Page 281 www.ijiras.com | Email: contact@ijiras.com International Journal of Innovative Research and Advanced Studies (IJIRAS) Volume 5 Issue 4, April 2018 ISSN: 2394-4404 Influence Of Career Self-Efficacy On Career Exploration Among Senior High School Students Mavis Brew Department of Psychology and Education, University of Education, Winneba, Ghana I. INTRODUCTION Self-efficacy is the belief in one’s capabilities to organize and execute the courses of action required to accomplish potential situations (Bandura, 1995). This can be explained as a person’s belief in his/her ability to succeed in a particular task, event, or situation. Bandura described these beliefs as determinants of how people think, behave, and feel. This implies that one performs and acts to situations according to how one feels and thinks about the event or situation at hand. Bandura (1977) identified two forms of self-efficacy which are high self-efficacy and low. He postulated that people with high self-efficacy have the belief that they can effectively handle life issues while those with low self- efficacy feel helpless to control issues and events they encounter in life. Thus, people have different self-efficacy levels that influence activities they choose to participate in and one of such activity is career exploration. Career exploration refers to all of the activities that individuals engage in to understand their strength, values, interest and gather information about existing careers (Esters, 2008). People engage in career exploratory activities to collect and analyse career related information to enhance their individual career management process. Participation in such activities promotes an understanding of oneself and the environment (Esters, 2008). The information gathered enables one to develop realistic career goals and plans for future careers. For career exploration to be effective, self-efficacy is an important variable that needs to be considered (Nauta, 2007). This is because, without self-efficacy, individuals may fail to strive for success in a chosen career. Though it is expected that students should have an idea of what they will want to do after their secondary education, most students in Senior High Schools are in a dilemma as to how they can have a purpose driven life (Super 1963). The researcher observed that Senior High Students who prepare themselves for tertiary education appear to have little or no knowledge on how to match their programmes of study to the many available tertiary programmes. Others who for one reason or the other will have to enter the world of work after their secondary education have no idea as to how to match their interests, values and abilities to meaningful jobs that will yield them greater satisfaction in life. It is therefore not surprising that many senior high school students in Ghana Abstract: The study sought to find out the influence of career self-efficacy on senior high school students’ career exploration practices. The study employed survey research design to collect data for the study from 273 senior high school students (145 males and 128 females) from three selected mixed schools. Two questionnaires were developed and used to collect data on respondents’ career exploration practices, career exploration level, and career self -efficacy level. Descriptive statistics were used to analyse the data. Respondents’ scores on the questionnaires we re organized into frequency counts and converted into percentages and presented as bar graphs and tables. The results showed that the main career exploration practice the students engaged in was field trip. It was recommended that school counsellors should consider other practices that involve little or no finances when designing career exploration programmes to assist students explore existing careers. Keywords: career choices, self-efficacy, carer exploration, senior high school, students