Expectancy Theory Models of Job Preference and Job Choice Applied to Graduate Engineering Students at the Air Force Institute of Technology

This thesis examined the power of the valence model in predicting job preference and the power of the force model in predicting job choice as hypothesized by Vroom's expectancy theory. The research involved a decision making exercise to capture 64 Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT) students' job preference policy and their job choice policy. Four job factors and their outcomes captured the valence policy; five job factors (the same four plus the expectancy factor) captured the force policy. Each of the five factors had two possible outcomes, so a full factorial design of 2 to the 5th power or 32 jobs was used. The valence model was quite powerful in predicting students' job preference. The mean R to the 2nd power group R to the 2nd power was .59. The results of the force model analyses were contradictory to Vroom's conceptualization of expectancy. The AFIT student did not incorporate expectancy information into his/her force decision making. (Author)