The role of the mother-daughter relationship in Taiwanese college students’ career self-efficacy

In this study, we examined the effects of the mother-daughter relationship on the career self-efficacy of 394 female Taiwanese college students, including feelings of attachment and psychological separation. Through hierarchical regression analysis, the mother-daughter attachment relationship was found to separately and significantly facilitate predictions of career self-efficacy at the first level. The predictivity of the added psychological separation variable on career self-efficacy at the second level also reached significance after controlling for the mother-daughter attachment relationship. Additionally, the communication of the attachment relationship and the functional independence and conflictual independence of psychological separation were significant predictors. This suggests that people who a) communicate well with their mothers and who are able to manage personal matters without help from mothers, or b) have conflictual relationships with their mothers that lead to negative emotions, have better career self-efficacy.