6.2 Academic Efficacy: Psychological Conditions for Maintaining Academic Identity

Academic efficacy is a crucial psychological condition for doctoral students in forming their academic identity. Representing the power of positive thinking, self-efficacy has been consistently shown to exert a profound influence on individuals' motivation, achievement, and self-regulation [51]. Perceived self-efficacy refers to individuals' beliefs regarding their capabilities to produce designated levels of performance that influence events affecting their lives [52]. Individuals with high self-efficacy perception demonstrate greater resilience in their behavior, experience less anxiety and depression, maintain mental well-being, and achieve higher academic performance [53] (pp. 44–45). When confronted with stress, individuals with low self-efficacy tend to feel powerless, whereas those with high self-efficacy believe they can effectively control and cope with stress, thus perceiving it as less threatening [54]. According to Bong and Skaalvik [55], self-efficacy acts as an active precursor of self-concept development. When doctoral students perceive themselves as capable of academic tasks, they are motivated to embrace the role of a researcher. Therefore, a sense of academic efficacy contributes to the construction and maintenance of doctoral students' academic identity.

The environment and situation can significantly influence the level of self-efficacy [56]. For doctoral students, the environment that affects their sense of academic efficacy includes the disciplinary environment and institutional environment. Research conditions, aca- demic atmosphere, and support from supervisors all impact on doctoral students' cognition and confidence in research activities [57]. Through interacting with key figures in the academic and institutional communities, doctoral students develop self-efficacy through the cognitive integration of the following four information cues: enactive mastery, vicarious experience, verbal persuasion, and emotional arousal [58]. Performances interpreted by doctoral students as successful make them receive positive feedback from academic activities, thus contributing to the maintenance of high levels of academic self-efficacy. Conversely, academic self-efficacy can influence their behaviors in academic research, po- tentially enhancing their overall sense of academic efficacy. According to Pasupathy and Siwatu, research self-efficacy is a significant predictor of research productivity among graduate students, and it also influences their research outputs by affecting their interest in conducting research [59]. As doctoral students produce more research output, they receive more positive feedback, reinforcing the relationship between research activities and per- formance interpretations, thereby strengthening their academic self-efficacy. Furthermore, academic self-efficacy also supports them to cope with academic pressure and challenges, which they usually face in academic training and knowledge production.

Doctoral students with a strong sense of academic efficacy are more likely to recognize their academic competence, facilitating the integration of their academic identity into their self-image. Conversely, a lack of academic efficacy makes it difficult for students to identify themselves as members of the academic community. Therefore, the sense of academic efficacy serves as a crucial psychological condition for doctoral students to construct and maintain their academic identity.

7.  Conclusions and Implications

Improving doctoral education requires facilitating the transformation of doctoral stu- dents into independent researchers. Constructing an academic identity is highly important for the personal growth and future academic development of doctoral students. This study discusses how doctoral students in Chinese research universities become researchers from a psychological perspective and explores the psychological process and different patterns of academic identity comprehension. Based on the grounded theory, this study reveals that the sense of academic meaning and academic efficacy profoundly impact doctoral students’ understanding of their academic identity. Throughout the dynamic process of academic identity construction, the sense of academic meaning and efficacy acquired from the interaction with the environment determine whether doctoral students can establish themselves as researchers. This provides an analytical perspective and research framework for exploring the doctoral students’ identity formation. As doctoral students transition from students to researchers, their self-identity exhibits considerable fluidity and variability. Analyzing their academic meaning and efficacy can elucidate the characteristics of doctoral students' identity development and help to reveal the mechanisms underlying academic identity construction. In an era characterized by diverse employment opportunities for doctoral graduates, although academic professions are no longer the sole destination for all doctoral students, high-quality doctoral education should enable students to recognize their identity as researchers to fulfill educational objectives effectively.

The sense of academic meaning and efficacy serves as a driving force and psychological conditions for doctoral students to enter academic careers. Disciplines and institutions provide fields and contexts for doctoral students to acquire academic meaning and efficacy. As a member of an academic community, an academic is an individual who integrates into this community and constructs their academic identity. For most scholars, the doctoral stage is a period in which they form their academic identity. By deepening the knowledge in their discipline and engaging in academic interactions, doctoral students can cultivate a sense of academic meaning and efficacy, strengthen their identification within their discipline and institution, and naturally establish their academic identity. Conversely, without acquiring a sense of academic meaning and efficacy from their environment, doctoral students may struggle to realize their academic identity. The findings of this study expand the socialization model, enrich the socialization process of postgraduates that used to be analyzed from an external perspective by using the intrinsic perspective of doctoral students, explore the self-transformation of doctoral students in the socialization process by using the concept of "identity", and establish the direct connection between knowledge acquisition, investment, involvement, and doctoral identity.

The conclusions of this study could provide some suggestions for the advancement of doctoral education. The psychological state of doctoral students warrants attention from both supervisors and administrators. In today's academic profession, where excessive workloads and stress are increasingly prevalent, it is essential to assist doctoral students in dealing with stress, adapting to their surroundings, and solving psychological problems to maintain their mental health and foster a positive approach to challenges. In doctoral education, particular emphasis should be placed on enhancing the sense of academic meaning and efficacy. Only when doctoral students perceive the value of the scientific research they undertake can they establish a psychological recognition of their academic identity and subsequently embrace the responsibilities and obligations of researchers. When doctoral students have a high sense of efficacy, they can actively confront setbacks and failures in their academic research endeavors, fostering a stronger commitment and sense of belonging to the academic community. Therefore, supervisors and administrators should guide doctoral students in actively pursuing the meaning of research activities and conducting meaningful research. Moreover, they should prioritize enhancing doctoral students’ sense of academic efficacy, especially during the early stages of doctoral socialization. Supervisors should provide guidance and support to help doctoral students understand the norms of the academic community, master the knowledge and skills necessary for academic research,

and integrate them into professional life. Doctoral students should also prioritize their mental well-being, consciously maintain and pursue meaning from academic activities, and proactively enhance their academic self-efficacy. Since all the interviewees came from research universities, this study did not identify any significant institutional differences. Furthermore, while we acknowledged how doctoral students understood academic identity from a psychological perspective at Chinese research universities, our study did not explore the diverse career paths these students may follow. An increasing number of PhD graduates are opting to leave academia. Future research could examine the impact of academic identity on the career decisions of doctoral students, as well as the relationship between academic identity and the performance of these students.