• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.49-61
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• 2017

This study seeks to explore high school students' changing attitudes toward science-related career choices with focus on the scientific career cultural capital perspective. We developed a questionnaire and surveyed female high school students. We used the survey results to explore the scientific career cultural capital factors and characteristics of the students who have chosen a science-related career. We selected twelve participants through science-related career choice type and then conducted in-depth interviews with them. Through the in-depth interviews, we explored how the factors of scientific career cultural capital affect the students' career choices. The result shows that the students developed internal resources through norms of obligation and reciprocity within the structure (family, school, community) based on external resources. The internal resources affected their science-related career choice. In elementary school, the students' interests in science and science-related occupations are the most influential in their choice of career directions. In high school, however, the students also considered career cognition, aptitude cognition, and career-value factors in their career choices. The interests in science were formed mainly due to education activity and daily-life activity. Over time, education activity's effect increased. The interests in science-related occupations were formed mainly due to daily-life activity during elementary school. In high school, the interests in science-related occupations formed due to diverse internal and external resources. Students who maintained a science-related career attracted external resources. Furthermore, they reinforced internal resources through interacting with various external resources. This study has implications for science education concerning students' science-related career choices.