Career Development Literature

This is the first in a series of articles that will discuss the literature on the predominant career theories; history of and theory behind interest inventories, a discussion of the prominent interest inventories, and the best use of interest inventories in the career development process; conceptual additions applicable to the study of interest inventories; and the literature that has focused on career indecision in adolescents and educational interventions with additional focus placed on middle schools. All of these articles come from dissertations by Virginia Robinson Richards, EdD, and Stephen Randall Richards, EdD, both copyrighted 1998. These articles are presented as a quick refresher for professional guidance counselors, an introduction to these theories for the non-professional, and as a starting point for students of the many disciplines related to career development theory. The bibliographies are purposely missing. If you choose to copy our work (shame on you), you will at least have to go to the library to find the work and maybe touch the covers of these works. We appologize for the non-academic format, but in a blogging forum it is not possible to keep the work as originally presented.


Predominant Career Theories
With the advent of technology, which accelerated tremendously during this century, many new and different jobs began to develop. People began to look at the necessity of shifing workers from the occupations of thier parents to the new occupations required in the current workplace. Early in the 20th century, training was relatively casual and individuals had or made little investment in preparation for the trades they entered. Around the time of World Wars I and II, vocational counselors, psychologists, and others interested in personal development and growth began to develop theories that would enable individuals to focus their attention on career decisionmaking (Srebalus, Marinelli, & Messing, 1982).


Personality Development Theory

Trained as a clinical psychologist, Anne Roe began her development of a theory of personality caeer choices through observation of artists and research scientists focusing on "possible relatioships between occupational behavior (not just choice) and personality" (Roe & Lunneborg, 1990, p. 68). In looking at previous studies, Roe identified and cateforized a list of needs involving persons' feelings concerning work. Common threads in these studies were bodily well-being, a need for food, a need for activity, and a need for self-realization through work. Roe (1956) agreed that people do not work just to earn a living but that "much more is involved in and expected of a job than a pay check" (p. 23). From these studies and her own work, Roe determined that one's occupation forms a major focus through thoughts and activities. As part of her own theory, Roe turned to Maslow's (1948) hierarchy of needs including physiological needs, safety needs, need for belongingness and love, need for importance, respect, self-esteem, independence, need for information, need for undestanding, need for bearty, and a need for self-actualization. Maslow's theory indicated people feel more urgency to satisfy the basic needs of food, shelter, and safety before they are capable of expressing needs on the higher levels, and, consequently, these other needs remain unachievable to the average individual until those basic needs are satisfied. Roe (1956) decided her use of Maslow's hierarchy was fairly obvious, I.E., "in our society there is no single situation which is potentially so capable of giving some satisfaction at all levels of basic needs as is the occupation" (p. 29) of the person involved.


Roe (1956) emphasized the interaction of heredity and environment as the focus of her work. Roe (Sharf, 1992) decided intelligence and temperament were limited in development by heredity, but interests and aptitudes tended to be determined by satisfaction or frustration through how well individual needs are fulfilled during interactions with others. Needs that are easily satisfied will not become motivators, but needs which are difficult to satisfy, or frustrated, may indeed become motivators. For example, a person may seek information about a certain subject. If that subject is introduced during school class time, the student may develop further interest if information is presented in such a way as to stimulate that interest, but if the student becomes frustrated by inability to grasp the information or difficulty with absorption of the information, interest may not develop. If satisfied with the effort made, the student will work harder to learn more about the subject. If rewarded when meeting this inmost need, the student may be further motivated by seeking additional praise or higher grades.


General cheldhood development theory led Roe (1956) to theorize the psychological climate of the home: i.w., concentration on the child, avoidance of the child, or acceptance of the child brings about certain types of personalities within the child. Parental concentration on the child can be overprotection which encourages dependence within the child, restricting curiosity and exploration; or overdemand from the child which seeks perfection and sets high standards of behavior. Parental avoidance of the child can be emotional rejection by lack of love and affection or by criticism; or neglect when the child is ignored due to parental concern with their own affairs, work, other children, and such. Parental acceptance of the child can be casual in which a minimum of love is offered; or loving with a warmer attitude while not fostering dependency. Roe further stated the parental attitudes of concentration or avoidance within homes caused children to be self-centered, aware of others' views of themselves. These same children grow to be people who wish to be in positions of strength when dealing with others and may develop aggressive or defensive attitudes toward others, preferring to deal with data or things in their choice of occupations rather than people. Children growing up in accepting homes are not as likely to be aggressive or defensive, but more interested in working with people rather than data or things in their occupations (Roe, 1956). In support of Roe, Dawis (1997) stated that needs interacting with parent/child practices and attitudes produce a basic personality orientation, e.i., toward persons or toward nonpersons, influencing the development of the work personality and vocational behavior of the individual.


