Effects of a Career Exploration Intervention on Students’ Career Maturity and Self-Concept

Abstract

This study investigated the effects of a career exploration intervention (CEI) on career maturity and self-concept among Malaysian high school students, using a true experimental design (pretest–posttest with a control group). One hundred thirty-nine high school students in Malaysia were recruited and randomly assigned to receive either a CEI or no intervention. Multivariate analyses of covariance showed significant differences in career maturity and self-concept between the experimental and control groups. Career maturity and self-concept were enhanced immediately after the CEI, and the effects were retained after 4 weeks. Students’ evaluation and feedback on the intervention were also collected. Research and practice implications are discussed.

Keywords

career exploration intervention career maturity self-concept

Schools offer a transition to the work world so that the individual can contribute to peace and harmony in the family, society, and the country. Hence, students are expected to think about career choices and career planning. The career planning and decision-making of individuals should start when students are in school because school is a place to develop talent, ability, potential, interest, and personality. School, especially high school, is an important time for students to develop career awareness, make career plans, and start to decide on career matters.

Adolescence is viewed as a critical time in which students need to make important career decisions such as orientation to a career choice, career exploration and self-appraisal, and commitment to career choice (Germeijs & Verschueren, 2006; Super, Savickas, & Super, 1996). According to Skorikov (2007), career development and planning for adolescents include tasks such as forming stable career preferences, narrowing career choices, developing career goals, and engaging in career planning. Because adolescents are still at the stage of developing their career interests and awareness, their career choices constantly change and fluctuate (Helwig, 2003; Wahl & Blackhurst, 2000). However, if adolescents are provided with effective career guidance or career exploration interventions (CEIs) during this stage of development, they could obtain better self-awareness and focus on their career planning and decision-making (Trusty, Niles, & Carney, 2005) and become more readily able to work (Lau, Muhamad, Guan, & Abdullah, 2018).

In Asian countries, adolescents commonly make their career choices by taking into consideration their parents’ opinions and expectations (Benjamin, Ahmad, & Leng, 2004; Chong, 2010; Letchemenen, 2013). It was also found that Asian students benefit from guidance in career choices through career counseling services (Benjamin et al., 2004; Pope, Cheng, & Leong, 1998). However, Ramakrishnan and Yasin (2012) found that Malaysian adolescents lack proper career guidance and information, which signifies the importance of examining this particular population and designing interventions to best meet the needs of Malaysian adolescents to help them navigate career choices.

Career Development Among Malaysian Adolescents

Many research findings showed that secondary school (middle and high school) students in Malaysia have low or moderate career maturity and are not prepared to make career choices and planning (Chong, 2010; Kamarul, 2006; Teo, 2005). Moreover, many scholars (e.g., Chong, 2010; Clara, 2002; Letchemenen, 2013; Salim, 1998) suggested that the general level of career awareness among Malaysian students was still low. This may be due to the fact that most students have unrealistic career goals or no career goals at all (Jamaat & Noah, 2000). Some Malaysian students who pursue higher education continue to be ignorant about career options and how to choose them (Chong, 2010; Kamarul, 2006). Scholars believe that this phenomenon may be due to the economic and educational environment of Malaysia.

Under the Malaysian high school “Open System” introduced in 1999, students entering Form 4 (age 16; the term “Form” in Malaysia is similar to the term “Grade” used in other countries) need to select the academic stream from the following options: science, arts, literature, vocational, or technology. The academic stream selection would determine the field or the area of studies in future education (e.g., university majors). Their future educational choice, in turn, can impact future career opportunities and choices (Salim, 2004). According to Salim (2001), one of the main reasons that cause difficulty in career decision-making among Malaysian students is the lack of awareness and knowledge of themselves and insufficient information about different career options. The lack of self-awareness and knowledge brings us to examine career maturity and self-concept and how we incorporate these concepts into a career intervention designed for Malaysian adolescents.

