CAREER INDECISION AND CAREER DECISION-MAKING DIFFICULTIES OF STUDENTS AND UNEMPLOYED GRADUATES

Actual statistical data of the Slovak Ministry of Work, Social Affairs and Family show that approximately half of the graduates do not work in the field they have studied. The paper studies whether the character of emotional and personality aspects of career decision-making difficulties, as well as relations between career indecision and career decision-making difficulties of unemployed graduates and graduates of various types and levels of schools can help in clarifying the data mentioned. To measure emocional and personality-related aspects of career decision-making difficulties, The Emocional and Personality Career Difficulties Scale (EPCD; Saka, Gati, & Kelly, 2008) was used and to measure career indecision, various versions of the Career Decidedness Scale (CDS; Lounsbury et al., 1999) were used, on the sample of grammar and secondary schools students (n = 250), university studetns (n = 47) and unemployed graduates (n = 127). The results of comparative analyses showed that the size and the structure of emotional and personality-related aspects of career decision-making difficulties were not differentiated by the level of schools as the phase of the career decision-making process, however they were differentiated by the post-decision phase (unemployed graduateds) and, they also were differentiated by the level of undecidedness of the students. The main results are discussed in the context of the career decision-making process, measuring tools used in diagnosing career decision-making difficulties and implications for supporting career decision-making of students and unemployed graduates.