Academic Persistence Outcome Expectations Scale (APOE)

1. Abstract

The Academic Persistence Outcome Expectations Scale (APOE) is a psychometrically validated, 15-item self-report assessment developed by Michael B. Kozlowski and Nadya A. Fouad (2023) to measure college students’ cognitive anticipations regarding the consequences of sustained postsecondary enrollment. Historically grounded in Albert Bandura‘s (1986, 1997) Social Cognitive Theory and Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT; Lent et al., 1994), the instrument addresses a pervasive measurement limitation in higher education research: the disproportionate reliance on positively valenced outcome expectations at the expense of adverse contingencies. The APOE bifurcates persistence outcome expectations into two distinct, psychometrically robust factors: Anticipated Punishments (Negative Outcome Expectations; 8 items) and Anticipated Rewards (Positive Outcome Expectations; 7 items). Each factor encompasses physical, social, and self-evaluative outcome expectation domains as originally theorized by Bandura.

Administered with a standardized stem (“If I decide to stay in college this year…”) utilizing a 5-point Likert response scale anchored from “Disagree” to “Agree,” the APOE was developed and validated across two independent samples of diverse undergraduate students in the United States. Psychometric evaluation via exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) substantiated a two-factor oblique structure (χ²/df ratios, RMSEA, CFI, and TLI meeting rigorous contemporary thresholds) after the elimination of one psychometrically poor-loading item from an initial 16-item pool. Reliability analyses demonstrated high internal consistency across validation samples, with McDonald’s omega (ω) values ranging from .77 to .81 for Anticipated Punishments and from .85 to .88 for Anticipated Rewards. Convergent and concurrent validity analyses revealed meaningful correlations with academic self-efficacy, persistence intentions, career goals, and generalized college outcome expectations. The APOE serves as an indispensable diagnostic and empirical tool for academic counselors, institutional retention specialists, and higher education researchers seeking a balanced, granular understanding of student persistence dynamics.

2. Keywords

Academic Persistence Outcome Expectations, Anticipated Punishments, Anticipated Rewards, Social Cognitive Career Theory, College Student Retention, Academic Self-Efficacy, Outcome Expectancy, Psychometric Validation, Higher Education Persistence, Student Mental Health

3. Authors

The Academic Persistence Outcome Expectations Scale was conceptualized, constructed, and psychometrically validated by:

• Michael B. Kozlowski, Ph.D. — Department of Psychiatry, Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU), 3270 SW Pavilion Loop, Portland, Oregon 97239-3098, United States. E-mail: [email protected] / [email protected].
• Nadya A. Fouad, Ph.D., ABPP — Department of Educational Psychology, School of Education, University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States.

4. Purpose

The primary purpose of the Academic Persistence Outcome Expectations Scale (APOE) is to provide a balanced, multidimensional operationalization of the cognitive outcome expectations that undergraduate students formulate regarding their ongoing enrollment in higher education. Within contemporary higher education, degree attainment remains a vital gateway to economic mobility, psychological well-being, and vocational self-actualization. Nevertheless, a substantial proportion of matriculating undergraduates fail to complete their baccalaureate degrees, often dropping out or stopping out due to an intricate matrix of academic, social, financial, and psychological stressors. For decades, vocational psychologists and higher education researchers have sought to clarify the cognitive mechanisms that guide academic persistence. However, existing assessment instruments have historically suffered from an asymmetrical focus, capturing almost exclusively the prospective benefits or rewards of staying in school while omitting the salient perceived costs, sacrifices, and punitive outcomes associated with persistence.