Career Maturity and Self-Concept

Super (1953) introduced the concept of career maturity and emphasized how career development exists on a continuum across the life span. According to Crites (1978), career maturity is an important aspect in individuals’ career development. An individual with more career maturity is one who has both self-awareness and career awareness (Crites, 1978; Gottfredson, 1985). The concept of career maturity has been widely studied among adolescents internationally, showing that career maturity is positively related to individual factors such as self-concept among Pakistani high school students (Zahra & Malik, 2018) and internal locus of control among Indonesian high school students (Munawir, Yusef, Effendi, & Afdal, 2018). In a longitudinal study using latent growth modeling, Bae (2017) found that household income, academic achievement, and parental involvement were related to higher levels of career maturity among Korean youth; however, the effects of these variables on career maturity decreased over time. Researchers also examined from a systemic level or intervention level, finding that a short-term career exploration program not only improved career maturity but also enhanced school satisfaction among Korean adolescents (Ham & Lim, 2017). In addition, international studies have compared the varying levels of career maturity in different educational settings such as public versus private high schools in India (Sharma & Ahuja, 2017).

Career awareness refers to the awareness of various types of jobs available on the market (Gribbons & Lohnes, 1982). Although widely studied for four decades, controversy over the definition of career maturity and its measurement exists (Swanson & D’Achiardi, 2005). Yet, it has been agreed that career maturity is an important construct for different stages of the human life span (D’Achiardi, 2005).

Additionally, Super’s theoretical underpinnings (Bakshi, 2004; Hartung, 2013; Super, 1990) proposed that psychological factors, such as self-concept, and environmental factors are related to the process of career development outcomes. Self-concept is defined as one’s perception of the self (Super, 1953). Students with a more crystallized self-concept have more realistic career goals (Bardwell, 1984). To help students in their career development, there is a need to focus on career maturity and self-concept. It is assumed that career maturity and self-concept determine preparedness for making career decisions (Crites, 1978; Gottfredson, 1985). In other words, a career decision is an expression of one’s self-concept (Bakshi, 2004; Hartung, 2013).

While we incorporated the assessments of both career maturity and self-concept as part of the CEI evaluation in this study, we also took into consideration cultural factors and adapted the CEI to fit the needs specific to Malaysian students. For instance, Clara (2002) found that there was a significant difference in career awareness based on academic streams for Malaysian students, whereby students in the science stream have a higher career awareness compared to students in the arts stream. Furthermore, there was a significant difference in career awareness between male and female students in the arts stream where female students had a higher career awareness compared to male students. However, these research results showed that there was no significant difference between male and female students in the science stream. Chong (2010) found that there was no significant difference in career maturity and self-concept between male and female Malaysian students.

Career Intervention for Adolescents

One important method recommended in past research to help adolescents enhance their career knowledge and increase their level of career maturity and self-concept is by applying career interventions or career programs. An effective career intervention could enhance students’ self-awareness on their interests and aptitudes as well as their career planning and career decision-making skills (Loos, 2008; Osborn & Reardon, 2006). For example, the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (a career guidance program) was found to increase aspects of career exploration knowledge for American high school students (Baker, 2002).

Unfortunately, career interventions in high schools are a low priority (Isaacson & Brown, 1997; Mortimer, Zimmer-Gembeck, Holmes, & Shanahan, 2002), although these programs are generally found to be effective (Oliver & Spokone, 1998; Ryan, 1999). D’Achiardi (2005) and Loos (2008) called for research that utilizes experimental designs to examine the effects of a career intervention or career program. Rowland (2004) specifically called for experimental studies to observe the effectiveness of a specific career intervention or career program prior to choosing the career intervention for use within the school system.

Research has shown the effectiveness of career interventions (e.g., Ballout, 2009; Hirschi & Lage, 2008; Roaten, 2004). These researchers concluded that career intervention enables adolescents to be more career prepared and helped them in career planning. However, there is insufficient research that evaluates career interventions in Asian countries such as Malaysia. In the past, research in Malaysia on career counseling used quantitative methods such as survey, correlation, and causal comparative. There were only a few experimental studies conducted in Malaysia (i.e., Devarajoo, 2002; Talib, Amla, Salleh, Ghavifekr, & Ariff, 2013). Talib, Amla, Salleh, Ghavifekr, and Ariff (2013) conducted a study to investigate the effects of a career education module on career development among Malaysian community college students. Meanwhile, Deevarajoo (2002) studied the effects of a motivational module on career maturity attributes among secondary school students in Selangor. Looking at the trends in previous research, there is a lack of experimental research regarding outcomes of specific career intervention that can enhance the career maturity and self-concept among Malaysian high school students.

