Abstract

Various meta-studies on organisational and occupational commitment coincide on employees' commitment to their organisation steadily declining since the 1970ies, while at the same time other forms of commitment like commitment to one's occupation became stronger. These findings may have to do with changing in work organisation as well as a changing role of the employees in this organisation. What has been neglected in this context is the role of vocational education, i.e. the development of vocational identity. We currently analyse the relation of different forms of commitment with the process of apprentices' development from novice to expert.

From the vocational pedagogy point of view, one should analyse various interrelations in this field. Regarding identification, we look at organisational and occupational commitment, their varying strength and their relation (degree of influence, mutual reinforcement or constrain etc.). Regarding identity, we analyse vocational identity and other attitudes towards work like work ethics. Furthermore, we analyse the relation between these two dimensions. Finally, our study identifies various factors that play a role for these processes - the way the profession was chosen, an apprentice's motivation to learn the chosen profession, the apprentice's relation to her instructor, the general climate in terms of mutual learning at the company, the profession's esteem, pay etc.

Methods

To test the for dimensions of commitment and vocational identity, we developed a psychometric scale that was tested and refined two times using a sample of 300 apprentices each.

Results

The workshop will present the findings of a study on 3000 apprentices. Then, there shall be room to discuss the findings in the light of other recent research on vocational identity as well as motivation in different apprenticeship systems.

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