Planned Happenstance Skills and College Students with Disabilities

Abstract

College students who are transitioning from higher education to employment encounter a variety of life events (i.e., happenstances), both planned and unplanned. These happenstances can influence their career development in both positive and negative ways. It is important for college students to possess skills that equip them to recognize, create, and utilize their happenstances in their career development process (i.e., planned happenstance skills [PHS]). There are multiple studies examining the relationship between PHS and other career-related constructs (e.g., occupational engagement, career decision-making self-efficacy) and college students’ characteristics (e.g., year of study, gender). However, to date, there are no studies examining the PHS of college students with disabilities and its relationship with other career-related constructs. This dissertation presents a collection of studies investigating the assessment and measurement of PHS among college students with disabilities. Across the chapters, I present: (a) an introduction to PHS in the career development process of college students with disabilities (Chapter 1), (b) evidence for the validity and reliability of the instruments measuring PHS and occupational engagement among college students with disabilities (Chapter 2), (c) evaluation of differences in college students’ PHS based on disability status (Chapter 3), (d) relationship between PHS and occupational engagement among college students with disabilities (Chapter 4), and (e) a conclusion synthesizing the findings across the three studies and identifying implications for research and practice (Chapter 5).