Does Traditional Stereotyping of Career as Male Affect College Women’s, but Not College Men’s, Career Decision Self-Efficacy and Ultimately Their Career Adaptability?

In South Korea, strong beliefs about traditional gender roles in accordance with Confucian and patriarchic atmosphere still strongly influence daily life and the career development process. Cultural and contextual factors impact the development of gender role socialization, which influences an individual’s career decision self-efficacy (CDSE) and adaptability to manage the challenging career decision-making process. In our study, we recruited 291 South Korean undergraduate students (138 women, 153 men) and investigated how an implicit gender-career stereotyping impacts career adaptability via CDSE and whether there is a gender difference on the direct and indirect effects of implicit gender-career stereotyping on career adaptability. The Implicit Association Test (IAT) was implemented to measure implicit gender-career stereotyping. By testing a moderated mediation model, we found a mediated effect of CDSE in the link between implicit gender-career stereotyping and career adaptability in the female students. Moreover, the direct relationship between implicit gender-career stereotyping and CDSE was significant only for female students. Given the findings, practitioners and educators who work with South Korean women need to explore the degree of clients’ traditional gender role stereotyping and provide tailored interventions to increase their level of career adaptability by minimizing the negative impacts of gender role stereotyping and by increasing CDSE.