Based on this, Roe's theory (Osipow, 1973, Walsh & Osipow, 1983; Roe, 1956; Roe & Lunneborg, 1990) posited:
1. Limits of potential development are set by genetic inheritance, including intellectual abilities, temperament, interests, and abilities.
2. General cultural background and socioeconomic position of the family affect the unique experiences of the individual.
3. Individual experiences which are governed by involuntary attention determine the pattern of development of interests, attitudes, and other personality variables that have not been genetically controlled.
a. Early satisfactions and frustrations as evidenced by the family situation, particularly relations with the parents; i.e., overprotectiveness; avoidance or acceptance of the child are evidence of individual experiences.
b. Degrees of needs satisfaction determine which of Maslow’s needs will become the strongest motivators.
4. The eventual pattern of psychic energies; i.e., attention-directed, is the major determinant of interests.
5. The intensity with which an individual feels (Maslowian) needs and the satisfying of these needs determine the degree of motivation to accomplish.

Dissatisfied with available classifications of occupations, Roe (1956) also developed a listing of eight occupational groups including service, business contact, organization, technology, outdoor, science, general culture and arts/entertainment. These groups were further divided into six levels based on degree of responsibility, capability, and skill needed to perform at each level, ranging from unskilled to professional and managerial levels.

Descriptive research conducted by Roe on artists and research scientists prior to her theory development was “primarily a series of investigations into personality characteristics, background factors, aptitude, and intellectual abilities as theory related to vocational choice” (Osipow, 1973, p. 24). Brown (1990b) felt Roe demonstrated little interest in practical application of her own ideas, doing little research following pronouncement of her theory. Brown, Lum, and Voyle (1997) argue that Roe’s theory has been too easily abandoned through misconstrued, invalid empirical tests of her hypotheses about parent/child interactions and their relation to career choice behavior. Additionally, Brown and Voyle (1997) state that Roe’s theory provides the only available model for linking early childhood experiences, development an individual’s need structure, and vocational behavior.

Although Roe (Roe & Lunneborg, 1990) developed only one measurement device, the Parent-Child Relations Questionnaire (PCR 1), used to explore basic orientations of people based on their early childhood experiences, other practitioners have developed many instruments based on Roe’s theory. Examples of instruments based on Roe’s theory include the Career Occupational Preference System (COPS) ( Knapp & Knapp, 1984) and the Computerized Vocational Information System (CVIS) (Harris, 1968) which are based on Roe’s interest framework; Ramak and Courses, Meir and Barak (1973) and Miller-Tiedeman’s (1976) Individual Career Exploration (ICE).

Osipow (1973) and Walsh and Osipow (1983) criticized the lack of empirical support for her theory. A longitudinal study with Harvard sophomores conducted by Hagen (1960) failed to support Roe’s theory. Work by Kinnane and Pable (1962) supported parts of Roe’s theory but did not rule out other theories. Studies conducted by Levine (1963), Switzer, Grigg, Miller, and Young (1962), and Utton (1962) supported Roe’s theory of person- and non-person orientation, but provided no support on how or if background factors described by Roe influenced the development or nondevelopment of these preferences. Studies conducted by Belz and Geary (1984), Cairo (1982), Erb and Smith (1984), and Gordon and Avery (1986) used Roe’s occupational groups and levels successfully in predicting target occupations, change within adjacent work fields, and job perceptions. Forty years later, Roe’s theory and classification of occupations is still the subject of research with Tracey and Rounds (1994) study of interest fields and Meir, Esformes, and Friedland’s (1994) use of the Courses Interest Inventory based on Roe’s classification to investigate Holland’s constructs of congruence. Brown et al. (1997), Dawis (1997), and Lunneborg (1997) called for additional research to more accurately test Roe’s theory as a means of better understanding early childhood experiences as they may relate to the development of an individual’s need structure.