Building on existing literature, the present study examined the effects of a CEI on career maturity and self-concept of high school students in Malaysia. This study employed a true experimental design to test the following two hypotheses:

When the CEI is implemented, students in the experimental group who receive the intervention will have higher levels of career maturity and more positive self-concept than students in the control group.

When the students in the experimental group obtain higher levels of career maturity and more positive self-concept after the CEI, the effect will remain at follow-up 4 weeks later.

Method

Participants

The school identified for our study was a public high school in the state of Selangor in Malaysia, selected randomly from a list of 260 schools provided by the Ministry of Education. The rationale for selecting a public high school in Selangor was that the findings could be generalized to a larger population of Malaysian schools, as Selangor is the state with the highest student population in Malaysia.

Form 4 students were chosen for this study. They were generally of about the same age—16 years old. These students were selected because they were adolescents and, according to Super (1990), they were in the exploration stage of career development when many individuals begin to make important career and educational decisions. Super (1990) also described this exploration stage as a tentative time in the career development process.

Students who are in Form 4 have completed 6 years of primary education in the New Curriculum for Primary Schools and 3 years of lower secondary education in the New Curriculum for Secondary Schools. Furthermore, Form 4 students are likely to start thinking about their career choices and career planning. In the Malaysian secondary school system, named the Open System introduced in 1999, students who enter Form 4 are given the opportunity to select the academic stream and study program of their choice from various options: science, literature, or vocational and technology. The academic stream chosen will determine the field or the area of studies in universities.

Initially all of the Form 4 students (N = 325) in the selected school were involved in the sampling selection. The school counselor obtained the roster of all Form 4 students. The students were divided into the male and female lists and were given an identification number. The total number of participants involved in this study was 160 (80 males and 80 females). The participants were then randomly assigned into two groups (experimental and control).

According to Keller, Warrack, and Bartel (1994), “a stratified random sample is obtained by separating the population into mutually exclusive sets or strata and then drawing simple random samples from each stratum” (p. 223). The random assignment of participants to the experimental or control groups was to equalize both groups on the basis of gender category (males and females). The random assignment helps to ensure the equivalence of groups and controls for the extraneous variables. Finally, the experimental group (n = 80) and the control group (n = 80) had more or less equal numbers of male and females. A blind draw (Schloss & Smith, 1999) was applied to choose experimental and control group. Slips were placed in a container; the slips were mixed so as to be distributed randomly thoroughly in the container. The researcher selected the group blindly, beginning with the experimental group, followed by the control group.

Initially, 160 participants were selected randomly for this study. However, the data of only 139 participants (86.88%) were used in subsequent analyses because 21 of the participants did not attend one or more of the program sessions or testing. The loss of the 10 males and 11 females due to absence during the experiment reduced the size of the experimental group from 80 to 69 participants and the size of the control group from 80 to 70.

CEI

The development and planning of the CEI in this research employed the Five-Stage Planning Model for Career Guidance and Counseling by Herr, Cramer, and Niles (1996). The five stages include (a) developing a program rationale and philosophy and specifying the mission, (b) stating program goals and behavioral objectives, (c) selecting alternative program processes, (d) developing an evaluation design, and (e) setting the milestones. For the purpose of developing the career intervention rationale and philosophy, a needs assessment was conducted to clarify the difference between the current status and the desired state of a particular process. The needs assessment involved interviews with 8 school counselors and 10 secondary school students. Before the CEI was implemented for the experimental study, the CEI was evaluated on 3 levels from 2 experts in career counseling and school counseling, 5 school counselors, and 31 students. Evaluation was conducted in the context of the assessed needs, program design, and implementation plans.

