Emotional and Personality-Related Career Decision-Making Difficulties

This study tests the temporal stability and the concurrent and predictive validity of the Emotional and Personality-related Career decision-making Difficulties (EPCD) model and questionnaire. Five hundred forty-three participants filled out the EPCD twice, 3 years apart. The Anxiety cluster was the most stable of the three, followed by the Self-Concept and Identity cluster, and then the Pessimistic Views cluster, which showed a significant decrease. Participants who reported having made a career decision by the second administration had lower EPCD scores at Time 1 than did those who remained undecided at Time 2. Whereas the decided group showed a decrease in the EPCD scores during the 3-year interval, the undecided group showed no significant decrease. Significant correlations were observed between the EPCD scores and low satisfaction with one’s chosen occupation. Gender differences were also found: among the decided group, women had higher EPCD scores than did men; overall, women had higher EPCD scores than did men only in the clusters of Anxiety and Self-Concept and Identity.