Development of professional identity in the educational space of higher education

Mastering a profession is the most important task in higher education. It consists of both the acquisition of professional knowledge, skills, and the formation of a special attitude to professional activity and its attributes. This attitude, called professional identity, allows you to successfully integrate professional activity into a person’s life. As a result of the analysis of modern research on professional identity, two main approaches to its consideration can be distinguished. The personal approach determines the relationship to the elements of professional activity. Within this approach, identity is interpreted as a set of cognitive, affective and motivational components. However, the most common model of professional identity development developed in this approach assesses the overall development of all three components. The social approach is based on the degree of coincidence of personal values and motives of a person with the values and motives of the professional community. This approach is rarely used in empirical studies of professional identity. Research on a student sample is practically absent. An analysis of modern empirical research has shown that the level of professional identity of senior students lags far behind the level of professionals, even with little work experience. The data obtained show that there is indeed a connection between the levels of identity development in the personal and social approaches. The nature of the relationship suggests that one of the factors slowing down the development of professional identity in a university is the lack of sufficient professional experience.

professional identity, students, mastering a profession, higher education, professional community