The goal of the CEI was to give students an opportunity to explore a variety of careers, using knowledge they gained about their interests and skills through assessments and structured activities. The intervention employed Super’s vocational development theory. Super (1990) defined the main task in the exploration stage during adolescence as crystallization, typically accomplished between the ages of 14 and 18 years. This is a critical time in the career development process in which cognitions regarding the formulation of general career goals are formed through awareness of resources, contingencies, interests, values, and planning for the expressed preferences. An activity using Holland’s typology theory was combined and used in the CEI. The combination of Super and Holland’s theories in the career program is regarded as practical and economical because these theories complement each other (Amla, 2000).

The CEI involved five stages. The first stage, self-knowledge, focused on activities designed to assist students in recognizing their personal interests, aptitudes, and work-related values. The second, career knowledge, focused on gathering career information as well as learning occupational titles. The third, educational knowledge, was designed to provide students with information on course requirements as well as various vocational programs available in Malaysia. The fourth, career goals, focused on activities designed to help students link career information with their self-information in formulating their general career goals. The fifth, career planning, focused on activities for helping students to plan the subjects and courses that they should take. The CEI covers three career development areas suggested by Zunker (2002): self-knowledge, educational and occupational exploration, and career planning. Furthermore, through the CEI, the students were not only learning how to find occupational and educational resources, they were also provided with direct educational and career information. A writing exercise for promoting career goal clarification was included in the CEI. Our CEI included some of the critical ingredients of effective career interventions according to Brown and Krane (2000).

The CEI was carried out in the school hall. Eight weekly sessions were used to complete the topics in the CEI for the experimental group (and the control group after the former had completed the intervention). Each session lasted about 90 min. The topics of the eight CEI sessions were as follows: What is career, my career interests, my job aptitude, my work values, occupational titles, educational information, my career goals, and career planning.

Measures

Career Maturity Inventory

The revised short form of Crites’ (1995) Career Maturity Inventory (CMI-R) was used to assess students’ career maturity. It is a 50-item measure of career maturity on attitudes and competencies that are critical in realistic career decision-making. Scale scores range from 0 to 50, with higher scores representing greater career maturity. Internal consistency coefficients for the CMI-R, across Grades 6–12, ranged from .72 to .90 (Crites & Savickas, 1995). The CMI-R, Malay language, was used in Malaysia by Dahlan (1996) and Teo (2005) in their research in Malaysia. Dahlan (1996) found career maturity to be related to locus of control in her studies with a Malaysian sample. Internal consistency reliability estimate for CMI-R, Malay-language version, for this study was .71.

Tennessee Self-Concept Scale (TSCS)

The second edition of the TSCS (TSCS:2) was used to measure self-concept. It is an 82-item instrument measuring six aspects of self-concept including physical, moral, personal, family, social, and academic/work. Scores range from 82 to 410, with higher scores representing more positive self-concept. The internal consistency coefficients for TSCS:2 (age level from 13 to 18 years) ranged from .73 to .93 (Fitts & Warren, 1996). The first edition of the TSCS (Fitts, 1965) in Malay language, was used by Chiam (1976) and Jamaain (1998) in their research. It was found suitable for use in Malaysia.

Because Malay language is the instructional language in Malaysian schools, the questionnaire was translated into Malay by using the back-translation technique (Brislin, 1970). A pilot study was conducted to establish the translated questionnaire’s reliability and validity for the Malaysian sample. A panel of four experts in counseling psychology validated the content of instrument items. The results of the content validation revealed that some translated terms and words were difficult to understand. Cronbach’s α for TSCS:2 for the current sample was .86.

Procedure

The school counselors of the selected school were invited to be experimenters of the study. They informed the randomly selected students about the first meeting. During this meeting, the principal investigator explained the objectives of the intervention, the students’ role, and duration of the intervention. Each student was given a file of information, which explained the CEI in detail. The informed consent letter was given to the students to get permission from their parents to participate in the study.

On the scheduled day of the first meeting, all 160 student participants in the experimental and control groups were asked to take the pretest of career maturity and self-concept. When the CEI began the following week, participants in the experimental group were given the CEI for 8 weeks. The week after the final session of CEI, all participants in both experimental and control groups took the posttest of career maturity and self-concept. Four weeks later, a follow-up assessment of career maturity and self-concept was conducted to determine retention of effects.

During the intervention for the experimental group, the control group followed their routine of scheduled curriculum activity under their respective teachers. After the follow-up assessment 4 weeks later, the control group was given the same CEI program so that they may also benefit from the intervention.