The APOE was explicitly engineered to remedy this empirical omission. Rooted in Bandura’s theoretical framework and Lent, Brown, and Hackett’s Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT), the APOE assesses not only what students hope to gain by persisting in their studies (Anticipated Rewards) but also what they anticipate suffering or sacrificing (Anticipated Punishments). In clinical, psychoeducational, and university counseling settings, students rarely deliberate over dropout decisions based solely on a lack of long-term career ambition; rather, their deliberations are heavily weighted down by proximal distress—such as acute financial insecurity, chronic emotional exhaustion, sleep deprivation, and relational alienation. By capturing both positive and negative outcome expectations, the APOE enables academic advisors, retention coordinators, and university mental health practitioners to conduct comprehensive risk assessments. Interventions can thereby be tailored to mitigate anticipated punishments (e.g., implementing emergency bursaries, time-management workshops, and mental health resources) rather than merely reiterating the distant, abstract benefits of graduation.

From an empirical perspective, the APOE equips researchers with an instrument capable of testing nuanced structural equation models of academic agency. Prior literature has often found inconsistent or weak paths between outcome expectations and persistence intentions when outcome expectations are measured strictly through positive lenses. By bifurcating the construct into opposing valences, the APOE allows investigators to evaluate whether anticipated punishments operate as independent cognitive barriers, suppressors, or moderators within the SCCT choice and performance models. Consequently, the instrument offers profound theoretical and practical utility across higher education research, vocational counseling, student affairs administration, and retention program design.

5. Psychological Construct

The psychological construct assessed by the APOE is Academic Persistence Outcome Expectations, defined as a student’s subjective beliefs concerning the probable consequences or contingencies that will occur if they remain enrolled in college over the course of an academic year. Outcome expectations are fundamentally differentiated from self-efficacy beliefs: whereas self-efficacy reflects an individual’s confidence in their behavioral capacity to execute specific actions (“Can I successfully pass my courses?”), outcome expectations represent the anticipated conditional outcomes produced by those actions (“If I stay in college and pass my courses, what physical, social, and emotional consequences will ensue?”). Kozlowski and Fouad (2023) established that academic persistence outcome expectations are structured along two overarching valenced dimensions, under which three theoretical classes of outcomes reside.

Dimension 1: Anticipated Punishments (Negative Outcome Expectations)

Anticipated Punishments encompass the subjective cognitive appraisal of negative, aversive, or costly outcomes projected to result directly from sustained collegiate persistence. Unlike general academic anxiety or perceived stress scales, this dimension explicitly links distress to the act of continuing enrollment (“If I decide to stay in college this year…”). Comprising 8 items, this factor taps into three classical classes of outcomes:

• Physical/Material Costs: Anticipated tangible resource depletion, specifically monetary strain and acute temporal deprivation. For example, students anticipate that remaining enrolled will prevent them from earning sufficient income (“I will not have enough money to pay my bills”) and consume their total waking bandwidth (“I will have no time to do anything else”).
• Social Costs: Anticipated deterioration of personal relationships and social support systems due to institutional and academic demands (“I will not be able to see my friends as often as I like”).
• Self-Evaluative / Affective Costs: Anticipated internal distress, chronic cognitive strain, and affective vulnerability caused by systemic academic pressure. Students anticipate subjective states of emotional impairment (“I will feel anxious,” “I will feel depressed,” “I will feel stressed”) and persistent cognitive overload (“I will feel as though I am consistently behind,” “I will not be able to manage all of my responsibilities”).

Dimension 2: Anticipated Rewards (Positive Outcome Expectations)

Anticipated Rewards capture the favorable, motivating, and reinforcing contingencies that students expect to realize through continuous academic persistence. Comprising 7 items, this subscale reflects future-oriented career utility, existential meaning, and positive emotional states:

• Instrumental / Career Advancement Outcomes: Anticipated alignment with vocational trajectories and professional attainment (“I will feel like I’m going in the right direction with my career,” “I will be closer to beginning my career,” “I will feel like my career is moving forward”).
• Existential and Self-Evaluative Rewards: Anticipated fulfillment of personal identity, life coherence, and internalized self-worth (“I will have hope for a better future,” “I will feel optimistic about my future,” “I will feel like I have purpose”).
• Affective / Emotional Rewards: Anticipated experiences of positive, activating subjective emotions associated with academic mastery and forward movement (“I will feel excited”).

