Parental authority as a mediator between career decision-making self-efficacy, career decision ambiguity tolerance, and career choice of nursing students: A path analysis

Background: Students' decision to pursue a nursing career is influenced by internal (e.g., innate desire, personal experiences) and external variables (e.g., parental influence, social support). However, little is known about how parental authority mediates nursing students' career decision-making self-efficacy, decision-making ambiguity, and nursing as a career choice.

Purpose: This study examined the influence of parental authority on nursing students' decision to pursue nursing and its mediating effect on the association between career choice, career decision ambiguity, and career decision-making self-efficacy.

Methods: A cross-sectional study that used total enumeration sampling. Four self-report survey instruments were utilized to collect data from nursing students (n = 378) of a state-run university in Saudi Arabia. The data were analyzed using Pearson's correlation coefficient, covariance-based structural equation model, and path analysis.

Results: The emerging model showed acceptable model fit indices. The path analysis indicated that parental authority mediated the relationship between career decision-making self-efficacy and nursing career choice. Career decision-making self-efficacy positively and indirectly affected nursing career choice through the mediation of parental authority. Career decision ambiguity tolerance did not directly influence parental authority, but it had a positive, indirect effect through the mediation of career decision-making self-efficacy of nursing students.

Conclusion: The strong and direct correlation between career decision-making self-efficacy, career decision ambiguity tolerance, and nursing career choice demonstrated in our study indicates that parental authority strongly influences nursing students' career choices. Our study concludes that parental authority over their children is highly predictive of their career choices.