Future work self and proactive career behavior, the serial mediating effect of academic passion and resilience

University students develop proactive behaviors for better employability. An image of a future work self can motivate proactive actions in students. Personal resources such as academic passion and resilience may be the way by which the future work self generates proactive career behaviors. This paper aims to study the mediating effects between future work self, academic passion, and resilience to predict proactive career behavior. A total of 802 undergraduate students with ages ranging from 18 to 27 years, (M = 23.2, SD = 2.7) were recruited for this study. Descriptive analysis, correlations, and reliability of the scales have been performed. Then, a hierarchical regression model was designed to study the effect of interaction in a serial model with passion and resilience using PROCESS. The results showed significant independent indirect effects of future work self through harmonious passion and resilience on proactive career behavior. Furthermore, a serial mediation through harmonious academic passion and resilience was found. These results provide evidence of the role that academic passion plays in generating personal resources such as resilience The future work self may as well be a motivator for proactive career-oriented behavior in students. (c) 2023 Universidad de Pais Vasco. Published by Elsevier Espa nia, S.L.U. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).