Crucially, Kozlowski and Fouad’s psychometric architecture demonstrates that Anticipated Punishments and Anticipated Rewards are not simply polar opposites on a single continuum; rather, they operate as distinct, partially orthogonal cognitive dimensions. A student may concurrently hold strong anticipated rewards (e.g., intense vocational aspiration) alongside severe anticipated punishments (e.g., extreme impending poverty and clinical depression), creating cognitive ambivalence that heavily impacts persistence behaviors.

6. Theoretical Framework

The APOE is fundamentally anchored in Albert Bandura’s Social Cognitive Theory (1986, 1997) and its direct vocational adaptation, Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT; Lent, Brown, & Hackett, 1994, 2000). According to Bandura, human agency is exercised through a triadic reciprocal causation model involving environmental influences, cognitive/personal factors, and behavioral patterns. Within this model, human action is regulated by two central cognitive forethought mechanisms: perceived self-efficacy and outcome expectations.

Bandura (1986) categorized outcome expectations into three structural classes:

1. Physical outcomes: Material losses or gains, sensory experiences, physical pleasure or discomfort, and tangible resource expenditures.
2. Social outcomes: Social approval, interpersonal warmth, recognition, relational strain, or social disapproval and ostracism.
3. Self-evaluative outcomes: Self-directed affective reactions, including pride, self-worth, existential fulfillment, or alternatively, guilt, shame, and perceived failure.

Crucially, Bandura explicitly theorized that outcome expectations possess both positive (incentive/reward) and negative (disincentive/punishment) valences. Human beings proactively engage in behaviors that they anticipate will produce favorable physical, social, and self-evaluative rewards, while actively desisting from actions anticipated to yield aversive or punishing outcomes.

When Lent, Brown, and Hackett (1994) formulated SCCT to explain educational and career development, they embedded Bandura’s outcome expectations as a vital determinant of academic interests, goals, and persistence behaviors. However, as the SCCT literature expanded across three decades, a profound methodological artifact emerged: operationalizations of outcome expectations almost exclusively measured positive valence (e.g., “Graduating will help me get a good job”). Lent et al. acknowledged that positive outcome expectations frequently correlate moderately with self-efficacy but sometimes fail to account for unique variance in academic persistence decisions when investigated alongside environmental barriers.

Kozlowski and Fouad (2023) recognized that in complex life decisions such as remaining in college, the anticipation of punishment (e.g., compounding debt, emotional collapse, lost social time) can exert an equal or even superior regulatory pull compared to the anticipation of distal rewards. By operationalizing Bandura’s three classical classes across both positive and negative valences, the APOE fully synthesizes SCCT with Bandura’s foundational postulates. It provides an empirically tractable bridge connecting cognitive appraisals of academic persistence with real-world institutional retention dynamics.

7. Validity

The validity of the APOE was established through rigorous, multi-stage psychometric procedures across two independent undergraduate cohorts (Kozlowski & Fouad, 2023), confirming content, construct, convergent, and concurrent validity.

Content Validity

The initial item generation phase was driven by theoretical derivation from Bandura’s tripartite classification (physical, social, self-evaluative) and review of contemporary higher education retention literature. An initial pool of potential items was evaluated by two independent doctoral-level vocational psychologists with recognized expertise in SCCT. Both expert reviewers demonstrated 100% agreement that the items effectively represented collegiate outcome expectations. Minor divergence occurred regarding which specific class (physical vs. social vs. self-evaluative) certain items represented. Rather than discarding conceptually rich items, additional items were drafted to clarify nuanced distinctions across classes, ensuring high content coverage of both anticipated punishments and rewards.

Construct and Structural Validity

Construct validity was demonstrated through complementary Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA). Parallel analysis and scree plot examinations empirically demonstrated the presence of two distinct latent constructs: Anticipated Punishments and Anticipated Rewards. Model fit indices supported the structural independence of these two factors, showing that a two-factor oblique model yielded superior fit compared to single-factor or orthogonal alternatives. Furthermore, independent structural evaluations confirmed that each subscale maintains robust unilateral structural stability, allowing researchers to utilize either subscale independently or both concurrently.

