Attitudes Toward Career Counseling: The Role of Public and Self-Stigma

Although many students struggle with career-related issues in college, comparatively few engage the career services offered by their academic institutions for help with their difficulties. In addition, there is little research on the factors influencing students' decisions to engage in counseling for career-related issues, making it difficult to develop programs to enhance students' use of career counseling services. The present study examines the relationships between the stigma associated with help seeking and attitudes toward engaging in career counseling. Participants were 509 college students who completed measures of stigma and attitudes toward career counseling. Structural equation modeling results indicated that public and personal stigmas were linked to self-stigma, which in turn was linked to attitudes toward seeking career counseling. Sixty percent of the variance in self-stigma and 42% of the variance in attitudes was accounted for in the model.