Abstract - Journal of Finance and Marketing (2021) Volume 5, Issue 12
Factors of the Employment Behavioral Intention of Leisure and Hospitality
Management College Students in Taiwan
This study examined the factors of the employment behavioral intention of leisure and
hospitality management college students in Taiwan. The research framework was based on a
literature review and relevant research variables. This study added an additional construct
(perceived behavioral control) and a moderator (individual difference) into the theory of
reasoned action (TRA) model. The subjects were college students in Taiwan. Questionnaires
were administered and a total of 450 valid samples were collected. This study adopted twostep structural equation modeling (SEM), and both SAS and AMOS were adopted as the tools
for analyzing the data for reconfirmation. A conceptual model was then proposed, in which
the employment behavioral intention was influenced by positive internship experiences and
negative internship experiences. Moreover, the relationship between positive internship
experiences and employment behavioral intention was moderated by the internship system. A
moderating test revealed that the influence of internship experiences on employment
behavioral intention was stronger for leisure and hospitality management students working
shorter hours than for students working longer hours. Over the past decade, the total number
of colleges and universities in Taiwan has increased every year. According to the statistical
information from the Census and Statistics Department of the Ministry of Education, the
number of colleges and universities increased from 155 in the academic year of 2001 to 163
in the academic year of 2010. Moreover, the number of universities nearly doubled, from 57
to 112, and the number of universities (institutes) of science and technology increased from
67 to 77. In addition, the number of students in colleges and universities increased from
1,084,012 in the academic year of 2001 to 1,124,425 in the 9 academic year of 2010, which
was a growth of nearly 4% (National Statistics, Taiwan). The above statistics indicated that it
is a popular trend to pursue college or university education. However, according to the
national statistics of Taiwan, the unemployment rate of individuals with a college degree or
above from 2007 to 2011 was 4.51%, 4.78%, 5.98%, 5.62% and 5.18%, respectively, which
was higher than the average unemployment rate. Moreover, according to the statistical
information of the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics of the Executive
Yuan (National Statistics, Taiwan) the youth unemployment rate was higher than that in
neighboring Asian countries, such as Japan and South Korea. Therefore, the Ministry of
Education has begun promoting school internship programs as an important policy to enhance
the employability of college graduates. The National Youth Commission and individual
colleges have also devoted themselves to similar programs. For example, the Ministry of
Education has set industry-academy cooperation information to spe Author(s): Jin-Li Hu
Abstract
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