Convergent and Concurrent Validity

Convergent and concurrent validity were examined in a second independent validation sample of undergraduate students through bivariate correlations with validated psychological and educational inventories:

• College Self-Efficacy: Anticipated Rewards demonstrated significant positive correlations with academic self-efficacy, corroborating SCCT’s theoretical postulate that individuals who feel efficacious about navigating academic demands expect favorable career and personal outcomes. Conversely, Anticipated Punishments correlated negatively with self-efficacy, indicating that students who doubt their academic capabilities anticipate greater emotional distress and logistical failure.
• Academic and Career Goals: Anticipated Rewards exhibited robust positive associations with career commitment and academic persistence intentions. Anticipated Punishments displayed significant inverse associations with persistence intentions, demonstrating that negative expectations act as potent cognitive inhibitors of long-term academic commitment.
• Concurrent Validation with General Outcome Expectations: The Anticipated Rewards subscale demonstrated strong, statistically significant concurrent validity with existing, conventional college outcome expectation scales, confirming that it accurately captures the positive outcome expectancy space while offering enhanced psychometric precision.

8. Reliability

The internal consistency reliability of the APOE was evaluated rigorously across two separate undergraduate samples using McDonald’s omega (ω), which is widely recognized as a psychometrically superior coefficient to Cronbach’s alpha, as it does not rely on the often violated assumption of tau-equivalence.

• Anticipated Punishments (Negative APOE Subscale): In the initial exploratory sample, the 8-item subscale yielded a McDonald’s omega of ω = .77. In the second, independent confirmatory validation sample, the internal consistency demonstrated further stability, achieving ω = .81. These values indicate solid, dependable internal reliability for measuring complex aversive cognitive expectations without excessive item redundancy.
• Anticipated Rewards (Positive APOE Subscale): The 7-item subscale demonstrated excellent reliability across both samples, producing McDonald’s omega coefficients of ω = .85 in Sample 1 and ω = .88 in Sample 2. These elevated coefficients confirm high internal homogeneity among items measuring career advancement, existential purpose, and positive affect.

The consistency of these coefficients across two distinct collegiate cohorts confirms that the APOE produces highly reliable scores suitable for both aggregate empirical research and psychoeducational screening. The modest standard error of measurement associated with these coefficients provides assurance that individual score profiles reflect genuine psychological expectations rather than random measurement error.

9. Factor Analysis

The structural architecture of the APOE was identified and confirmed through a two-phase analytical strategy employing both Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) across independent participant samples (Kozlowski & Fouad, 2023).

Exploratory Factor Analysis (Sample 1)

In Sample 1, an initial item pool representing physical, social, and self-evaluative persistence outcomes was subjected to EFA using maximum likelihood extraction with an oblique (promax) rotation, accommodating theoretical correlations between positive and negative valences. The determination of factor retention was guided by Horn’s parallel analysis, scree test examination, and eigenvalues exceeding 1.0. Parallel analysis definitively indicated a two-factor latent solution. Item trimming procedures were executed according to strict psychometric criteria: retaining items with primary factor pattern loadings ≥ .40 and removing items demonstrating substantial cross-loadings (loading > .30 on multiple factors) or weak communalities. This trimming procedure resulted in a clean 16-item structural solution clearly delineated into two primary dimensions: Factor 1 (Anticipated Punishments) and Factor 2 (Anticipated Rewards).

Confirmatory Factor Analysis (Sample 2)

To cross-validate the structural model, CFA was conducted on an independent validation cohort of undergraduate students (Sample 2). The hypothesized two-factor oblique model was tested using robust maximum likelihood estimation. During the initial CFA specification, one item exhibited an inadequate factor loading (< .40) and inflated residual error variance. Following theoretical and statistical evaluation, this item was removed, resulting in the final 15-item APOE measure (8 negative items, 7 positive items).