Ethical Issues

Ethical and moral behavior was enforced for this research study. Because the desired participants for this study were below 18 years old, informed consent was obtained from their parents or legal guardians (Leedy & Ormrod, 2012) prior to their participation. The informed consent included a brief overview of the purpose of the CEI and the activities throughout the research process. Confidentiality was also viewed as another ethical consideration for this study. Caution was exercised with data obtained from the participants, both in the storing and reporting of the collected data. Limits to confidentiality that participants were made aware of was the inability to control what participants might tell others about the discussions held within the study and the chance that one participant may see and tell others what another participant wrote or answered on the activities. This limitation was addressed by encouraging participants to respect the privacy of their peers and only discuss what was said in the classroom during the sessions and not outside the sessions.

Analysis

The sample size was 139. This sample size was based on a priori power analysis determining the minimum number of participants needed to achieve power to detect the d = .50 between-group effect sizes (Lane et al., 2005). It was estimated that a total sample size of 105 participants would provide adequate power (.80) to detect a difference between two groups (α = .05, two-tailed) on the outcome measures.

A multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was used to determine the comparability between the experimental and control groups in career maturity and self-concept prior to the CEI. A multivariate analysis of covariance was used to examine group differences on the outcome variables at posttest, while controlling for pretest scores on the same variables. Finally, a repeated measures MANOVA was used to compare the experimental group’s posttest and follow-up tests 4 weeks later, in order to evaluate retention of experimental effects over 4 weeks.

The multiple imputation method for substitution of missing data from the SPSS version 22 statistical package was used. Substitution of missing data was not used for the questionnaire data. Pooled results were reported where multiple imputation of missing data was utilized. Before data analysis, normality tests were conducted. All univariate and multivariate statistical assumptions were met (Howell, 2002).

Results

Among the 160 students randomly selected for the study, the final sample consisted of 139 participants (69 experimental, 70 control). There were no significant differences between the experimental and control groups on key demographic variables, and they were all from the same school and form.

Before testing the hypotheses, comparability between the experimental and control groups regarding career maturity and self-concept scores at pretest was examined. The multivariate Pillai’s Trace tests showed no significant multivariate effect for groups on the two dependent variables, F(2, 136) = 0.11, p > .05, with an effect size of .04. The experimental and control groups did not differ on pretest in career maturity (experimental, M = 29.28, SD = 3.29; control, M = 29.64, SD = 3.49) nor self-concept (experimental, M = 287.99, SD = 22.90; control, M = 287.34, SD = 22.51; see Table 1).

Table 1.

Descriptive Statistics for Pretest and Posttest of Experimental and Control Groups.

Measure	Statistics	Experimental Group (n = 69)			Control Group (n = 70)
Measure	Statistics	Pretest	Posttest	Follow-Up	Pretest	Posttest	Follow-Up
CMI-R	M	29.28	34.81	35.00	29.64	29.56	29.59
	SD	3.29	3.33	2.66	3.49	3.54	3.45
	Skewness	−0.35	−0.06	−0.01	0.02	0.01	−0.44
	Kurtosis	0.07	0.76	−0.12	0.66	−0.01	−0.19
TSCS:2	M	287.99	317.14	316.64	287.34	291.74	296.10
	SD	22.90	21.71	16.24	22.51	23.87	19.71
	Skewness	−0.52	−0.19	0.01	−0.16	0.20	−0.08
	Kurtosis	0.90	0.86	−0.28	−1.06	−0.06	−0.08

Note. CMI-R = Career Maturity Inventory–Revised; TSCS:2 = Tennessee Self-Concept Scale–Second Edition.

After the CEI, the multivariate Pillai’s Trace tests showed that there was significant multivariate effect for treatment, F(2, 134) = 73.70, p < .05, on the two dependent variables with an effect size of .52. There was significant difference on CMI-R and TSCS:2 posttest scores between the experimental and control groups when pretest CMI-R and TSCS:2 scores were treated as covariates. The results revealed significant differences between the experimental and control groups in the CMI-R posttest, F(1, 135) = 117.84, p < .05, and TSCS:2 posttest, F(1, 135) = 54.28, p < .05. CEI has an effect size on the CMI-R posttest (.47) and TSCS:2 posttest (.29) that can be considered moderate. The experimental and control groups differed at posttest in career maturity (experimental, M = 34.81, SD = 3.33; control, M = 29.56, SD = 3.54) and self-concept (experimental, M = 317.14, SD = 21.71; control, M = 291.74, SD = 23.87; see Table 1). Our hypothesis about experimental effects at posttest was supported.

