Аннотация
Research on public sector attractiveness consistently reveals a gap between positive evaluations of public missions and the actual willingness of young people to apply for government positions. This article aims to explain this gap by analytically distinguishing two stages of career decision making: the formation of interest and the formation of application intention. The empirical basis of the study consists of survey data collected from students of Karaganda university of KAZPOTREBSOYUZ (N = 196) in September 2025, who evaluated a real vacancy in the public sector. The findings demonstrate that symbolic attractiveness associated with mission and perceived public value plays a significant role in generating interest, but loses explanatory power at the stage of intention formation. Application intention emerges under conditions of anticipated work constraints and early sectoral screening, whereby innovation-oriented students exclude the public sector from their set of considered alternatives. In addition, evaluative ambivalence is identified as a stable condition that disrupts linear transitions from values to action. The results refine the explanatory scope of public service motivation (PSM) theory and highlight the need to complement attraction models with mechanisms of early exclusion and ambivalent evaluation.