Exploring the relationship between student-perceived faculty encouragement, self-efficacy, and intent to persist in engineering programs

Copious research on Social Cognitive Career Theory has found student self-efficacy substantially related to persistence in engineering programs. The present exploratory study investigated the associations among faculty encouragement (a specific type of verbal persuasion in college context) and students' self-efficacy, outcome expectations, and intent to persist in engineering majors using a sample of first-semester engineering students at a mid-sized public university. Analytical data were collected from 205 first-year engineering students in the fall semester at a mid-sized public four-year university in the United States. Results show that students' perception of faculty encouragement can statistically significantly contribute to students' self-efficacy and outcome expectations, supporting the hypothesis that student-perceived faculty encouragement was a source of self-efficacy and outcome expectations. Further, although students' perception of faculty encouragement can influence students' intent to persist, the effect was not directly transmitted; rather, it was found only through an indirect path via self-efficacy.