For the second hypothesis, the multivariate Pillai’s Trace tests show that there was no significant multivariate effect, F(2, 67) = 0.57, p > .05. The results revealed no significant differences between the posttest and 4-week follow-up scores on career maturity and self-concept in the experimental group. This finding supports our second hypothesis about the retention of experimental effects over a 4-week period for the experimental group. The experimental and control groups varied at follow-up in career maturity (experimental, M = 35.00, SD = 2.66; control, M = 29.59, SD = 3.45) and self-concept (experimental, M = 316.64, SD = 16.24; control, M = 296.10, SD = 19.71; see Table 1). Our second hypothesis about experimental effects at follow-up was supported.

During the last session of the CEI, participants were given an evaluation questionnaire about the intervention. They were asked to respond to a number of statements addressing the different intervention components as well as to give their perspective regarding the overall utility of the intervention. Overall, the evaluation results appeared to be satisfactory. Most reported that they learned about careers (91%), their occupational interest (86%), job aptitude (81%), work values (81%), and where to find information about career (77%), and education (75%). Over two thirds of the participants (74%) reported that they would recommend this program to their friends. Most enjoyed participating in the program (74%) and felt more prepared to make career decision in the future after participating in the CEI (84%).

Discussion

Results of this study supported the effects of the CEI on enhancing students’ career maturity and self-concept. The increase in career maturity might be a result of students having learned more about careers as well as how to obtain the necessary information when they were ready to look for it and explore their career options. Additionally, past research has shown that guiding adolescents about self-knowledge and career knowledge within a career guidance program can result in increased recognition of interest, occupations, educational opportunities, and decision-making approaches (Osborn & Reardon, 2006). Further analysis on the effect size on career maturity measure in this study revealed an effect size of .46. The effect sizes for career maturity measure seem to be more than the mean effect size of .34 based on the meta-analysis study conducted by Ryan (1999). This could be attributed to the career exploration activities which took into consideration both cognitive and attitude aspects involved in career maturity.

Studies by Loos (2008), Mohamad Hashim (2003), and Osborn and Reardon (2006) also used an experimental research design and focused on career interventions; however, they used different dependent variables such as career interest and career decision-making. In these studies, career interventions were successful in facilitating career development of participants in the intervention group. Previous studies have also found that career interventions, regardless of the length and format, tended to benefit most individuals (Jurgen, 2000). The meta-analytic reviews (Brown & Krane, 2000; Oliver & Spokane, 1998; Ryan, 1999; Whiston, Sexton, & Lasoff, 1998) on career interventions that focused on outcomes have found positive influence of training programs on career development. On the other hand, a meta-analytic study revealed that not one individual program showed significantly better results than another because career development is a complex phenomenon involving various factors. This indicates that career intervention could help in enhancing a student’s career development; however, it might be best if such programs are verified empirically, in the local school context, before implementation.

Our findings about enhancement of self-concept are consistent with previous studies (Kern, 1990; Portnoi, Guichard, & Lallemand, 2003). The findings of this study could be explained by suggesting that these increases in self-concept might be attributed to students having learned more about themselves and having gained self-knowledge such as recognizing their personal interests, aptitudes, and work-related values. Ryan (1999) revised the results of meta-analyses and concluded that by broadening the definition of career choices outcomes and controlling for the amount of all the career interventions, the mean effect size was .34. The effect size for self-concept measure for this study was .28, which is less than the mean effect size of .34. However, given this finding, it seems reasonable to say that self-concept is multidimensional and it includes many subparts, and even these subparts may have more than one dimension. Moreover, one’s self-concept is fairly stable and changes little over time (Shavelson, 1976). Our findings also indicated that the experimental effects were retained over the next 4 weeks after intervention. This finding supported that career guidance could produce sustained effects (Krass & Hughey, 1999). Results of this study support the need for program planning and for providing students with information on careers and education in order to enhance their career maturity and self-concept.