Lunneborg and Roe (1990) agreed with Walsh and Osipow (1983) that Roe’s greatest achievement may lie, not in empirical research, but in career counselors’ use of the two-way job classification system and “obtain(ing) a family history from their clients (based) on Roe’s dimensions of people vs. ideas” (Walsh & Osipow, p. 60). Roe (1956) herself felt more attention should be paid to the role of occupation in the life of an individual and that occupations should be open to all, particularly women and minorities, since appropriate work can be satisfying not only to society but to the individual.

Social Learning Theory of Career Decision-Making
Bandura’s (1969) social cognitive learning theory of behavior assumed individual personality and behaviors arise from an individual’s unique learning experiences and the effects of negative and positive reinforcement as these experiences occur. Social cognitive or learning theory proposed that three major types of learning experiences result in behaviors and skills that allow a person to function effectively in society. These experiences include, (a) instrumental learning experiences occurring when the individual is positively or negatively reinforced for a behavior; (b) associative learning experiences occurring when the individual associates a previously neutral event with an emotionally laden event; and (c) vicarious experiences occurring when the individual observes the behavior of others or gains new information and ideas from other sources.

The social learning theory of Krumboltz, Mitchell, and Jones (1976) was an outgrowth of Bandura’s social cognitive theory of behavior. Social learning theory assumes personality and behaviors come directly from the unique learning experiences that each individual has undergone. Additionally, Mitchell and Krumboltz (1990) stated genetic endowment and special abilities, environmental conditions and events, and task approach skills allow individuals to take part in a variety of planned and unplanned learning experiences, thereby, shaping their future career preferences and choices as they make formal and informal assessments concerning their personal capabilities and the world of work in general. Genetic endowments and special abilities are inherited qualities which may set limits on an individual’s skills. Environmental conditions or events are factors over which the individual has no control. Task approach skills are the skills, performance standards and values, work habits, and perceptual and cognitive processes an individual brings to new problems. Mitchell and Krumboltz also consider economic and sociological conditions to be reinforcers for individuals as individuals evaluate each of their unique learning experiences.

Krumboltz’s (1981) theory posited three basic factor groups as the determinants shaping career preferences. Within these factors, he developed a number of testable propositions and determined that equal importance rests on the inverse influence of each.
1. Factors influencing preferences with an educational or occupational preference being an evaluative self-observation generalization based on those learning experiences pertinent to any career task with propositions explaining the acquisition of these preferences.
Proposition IA1. An individual is more likely to express a preference for a course of study, an occupation, or the tasks and consequences of a field of work if that individual has been positively reinforced for engaging in activities one has learned are associated with the successful performance of that course, occupation, or field of work (p. 59).
Proposition IA2. An individual is more likely to express a preference for a course of study, an occupation, or the tasks and consequences of a field of work if that individual has observed a valued model being reinforced for engaging in activities one has learned are associated with the successful performance of that course, occupation, or field of work (p. 59).
Proposition IA3. An individual is more likely to express a preference for a course of study, an occupation, or the tasks and consequences of a field of work if that individual has consistent, positive reinforcement for engaging in activities one has learned are associated with the successful performance of that course, occupation, or field of work (p. 59).
2. Factors influencing career-decision making skills with propositions explaining how these particular skills are acquired.
Proposition IIA1. An individual is more likely to learn the cognitive and performance and emotional responses necessary for career planning, self-observing, goal setting, and information seeking if that individual has been positively reinforced for those responses (p. 61).
Proposition IIA2. An individual is more likely to learn the cognitive and performance and emotional responses necessary for career planning, self-observing, goal setting, and information seeking if that individual has observed real or vicarious models engaged in effective career-decision making strategies (p. 62).
Proposition IIA3. An individual is more likely to learn the cognitive and performance and emotional responses necessary for career planning, self-observing, goal setting, and information seeking if that individual has access to people and other resources with the necessary information (p. 62).
3. Factors influencing entry behaviors into educational or occupational alternatives with propositions explaining factors accounting for the actual entry behaviors into occupations, training programs, or educational courses of study.
Proposition IIIA1. An individual is more likely to take actions leading to enrollment in a given course or employment in a given occupation or field of work if that individual has recently expressed a preference for that course, occupation, or field of work (p. 63).
Proposition IIIA2. An individual is more likely to take actions leading to enrollment in a given course or employment in a given occupation or field of work if that individual has been exposed to learning and employment opportunities in that course, occupation, or field of work (p. 63).
Proposition IIIA3. An individual is more likely to take actions leading to enrollment in a given course or employment in a given occupation or field of work if that individual’s learning skills match the educational and/or occupational requirements (p. 64).

