1) Self-Appraisal
2) Occupational Information
3) Goal Selection
4) Planning
5) Problem Solving
Item scores are summed. Higher scores indicate higher levels of career decision self-efficacy.
Maximum score is 450 (90 maximum for each subscale)
The short form of the scale was developed in 1996 with only 25 items. It is usually scored on a 5-point continuum (from No confidence at all (1) to Complete confidence (5)).

Number of Items

CDSE: 50
CDSE-SF: 25

15 minutes

Time given is for original form. The short form (CDSE-SF) requires about 10 minutes to administer.

Required Training

No Training

Adolescent

16 - 17

years

Adult

18 - 64

years

Instrument Reviewers

Uzma Khan, MS, CRC, Vocational Rehabilitation student, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Lindsay Clark, Assistant Professor, Dept. of Medicine, University of Wisconsin-Madison

ICF Domain

Participation

Measurement Domain

Activities of Daily Living
Emotion
Cognition

Professional Association Recommendation

None found -- last searched 3/19/2024.

Considerations

The factor structure of the instrument is still unclear based on studies. The original authors recommended using the scale to evaluate self-efficacy expectations with regard to the general domain of career decision-making tasks and behaviors
In 1996, a short version with the best 25 items of the original scale was developed with the same or superior levels of reliability and validity.
The revision by Gaudron, 2011 reduced the number of items to 18 from the original 50 and 25 (short form) items. The most recent recommendation is four factors with 18 items total in the following categories – goal selection, problem solving, information gathering, and goal pursuit management.
The scale has been translated into multiple languages and has been used across multiple countries. Languages available (in Short Form only) include:
- Chinese (Cantonese - Traditional)
- Chinese (Mandarin - Simplified)
- Greek
- Hungarian
- Indonesian
- Khmer (Cambodia)
- Polish
- Romanian
- Slovak
- Swedish
- Vietnamese
One consideration would be to recognize that cross cultural differences affect career development and decision making when trying to understand inconsistencies in factor loadings. Items’ nature and specificity may be inappropriate for some settings, so selective modifications in item content may increase the scale’s utility.
The instrument may also be administered via computer.

Standard Error of Measurement (SEM)

African American college students (calculated from Chaney et al., 2007; n = 220; mean age = 21.3 (4.4) years; 66% female, 34% male; short form of CDSE—CDSE-SF)

SEM for the Self-Appraisal subscale: 0.314
SEM for the Occupational Information subscale: 0.335
SEM for the Goal Selection subscale: 0.306
SEM for the Planning subscale: 0.317
SEM for the Problem Solving subscale: 0.366

Korean college students (calculated from Jung & Yoo, 2022; n = 400; 82.2% women, 17.8% men; adapted version of CDSE-SF)

SEM for entire group (n = 400) = 0.167

Turkish University students (calculated from Buyukgoze-Kavas, 2014; n = 695; 46.9% female, 52.9% male, 0.1% no indication; mean age = 21.39 (1.5) years; CDSE-SF)

SEM for entire group (n = 695) = 0.161

Minimal Detectable Change (MDC)

African American college students (Chaney et al., 2007; CDSE-SF)

MDC for the Self-Appraisal subscale: 0.87
MDC for the Occupational Information subscale: 0.93
MDC for the Goal Selection subscale: 0.85
MDC for the Planning subscale: 0.88
MDC for the Problem Solving subscale: 1.01

Korean nursing students (calculated from Jung & Yoo, 2022; CDSE-SF)

MDC for entire group (n = 400): 0.463

Turkish University students (calculated from Buyukgoze-Kavas, 2014; CDSE-SF)

MDC for entire group (n = 695) = 0.446

Normative Data

College students (Chaney et al., 2007; CDSE-SF)

Mean CDSE: 4.00 (0.68)

College students (Betz et al., 2005; n = 1832; CDSE-SF)

Mean CDSE-SF for Caucasian participants (n = 1399): 3.80 (0.65)
Mean CDSE-SF for African American participants (n = 188): 3.9 (0.69)
Mean CDSE-SF for Asian American participants (n = 71): 3.8 (0.55)
Mean CDSE-SF for Hispanic/ Latino/ Latina participants (n = 62): 3.9 (0.73)

Korean Nursing Students (Jung & Yoo, 2022; CDSE-SF)

Mean CDSE-SF for the first test (n = 400): 3.67 (0.59)
Mean CDSE-SF for the retest 2-week post (n = 40): 3.85 (0.56)
Mean CDSE-SF: 3.71 (0.52)

Turkish University students (Buyukgoze-Kavas, 2014)

Mean CDSE-SF score: 3.50 (0.59)

Test/Retest Reliability

Taiwanese College Students (Mau, 2000; n = 93)

Acceptable test-retest reliability (ICC = 0.83)

Korean Nursing Students (Jung & Yoo, 2022; n = 40; CDSE-SF)

Excellent test-retest reliability (ICC = 0.86)

Turkish University students (Buyukgoze-Kavas, 2014; CDSE-SF)

Excellent test-retest reliability (ICC = 0.91)

