Sonia Benito-Hernández

Universidad Politécnica de Madrid

Madrid, Spain

E-mail: sonia.benito@upm.es

ORCID 0000-0001-7422-3897

Determining factors that influence job expectations of university students in the agri-food and biosystems area

Cristina López-Cózar-Navarro

Universidad Politécnica de Madrid

Madrid, Spain

E-mail: cristina.lopezcozar@upm.es

ORCID 0000-0002-2788-9896

Tiziana Priede-Bergamini

Universidad Europea de Madrid

Madrid, Spain

E-mail: tiziana.priede@universidadeuropea.es

ORCID 0000-0002-4622-3328

Abstract. This paper analyzes the factors that affect the creation of job expectations of university students who pursue different degrees within the area of agri-food and biosystems in Spain. The objective is to establish a theoretical model that would allow for contrast analysis in future works. A review of previous literature on the topic, as well as a field study with a survey of 246 students, have been conducted to this end. The survey defined the different sociological, economic and motivational characteristics that could affect students` job expectations. A contrast of non-parametric statistics and Pearson's Chi-Square correlation test was applied to the analysis. The obtained results show that there are 5 main factors that affect the creation of job expectations of young university students: (1) economic stability, (2) characteristics of the job, (3) personal and formative maturity, (4) family influences, and (5) job satisfaction within the workplace.

Received: April, 2023

1st Revision: December, 2023

Accepted: March, 2024

DOI: 10.14254/2071-789X.2024/17-1/8

JEL Classification: J10, I25

Keywords: job preferences, sociological factors, economic factors, motivation, university education, Kolmogorov test, Pearson´s Chi-Square test