The resulting 15-item two-factor model exhibited favorable goodness-of-fit statistics across standard empirical indices:

• Comparative Fit Index (CFI): Demonstrated excellent fit (> .90, approaching .95).
• Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI): Confirmed strong structural alignment (> .90).
• Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA): Exhibited acceptable to close fit (≤ .06 to .08, with 90% confidence intervals within conventional parameters).
• Standardized Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR): Demonstrated small residual discrepancies (< .06).

All 15 standardized factor loadings in the final model were statistically significant (p < .001) and substantial in magnitude (ranging predominantly from .50 to .85). The correlation between the two latent factors was modest and negative, confirming that while Anticipated Punishments and Anticipated Rewards share common variance within the overarching outcome expectation umbrella, they operate as distinct psychometric dimensions rather than opposite ends of a single continuum.

10. Instrument / Measurement Tool

• Test Type: Original psychometric self-report rating scale.
• Target Population: Undergraduate college and university students (adults aged 18 years and older; young adults aged 18–29). Applicable across diverse gender identities (cisgender women, cisgender men, transgender, nonbinary, and genderqueer individuals).
• Item Count: 15 items total (8 items for Anticipated Punishments; 7 items for Anticipated Rewards).
• Item Stem: Every item is introduced by the standardized conditional stem: “If I decide to stay in college this year…”
• Response Format: 5-point Likert-type scale with the following anchors:
  • 1 = Disagree
  • 2 = Somewhat Disagree
  • 3 = Not Sure
  • 4 = Somewhat Agree
  • 5 = Agree
• Subscales:
  • Anticipated Punishments (Negative Outcome Expectations): Items 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8.
  • Anticipated Rewards (Positive Outcome Expectations): Items 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, and 15 (listed in author documentation as F2 items 1 through 7).
• Scoring Instructions:
  • Calculate separate mean or sum scores for each subscale. Do not compute a combined single composite score by reverse-scoring, as the two factors represent distinct multidimensional constructs.
  • Anticipated Punishments Score: Sum items 1 through 8 (range: 8 to 40) or average the 8 items (range: 1.0 to 5.0). Higher scores indicate greater anticipated stress, financial hardship, social disruption, and emotional distress.
  • Anticipated Rewards Score: Sum items 9 through 15 (range: 7 to 35) or average the 7 items (range: 1.0 to 5.0). Higher scores reflect stronger expectations of vocational advancement, hope, purpose, and positive affect.
• Administration Time: Approximately 3 to 5 minutes.

11. Permissions & Fee and Test Year

• Publication Year: 2023.
• Copyright & Permissions: The Academic Persistence Outcome Expectations Scale is copyrighted by Michael B. Kozlowski, Nadya A. Fouad, and SAGE Publications (2023). The authors have made the scale openly accessible for research, scholarly inquiry, and non-commercial educational/teaching purposes without fee, provided appropriate academic citation is given.
• Commercial Licensing: Any commercial use, software integration, or profit-generating assessment distribution requires formal permission and licensing from the copyright holders and the publisher.
• Author Correspondence: Requests regarding structural equation modeling specifications or psychometric inquiries may be addressed to Dr. Michael B. Kozlowski at [email protected] or [email protected].

12. References

• Bandura, A. (1986). Social foundations of thought and action: A social cognitive theory. Prentice-Hall.
• Bandura, A. (1997). Self-efficacy: The exercise of control. W. H. Freeman.
• Kozlowski, M. B., & Fouad, N. A. (2023). Development and validation of the Academic Persistence Outcome Expectations Scale. Journal of Career Assessment, 31(3), 555–570. https://doi.org/10.1177/10690727221126145
• Lent, R. W., Brown, S. D., & Hackett, G. (1994). Toward a unifying social cognitive theory of career and academic interest, choice, and performance. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 45(1), 79–122. https://doi.org/10.1006/jvbe.1994.1027
• Lent, R. W., Brown, S. D., & Hackett, G. (2000). Contextual supports and barriers to career choice: A social cognitive analysis. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 47(1), 36–49. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0167.47.1.36

13. Items of the Scale (Questionnaire)