Internal Consistency

College Students

Adequate to Excellent internal consistency for the five subscales (Cronbach’s alpha= 0.78 – 0.85) (Chaney et al., 2007, CDSE-SF; Betz et al., 2005, CDSE-SF)
Excellent internal consistency for CDSE and CDSE-SF total score (Cronbach’s alpha= 0.87 - 0.97) (Taylor & Betz, 1983; Betz et al., 1996; Buyukgoze-Kavas, 2014; Creed et al., 2002; Gaudron 2011; Hampton, 2005; Jin et al., 2012; Miguel et al., 2013; Nam et al., 2010; Presti et al., 2013, as cited in Martoncik et al., 2021)
Excellent internal consistency for CDSE-SF total score (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.90 (Storme et al., 2019; n = 246)

Criterion Validity (Predictive/Concurrent)

Concurrent Validity:

College students

Excellent concurrent validity with CDSE for Nursing Students (r = 0.66) (Jung & Yoo, 2022; CDSE-SF)
Adequate correlation with Career Decision Scale (r = -0.40; (Taylor & Betz, 1983; n = 346)
Adequate correlation with vocational identity (median r = 0.36) and career decidedness (median r = 0.33) (Robbins, 1985; n = 92; mean age = 19.62 (2.22))

Construct Validity

Convergent Validity

Slovak Primary students: (Martoncik et al., 2021; n = 400; 48.75% female, 42.25% male; mean age = 13.86 (0.73); transitioning between primary and secondary education)

Adequate correlation between CDSE-SF 18 items and the General Self-Efficacy Scale (r = .492)

Bibliography

Betz, N. E. (1992). Counseling uses of career self-efficacy theory. Career Development Quarterly, 41, 22-26.

Betz, N.E., Hammond, M., & Multon, K . (2005). Reliability and validity of response continua for the Career Decision Self-efficacy Scale. Journal of Career Assessment, 13, 131-149.

Betz, N. E., Klein, K., & Taylor, K. (1996). Evaluation of a short form of the Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale. Journal of Career Assessment, 4, 47-57.

Betz, N. & Luzzo, D. (1996). Career assessment and the Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale. Journal of Career Assessment, 4, 313-328.

Buyukgoze-Kavas, A. (2014). A Psychometric Evaluation of the Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale–Short Form With Turkish University Students. Journal of Career Assessment, 22(2), 386–397. https://doi.org/10.1177/1069072713484561

Chaney D., Hammond M. S., Betz N. E., Multon K. D. (2007). The reliability and factor structure of the Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale-SF with African Americans. Journal of Career Assessment, 15, 194–205.

Creed, P. A., Patton, W., & Watson, M. B. (2002). Cross-cultural equivalence of the Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy Scale-Short Form: An Australian and South African comparison. Journal of Career Assessment, 10(3), 327–342. https://doi.org/10.1177/ 10672702010003004.

Gaudron JP. (2011). A psychometric evaluation of the career decision self-efficacy scale – short form among French university students. J Career Assess,19:420–430.

Hampton, N. Z. (2005). Testing for the structure of the Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale-Shnamort Form among Chinese college students. Journal of Career Assessment, 13(1), 98–113. https://doi.org/10. 1177/1069072704270298.

Jin, L., Ye, S., & Watkins, D. (2012). The dimensionality of the Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale–Short Form among Chinese graduate students. Journal of Career Assessment, 20(4), 520–529. https://doi. org/10.1177/1069072712450492.

Jung, Y. M., & Yoo, I. Y. (2022). Development and testing of the career decision-making self-efficacy scale for nursing students: a methodological study. BMC nursing, 21(1), 231. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12912-022-01017-7

Luzzo, D. A. (1993). Reliability and validity testing of the Career Decision-Making SelfEfficacy Scale. Measurement and Evaluation in Counseling and Development, 26, 137-142.

Martončik, M., Kačmárová, M., Hruščová, E., Žilková, I. M., & Kravcová, M. (2021). Factor structure and reliability of the Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale-Short Form in Slovak adolescent sample. Current Psychology, 40(3), 1429-1438.

Mau W. C. (2000). Cultural differences in career decision-making styles and self-efficacy. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 57, 365–378.

Miguel, J. P., Silva, J. T., & Prieto, G. (2013). Career Decision Self- Efficacy Scale — Short Form: A Rasch analysis of the Portuguese version. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 82, 116–123. https://doi. org/10.1016/j.jvb.2012.12.001.

Nam, S. K., Yang, E., Lee, S. M., Lee, S. H., & Seol, H. (2010). A psychometric evaluation of the Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale with Korean students: A Rasch model approach. Journal of Career Development, 38(2), 147–166. https://doi.org/10.1177/ 0894845310371374.

Presti, A. L., Pace, F., Mondo, M., Nota, L., Casarubia, P., Ferrari, L., & Betz, N. E. (2013). An examination of the structure of the Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale (Short Form) among Italian high school students. Journal of Career Assessment, 21(2), 337–347. https://doi.org/10.1177/1069072712471506.

Robbins, S. B. (1985). Validity estimates for the Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy Scale. Measurement and Evaluation in Counseling and Development, 18(2), 64–71. https://doi.org/10.1080/07481756.1985.12022792

Storme, M., Celik, P., & Myszkowski, N. (2019). Career decision ambiguity tolerance and career decision-making difficulties in a French sample: The mediating role of career decision self-efficacy. Journal of Career Assessment, 27(2), 273-288. https://doi.org/10.1177/1069072717748958

Taylor, K. M., & Betz, N. E. (1983). Applications of self-efficacy theory to the understanding and treatment of career indecision. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 22(1), 63-81. https://doi.org/10.1016/0001-8791(83)90006-4