Investigating the propensity for the teaching profession in preliminary and initial stages of teacher education: Assessment of personality characteristics, communicative tolerance and reflexivity

Introduction. The research problem is determined by the fact that the current educational system is experiencing a colossal shortage of qualified professionals, despite the fact that pedagogical universities award a sufficient number of Education degrees annually. Thus, it is required to study the inclination towards the teaching profession and to identify its structural components in the preliminary and initial stages of teacher education as a way to solve the staffing problems in the field of education. The article aims to identify the psychological characteristics of a predisposition to the teaching profession and to create descriptive profiles of students who exhibit the most pronounced specific configurations of personality traits, communicative tolerance, and reflexivity. Materials and Methods. The theoretical and methodological basis of the study was formed by the activity approach, presented in the provisions on the foundations of professional performance and the model of basic competencies from the perspective of V. D. Shadrikov’s functional system of performance. The individual-centered approach, revealing the role of the teacher’s personality in the development of students, was also utilized. The empirical study was conducted using general research methods (analysis of theoretical sources on the problem) and empirical methods (questionnaires, testing). Based on the theoretical analysis conducted, psychological characteristics were identified – personality traits, motivation, empathy, orientation, communicative tolerance, and reflection – the evaluation of them formed the basis of the early career guidance model. Data processing was carried out using methods of mathematical and statistical analysis (hierarchical cluster analysis, analysis of variance, φ-Fisher criterion). The study sample consisted of 140 people: EG-1 (N=81) –Year 10 and Year 11 students (secondary school based preliminary teacher education) and EG-2 (N=50) – students of a pedagogical university. Results. The authors obtained the following results: 1) psychological characteristics were identified – empirically verifiable markers of predisposition to the teaching profession; 2) profiles of students with the most pronounced combination of personality traits, communicative tolerance, and reflectivity were statistically determined and substantiated, the totality of which indicates the manifestation of a predisposition to the teaching career; 3) the validity of the identified profiles of students with different levels of predisposition to the career in Education was confirmed by the results of a comparative analysis with the profile of a group of students from a pedagogical university who had already chosen a career in teaching. Conclusions. The results of the conducted research made it possible to identify and describe profiles of students with varying degrees of manifestation of psychological characteristics related to a propensity for the teaching profession. This significantly expands the capabilities of educational institutions in carrying out more precisely targeted career guidance with schoolchildren at different stages of education.