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Career Capital and Well-Being: The Moderating Role of Career Adaptability and Identity of Normal Student

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Abstract

This study explores the differences in career capital’s effect on well-being and the moderating effect of career adaptability between Chinese normal and non-normal students. 312 Chinese college students were surveyed in order to explore the impact of career capital on well-being and the moderating effect of career adaptability in normal and non-normal students. Results showed that: (1) Among normal students, psychological capital had the greatest impact on subjective and psychological well-being, followed by social capital and human capital. Human capital was the second most important factor in psychological well-being, whereas social capital was the least. (2) Among non-normal students, psychological capital had the greatest impact on subjective and psychological well-being, followed by human capital and social capital. (3) Career adaptability can only negatively moderate the impact of psychological capital on non-normal students’ well-being. This study revealed that psychological capital was the primary factor affecting well-being. The influence of social capital on normal students’ subjective well-being and non-normal students’ well-being is stronger than that of human capital, but the influence on normal students’ psychological well-being is weaker than that of human capital. The motivation factor of career adaptability produces the moderating effect.

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Acknowledgements

Authors express gratitude to all friends who helped collect data for this study.

Funding

This work was supported by a Postgraduate Education Innovation Project of Shanxi Province (grant number: 2022Y448) and College Teaching Reform and Innovation Project of Shanxi Province (General Project) (grant number: J2021276).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Education Science, Shanxi Normal University, Xiaodian District, Taiyuan City, Shanxi Province, China

    Qian Xu, Chao Zhang & Suning Yu

  2. School of Teacher Education, Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology, Nanjing, China

    Yifan Cui

  3. School of Education Science, Huaiyin Normal University, Huai’an, China

    Xinyu Hu

Authors
  1. Qian Xu
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  2. Chao Zhang
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  3. Yifan Cui
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  4. Xinyu Hu
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  5. Suning Yu
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Contributions

Qian Xu: Conceptualization, Methodology, Writing-original draft. Chao Zhang: Conceptualization, Writing-review & editing. Yifan Cui: Software, Formal analysis, Investigation, Data curation. Xinyu Hu: Writing-original draft. Suning Yu: Writing-review & editing.

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Correspondence to Chao Zhang.

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Qian Xu and Chao Zhang contributed equally to this work.

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Xu, Q., Zhang, C., Cui, Y. et al. Career Capital and Well-Being: The Moderating Role of Career Adaptability and Identity of Normal Student. Soc Indic Res 169, 235–253 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-023-03157-y

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