FEAR OF SUCCESS IN WOMEN’S CAREER DEVELOPMENT: A SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE REVIEW AND FUTURE RESEARCH AGENDA
Over the past 20 years, very few articles have discussed fear of success and linked it to gender issues. Even though fear of success is a psychological condition that affects women, which has implications for women’s perspectives and orientation towards future career development if viewed subjectively based on one’s perspective on work and the environment. High fear of success will make women desire to compete in achieving lower achievements. This research was conducted to outline the evolution of research on fear of success over the last twenty years and explore opportunities for future research directions, particularly those linking fear of success to gender and women’s career development. This research was carried out using a systematic literature review involving a final sample total of 21 articles published during 2000-2021. This study then found that there is still a theoretical and empirical gap in measuring fear of success which Horner and Zuckerman’s theory still dominates. There has been a slowdown in the development of new theories about measures of fear of success. The research challenge is whether this theory is still considered relevant if it is used to answer factual needs or conditions. Another finding research on fear of success for twenty years has been dominated by research on students and employees across gender. Only four studies specifically examine the fear of success for women with the complexity of multiple personal, family and community roles.
Fear of Success, Systematic Literature Review, Career Women.