The development of career planning scale for junior high school students based on cognitive information processing theory

Based on the career theory of Cognitive Information Processing (CIP), we selected scale items from literature reviews and expert guidance. The scale consisted of 28 items with 4 factors (interests, abilities, values, personality). To test the scale’s factor structure, we used confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), and the model was modified according to CFA results. The second-order confirmatory factor analysis was applied to the model of the scale to prove the rationality of the total score. The internal consistency were evaluated using Cronbach’s alpha coefficients. In addition, the composite reliability (CR) and average variance extraction (AVE) of the scale were also calculated to test the convergent validity. After related analyses, the scale was proved to have good psychometric properties, which can be used to measure junior high school students’ career planning level in information technology course from the aspects of interest, ability, values, and personality. The effect of the first-order confirmatory factor analysis model constructed in this study is not ideal. Therefore, on this basis, a second-order confirmatory factor analysis model is constructed in combination with existing literatures, and the rationality of the model is verified through data, which highlights the novelty of this study.