Tourism and Hospitality College Students’ Career Anxiety: Scale Development and Validation

ABSTRACT

To understand problems related to career choices that may be encountered by tourism and hospitality graduates before they enter the labor market, we developed a career anxiety scale for tourism and hospitality graduates. In this study, 479 valid questionnaires were returned by 4th-year university students from departments of tourism and hospitality at 10 universities. In accordance with the results, we established 4 dimensions (personal ability, irrational beliefs about employment, employment environment, and professional education training) for the career anxiety scale, which comprised 25 questions. This scale makes a crucial contribution to tourism and hospitality education and academic research.

KEYWORDS:

• Career decision making
• career anxiety
• tourism and hospitality college student
• Taiwan