Limitations and Future Directions

There are several limitations in this study that may offer future directions for research. Future studies may assess in-depth processes of change underlying improvements in career maturity and self-concept in relation to changes in career development. The statistical methods used to assess changes in career development in the current study were appropriate given the power available to assess these changes; however, it is likely that these multivariate methods did not take adequately into account the complexity of the psychological processes driving change in the experimental group. A structural equation modeling method with additional variables for appropriate elucidation of this model could be helpful.

Experimenter effect could be a threat in this current study because the researcher conducted the CEI. This is because training school counselors to conduct the intervention would have taken too much time and was not the focus of the study. Even though the researcher’s behavior was observed and evaluated by two counselors (who used a checklist to ensure the researcher followed the designed procedures for administering the CEI), there was a possibility that the researcher may have failed to follow the designed protocol. Other factors such as the researcher’s personality could have influenced the results of this study. An important direction for future research is to have trained school counselors run the same program to ascertain whether the results can be replicated. Again, although school counselor training was not the focus of the study, it is always needed and, therefore, is recommended for further study because the success of any program depends on the quality of the training received by its administrators.

Another limit of this study is the small sample size, which limits the sample population to only 160 students initially and later to 139 after attrition. The limited size of the study sample might affect the generalizability of the findings. In addition, a small sample may have special localized characteristics not common in the population it is supposed to represent. The findings of this study were obtained from the data of students from an urban national high school. Thus, the results cannot be generalized to populations of private schools. Additionally, our sample was limited to only Form 4 students. The results of this study cannot be generalized to all ages and classes.

Although limitations were present in this study, attempts were made to account for the limitations such as describing the research design (including the sample utilized, the instruments used), using a control group, stratified random assignment of the participants, and the use of transfer tasks. These can be considered of high quality because they have met pertinent prerequisites for internal validity (Scott, Leritz, & Mumford, 2004). Besides, the effects of training evidenced substantial external validity with the CEI proving beneficial in the school setting (outside a content-based curriculum) for the students. Steps to account for the limitations undoubtedly added to the quality and outcome of the study, even though the limitations were still present.

Practical Implications and Conclusion

Findings of this empirical study, which focused on a CEI, have practical implications for career guidance and counseling practice. Students who were exposed to the CEI improved their career maturity and self-concept. This suggests the need for planning and implementing career programs or career interventions and/or other empirically tested methods (in isolation or infused into the curriculum). Such intervention programs can support and enhance the students’ career maturity and self-concept and help them in career development. In the school system, priority is given to high intelligence and the attainment of excellent grades. Perhaps the time has come to promote career planning and suitable career goals in a formal and systematic manner through empirically tested career guidance programs or career interventions. At the high school level, adolescence seems to be an appropriate time for career guidance as suggested by some researchers (Germeijs & Verschueren, 2006; Trusty et al., 2005), and this was supported in this study as well. This is because youths aged from 14 to 18 years are in a stage of exploration (Super, 1990) where they are still developing their career awareness and career interests. If the adolescents are provided with effective career guidance, they can become both knowledgeable and focused in their career development. Thus, it is important to provide a facilitative environment during adolescence to enhance career development.

This study puts research and theories into practice by providing community service in conducting the CEI in a high school. It was apparent, from time spent at the high school, that the students did not have a lot of structured time dedicated to their career exploration and career development. Providing a service that appeared to benefit students was a need that the school had acknowledged. In addition, this already formed relationship between the high school and the university, which opened the door for other training opportunities that could benefit the students. This is evidenced by the school’s request for the continued delivery of the CEI program. By providing this kind of service, it is easier to determine what other research needs to be developed to better serve the community. In summary, career maturity and self-concept of the students improved through the CEI. A key implication of this study is the importance of delivering the intervention early in the students’ career exploration stage.

Footnotes

Acknowledgment

This study was made possible by the assistance of one of the secondary schools in Malaysia. We sincerely thank them for their efforts with recruitment.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

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