HEXACO and Career Identity in Kenya, Namibia, and South Africa

Career identity refers to a structure of meanings wherein individuals connect their motivation, interests, and values with career roles (Meijers, 1998). Developing a career identity is understood as one of the most difficult aspects of identity formation during the transition from adolescence to adulthood in Western industrialized nations (Branje et al., 2021; Erikson, 1959; Schwartz et al., 2013; Schwartz et al., 2012), amidst the fast-paced job market with shifting work structures, dynamic professional landscapes, and technological advancements. While these developments open up numerous avenues for exploration, they also demand high levels of personal agency (Côté & Levine, 2002). That is, young adults in Western, industrialized societies, need to decide for themselves which career choice is right for them, allocate necessary resources to pursue their desired career and actively adjust their goals and strategies when confronted with challenges, often with low external support and few structured guidelines (Arnett, 2006; Côté, 2000; Syhwartz, Donnellan, et al., 2012). Crocetti, Rubini, and Meess (2008) understand career identity develop ment as a dynamic process, which encompasses three dimensions, commitment, reconsideration, and in-depth exploration. Commitment refers to choosing a career path, investing into career choices and gaining self-confidence from this. Reconsideration describes the process of evaluating current career choices in relation to other possible alternatives, which can lead them to abandon their current commitment to pursue a more satisfactory career path (Crocetti et al., 2008; Meeus, 1996). In-depth exploration refers to actively reflecting and acquiring additional information on one’s current commitments. Ongoing confusion about one’s (career) identity has been related to low self-worth, anxiety, and depression, whereas a high sense of (career) identity has been related to happiness and life satisfaction (Crocetti et al., 2008, 2014; Schwartz et al., 2011). Considering the wide-reaching consequences of career identity for psychosocial functioning, it is crucial to comprehend which factors contribute to successful career identity development. The existing body of literature suggests personality traits as key predictors of (career) identity development (Grotevant, 1987; Kroger & Marcia, 2011; Luyckx et al., 2006), which has been discussed and tested within the Big Five framework of personality. More specifically, a mature personality structure, characterized by high conscientiousness, emotional stability, agreeableness, and some facets of extraversion is believed to facilitate the fulfillment of adult social roles required to be a productive member of society (Caspi et al., 2005; Roberts et al., 2006). Hence, these traits should facilitate career identity development (see also Marcia, 1976, who argues that having commitments is related to a “strong personality”). Corroborating this notion, high levels of conscientiousness, emotional stability, extraversion, and agreeableness have been consistently linked to high levels of (educational) identity commitment, low levels of (career) identity reconsideration and high levels of (career) exploration in depth (Crocetti et al., 2008; Klimstra et al., 2012; Luyckx et al., 2006, 2014, but see also Hatamo et al., who found a negative predictive effect of agreeableness on exploration-in depth). Moreover, high openness has been consistently linked with high levels of exploration in-depth (Crocetti et al., 2010; Luyckx et al., 2014; Morsunbul et al., 2014). This is not surprising given that highly open individuals tend to seek novel experiences and engage in introspection (DeYoung, 2015). The identity literature acknowledges that identity and cultural context are closely intertwined (Kroger & Marcia, 2011; Schwartz et al., 2013; Schwartz et al., 2012), hence, there might be cross-cultural differences with respect to the structure of career identity and its association with personality. However, so far, these have mainly been tested in Europe and North America. The few existing studies from East Asia suggest that the dimension of commitment might be more universal, while identity exploration might be specific to individualistic contexts with a high focus on individual agency (Berman et al., 2001; Ohnishi et al., 2001; Schwartz et al., 2012; Sugimura et al., 2015). In communal cultural contexts, where self-construal is more group-oriented, career identity might be developed through imitation and identification rather than through exploration (Bosma & Kunnen, 2001; Schwartz et al., 2012a). An alternative perspective has been proposed by Schwartz, Donellen, and colleagues (2013) who argue that identity exploration also occurs within communal contexts, but rather operates through collective or group-level agency than through individual agency. Another factor contributing to the structure of career identity is socioeconomic status: Exploring different professions and selecting the most fitting career path requires sufficient financial resources and opportunities (Schwartz et al. 2013). Moreover, in contexts where career options are limited, gaining a sense of purpose and developing self-confidence through one's career may be less salient. If the mechanisms and structures of career identity differ across cultural contexts, the relationship between career identity and personality traits might also vary. Nonetheless, consistent patterns have been observed across diverse cultural contexts, extending from Belgium (Luyckx et al., 2006, 2014) and the Netherlands (Crocetti et al., 2010) to Japan (Hatano et al., 2022) and Turkey (Morsunbul et al., 2014). In the present study, we extend this literature by testing to what extent the three-dimensional structure of career identity proposed by Croecetti et al. (2008) and its association with personality traits generalize to the three countries in Sub-Saharan Africa (Kenya, Namibia, and South Africa). Even though, this has never been studied empirically, however, related literature suggests that this might be the case. Specifically, previous studies found that personality is associated with other career-related variables (e.g., career choice, career indecision, and academic achievement) in Kenya, Namibia and South Africa (Jonck et al., 2019; 2019; Kemboi, 16; Mbwale, 2004; Ouma, 2014; but see also Karanja, 2009. Moreover, Irerei and colleagues (2013) report that attitudes, which some researchers regard as elements of personality (McAdams & Pals, 2006), predict occupational identity among Kenyan university students. Relatedly, a qualitative study by Geldenhuys & de Lange (2017) concludes that personality traits are important for career identities of first-year female students of color in South Africa. For the current project, we will use data from the Africa Long Life Study (ALLS), an ongoing longitudinal study on emerging adults in Kenya, Namibia, and South Africa. We chose to operationalize personality based on the HEXACO framework rather than the Big Five, as previous research indicates that the HEXACO are more suitable for cross-cultural research (Lee & Ashton, 2008; Saucier, 2009). In the ALLS, the HEXACO were assessed at wave 1 and 2 (+ 6 months), career identity will be assessed at wave 6 (+2,5 years).