Associations of Health Symptoms and Perceptions With Work Volition

We used survey data to examine the associations of recent health symptomatology and illness perceptions with work volition among 129 college students who had chronic health conditions. Recent health symptomatology and illness perceptions were both negatively related to work volition. Whereas illness perceptions had incremental validity over recent health symptomatology in the prediction of work volition, recent health symptomatology did not add significantly to the explained variance beyond illness perceptions. Assessing illness perceptions provides a more complete understanding of the potential impact of health conditions on students' work volition than does recent health symptomatology alone, and counselors are advised to help clients modify illness perceptions if they are based on inaccurate information.