This conceptual paper explores the psychological dimensions of agricultural work. Agriculture is a cornerstone of human civilisation and a critical domain for achieving global sustainability. Multiple sectors in agriculture's diverse value chain face challenges related to climate change, labour shortages, supply chains and transport, production and storage, and technological transformation. Psychology, particularly vocational psychology and career development, offers valuable theoretical and empirical insights and interventions for individuals’ career development and the industry's workforce development. The paper includes examples from a program of research and development pertaining to aspects of agriculture including on-farm labouring work, mechanical and machinery work, technology adoption, and career education. We propose an agenda for advancing psychological theory, research, and practice for better understanding and enhancing career development in and for agriculture.

Applied Psychology has been characterized as a paradigm of scientific psychology. The main features concern the type of science, the object of study, and the nature of professional practice. In this context, two research programs that tackle relevant issues for the development of a career paradigm aiming for sustainable careers are presented. The first study examines the reciprocal influence on enhancing well-being and performance at work, aiming for sustainability. The second study examines the role of digital and digitalized competences in the transforming nature of work, as well as the impact of reskilling and upskilling, which may have either positive or dysfunctional effects depending on the approach to implementing and managing digital technology, either deterministic or human-centric. The implications for the research on careers, especially from the recently developed paradigms, are considered.

The paper considers careers embedded in the complexity of the current scenario. It highlights how organizational critical events, at different and intertwined levels (macro, meso, micro), threaten and challenge good work and working healthiness in contemporary workplace contexts. This contribution underlines the dual connotation of opportunity and risk that the theme of (un)sustainability suggests for careers, soliciting clear connections with real organizational life. The prefix “un” in brackets alludes to this structural duplicity, to be crossed and regulated. We explore the evolution of a paradoxical scenario in the relationship between people and work and the theoretical framework of the sustainability of/at work. We underline the structural ambivalence of the meaning of work, pointing out the polarizing tension to construct meaningful balance inside livelihoods, work and lives. We claim for processual organizational lens to tackle with the (un) sustainability and sustainable development of socio-material workplace conditions for sustainable working and careers.

This study used a short-term longitudinal design to test the social-cognitive model of career self-management's (CSM) theorized pathway in which exploratory actions mediate the association between career exploration self-efficacy and decisional outcomes. The study clarifies the role of exploratory actions in the decision-making process by distinguishing between self-exploration and environmental exploration. College students ( N = 136; 77% female; mean age = 18.71 years [ SD = 1.19]; 47% with undeclared majors) completed an online survey assessing self-efficacy for self-appraisal and self-efficacy for obtaining occupational information. A month later, they reported the frequency of their engagement in self-exploratory and environment-exploratory actions over the past month and completed measures of two decisional outcomes reflecting readiness to make career decisions (vocational identity and need for additional occupational information). The CSM's mediational pathway was supported with respect to self-exploration but not environmental exploration. I discuss implications for the CSM model and for career-development interventions.

This study explores the career information-seeking behaviours of young people and career advisers. These are examined through the interrogation of a secondary data set held by Scotland's national skills agency, Skills Development Scotland. Descriptive and frequency analyses of engagement records from career conversations reveal three key characteristics of information seeking in career advisory settings: prompted information seeking; information seeking on young people's behalf and collaborative information seeking. The original contribution of this study lies in two novel research foci: (a) the identification of distinct patterns of career information-seeking behaviours and colloquial language which signifies that information seeking has taken place and (b) the consideration of young people and career advisers’ collaborative information seeking behaviours and their roles and functions within the career information-seeking process. These findings have implications for the improvement of career services and the development of career information, advice and guidance (CIAG) policies.

The present study examined the career goal management strategies of Italian young adults. Based on the dual-process framework of goal management, assimilation and accommodation, which are considered adaptive personal resources, were hypothesized to be associated with young adults’ career goal engagement and career goal disengagement. Perceived employability and career adaptability were also hypothesized to play a mediating role in these associations. A two-time study was carried out among Italian university students ( N = 294). The results confirmed that assimilation was positively associated with career goal engagement and perceived employability mediated this relationship. Additionally, assimilation was found to be negatively associated with career goal disengagement, whereas accommodation was positively associated with career goal disengagement. These findings have implications in career counseling and university programs related to young adults’ university-to-work transitions.

This study reviews the literature published on job crafting using bibliometric techniques. It utilizes the papers published on the topic from 1990 to 2023, retrieved from the Scopus database. The purpose of the paper is to draw the intellectual, conceptual and social structure of the field of research on job crafting. It uses the bibliometric method to review the literature on “job crafting.” The findings of the study reveal both the micro and macro aspect of the research published so far such as Europe is the epicenter of research on the topic, while experiments and questionnaires a popular choice in methods adopted. This review gives a unique view of the past and outlines a number of future directions for research on the topic and it will be of interest to existing scholars in the field as well as doctoral students who might be interested in the topic.

Rooted in the decent education as a precursor to decent work, this study investigated via network analysis the relationship between the work as meaning inventory for university students (WAMI-U) (positive meaning, meaning-making through study, greater good motivations) and the humor styles questionnaire (HSQ) (health-promoting styles: affiliative humor, self-enhancing humor; health-endangering styles: aggressive humor, self-defeating humor) in 371 Italian university students. Central nodes and bridge nodes between WAMI-U and HSQ were calculated. Positive meaning, meaning-making through study (WAMI-U), and self-enhancing humor (HSQ) had high centrality. Affiliative humor, self-enhancing humor (HSQ), and positive meaning (WAMI-U) had bridge function. The high centrality and bridge function of self-enhancing with all dimensions of WAMI-U, followed by the bridge function of affiliative humor in relation to meaning-making through study (WAMI-U) confirmed them as health-promoting styles. Negative associations between maladaptive humor styles and positive meaning (WAMI-U) confirmed their standard as health-endangering styles. Implications for research and prevention are discussed.

Transitioning from high school is known to be challenging for students. Utilising the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analysis for scoping review guidelines, this scoping review examined the extent of existing research on the association of career indecision with depression, negative thoughts, and the role of self-efficacy and sense of control among school leavers. The extensive database search indicated only nine studies met the specified inclusion criteria. Results showed that more decided high school students tended to have more positive affect and higher levels of well-being. Conversely, levels of depression were found to be higher in less decided adolescents, with a direct relationship as well as the possible causal relationship indicated. The results indicate that integrated counselling in vocational and mental health support services is needed in schools through the leaving years and tertiary institutions as students commence study. Further research is needed to better understand the interrelatedness and specific relationships between these variables.