Students’ work experience in relation to their career engagement and metacognitive awareness

Figures & data

Table 1. Means and standard deviations of career engagement and metacognitive awareness and their relations to employment status.

Employment status	M	SD	No work experience		Work experience		t	p
			M	SD	M	SD
Career engagement
Planning	3.28	.91	3.15	.90	3.34	.91	−1.65	. 100
Networking	2.48	1.10	2.24	1.02	2.57	1.12	−2.40	.017*
Metacognitive awareness
Knowledge about cognition	3.74	.58	3.69	.57	3.76	.59	-.976	.330
Regulation of cognition	3.15	.77	3.19	.66	3.13	.75	.637	.525

*p < .05.

Table 2. The amount of work in relation to career engagement and metacognitive awareness.

The amount of work	Group 1 Less 20 h		Group 2 20–34 h		Group 3 35 or more h		f	p
	M	SD	M	SD	M	SD
Career engagement
Planning	3.29	.89	3.34	1.03	3.52	.85	.970	.381
Networking	2.45	1.03	2.58	1.30	3.06	1.08	4.52	.012*
Metacognitive awareness
Knowledge about cognition	3.73	.55	3.59	.64	4.05	.62	7.09	.001*
Regulation of cognition	3.05	.74	3.08	.80	3.47	.70	4.83	.009*

*p < .05, Statistical differences: Networking: group 3 > group 1; Knowledge about cognition: group 3 > group 1 and group 2; Regulation of cognition: group 3 > group 1.

Table 3. The nature of work in relation to career engagement and metacognitive awareness.

The nature of work	Work related to the study field		Work not related to the study field		t	p
	M	SD	M	SD
Career engagement
Planning	3.55	.83	3.17	.99	−2.84	.002*
Networking	3.00	1.07	2.16	1.01	−5.60	.000**
Metacognitive awareness
Knowledge about cognition	3.82	.61	3.75	.59	-.749	.227
Regulation of cognition	3.12	.83	3.16	.74	.370	.356

*p < .05, ** p > .001.

Table 4. The relationship between the nature of work and experiences of the relevance of work.

Relevance of work	Work related to the study field (n = 90)		Work not related to the study field (n = 103)		t	p
	M	SD	M	SD
Level of work corresponds to education	4.04	1.13	1.74	1.24	−13.40	.000
Utilisation of studies at work	4.42	.86	2.10	1.29	−14.91	.000

Table 5. Pearson’s correlations between the relevance of work and career engagement and metacognitive awareness.

Relevance of work	Level of work corresponds to education	Utilisation of studies at work
Career engagement
Planning	.195**	.247**
Networking	.394**	.485**
Metacognitive awareness
Knowledge about cognition	.178**	.135*
Regulation of cognition	.124	.046

*p < .05, ** p > .001.

Table

Career engagement items	Factor 1	Factor 2	Communalities
To what extent have you in the past 6 months …
1. actively sought to design your professional future.	. 95		.84
2. developed plans and goals for your future career.	. 93		.82
3. sincerely thought about personal values, interests, abilities and weaknesses.	.50		.26
4. collected information about employers, professional development opportunities or the job market in your desired area.	.59		.53
5. established or maintained contacts with people who can help you professionally.		.65	.58
6. voluntarily participated in further education, training or other events to support.		.63	.50
7. assumed duties or positions that will help you progress professionally.		.90	.68

Table

Factors and items
Knowledge about cognition
2. I use my intellectual strengths to compensate for my weaknesses.
3. I know when each strategy I use will be most effective.
4. I am good at organising information.
7. I try to use strategies that have worked in the past.
8. I am aware of what strategies I use when I study.
9. I find myself using helpful learning strategies automatically.
Regulation of cognition
10. I think about what I really need to learn before I begin a task.
11. I set specific goals before I begin a task.
16. I summarise what I’ve learned after I finish.
17. I ask myself how well I accomplish my goals once I’m finished.
18. I ask myself if I learned as much as I could have once I finish a task.