While a number of studies conducted through the years have provided credence to parts of Mitchell et al.’s theory, this was not the initial purpose of the studies but do appear to be relevant to social learning theory. Almquist (1974) found females selecting male-dominated occupations were highly influenced by female role models to support “proposition 1” and Hawley (1972) found women in nontraditional roles perceived significant males to be encouraging with respect to women’s abilities to engage in serious work to support “proposition 3.” Additionally, Oliver (1975) found verbal reinforcement from counselors could modify stated career choices for high school students. Krumboltz, Baker, and Johnson (1967) and Krumboltz et al. (1976) demonstrated that providing students with simulated work activities produced more occupational information for each student than did presentation of information through pamphlets or films.

Mitchell and Krumboltz (1990) stated that all individuals regardless of race, gender, or ethnic origin must have exposure to the widest array of learning opportunities available for maximum career development. These learning opportunities would include mentors and role models in addition to scheduled learning experiences, such as school. Based on changes in societal influences and shifts in conventional values, Obleton (1984) described beneficial results from deliberately planned model-mentor workshops aimed at career development processes when used with young black females, and Gerstein, Lichtman, and Barokas’ (1988) longitudinal study showed professional careers chosen over clerical/sales when female high school seniors were studied. Looking at positive reinforcement issues, Astin (1965), Baird (1971), Chusmir (1983), Brooks and Haigler (1984), Kerr and Ghrist-Priebe (1988), and Osipow (1972) found students felt comfortable even though undecided about formal career plans, raised career aspirations, or changed career or educational plans when they were positively reinforced by a valued person or a valued model. Research conducted by Hawley (1972), Little and Roach (1974), and Trent and Medsker (1968) found a major determinant of decisions to attend college or choose nontraditional careers to be students’ perception of parental support. Fitzgerald, Fassinger, and Betz (1995) pointed out empirical support for social learning theory of career decision making has been largely confined to early correlational studies and little significant evolution has occurred during the past 20 years.

Although Krumboltz (1988) developed the Career Beliefs Inventory to help identify inaccurate self-observations, researchers have focused more attention on the area of occupational information-seeking with Krumboltz et al.’s (1967) development of the Job Experience Kits designed to provide clients with successful experiences and job information. As the Job Experience Kits are not identical in content, counselors can individualize the interviewing and “shadowing” of workers, the use of films, and other printed materials to tailor these experiences to the previous learning experiences and interests of clients (Mitchell & Krumboltz, 1990). Jones and Krumboltz (1970) developed the Vocational Exploratory Behavior Inventory to evaluate the task approach skills, i.e., talking to counselors, acquiring occupational information, etc., needed by a client in career decision making,

Social Cognitive Theory
Hackett and Betz’s (1981) work on self-efficacy is a recent addition to the career field derived from Bandura’s general theory on social cognition. Bandura (1986) defined self-efficacy as “people’s judgments of their capabilities to organize and execute courses of action required to attain designated types of performance” (p. 391) and postulated self-efficacy impressions help to determine a person’s choice of activities and environments. Research conducted with regard to self-efficacy by Hackett and Lent (1992) and Multon, Brown, and Lent (1992) showed self-efficacy to be predictive of academic and career-related choice and performance within these same areas. Taylor and Betz (1983) developed the Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy Scale (CDMSES) to assess self-efficacy expectations as they apply to career decision-making tasks and behaviors.

Adding to Hackett and Betz’s original work has been Lent, Brown, and Hackett’s (1994; 1996) social cognitive framework linking three aspects of career development; career interests, academic and career choice options, and performance and persistence in undertakings. Lent et al. saw their work as theory integration explaining “central, dynamic processes and mechanisms through which (a) career and academic interests develop, (b) career-relevant choices are forged and enacted, and (c) performance outcomes are achieved” (p. 80). From Bandura’s (1986) social cognitive theory, Lent et al. took triadic reciprocity in which personal attributes, external environmental factors, and overt behaviors act upon and are acted upon by each other. While other theories of career development stress that vocational choices are determined by persons and their environments, these same theories also fail to take into account the behavior of the individual in influencing particular situations which can in turn then affect their thoughts and subsequent behaviors. Lent et al. stated these static career development theories fail to take into account interactions occurring between constantly developing individuals and their ever-changing contexts.

Lent et al. (1994; 1996) saw self-efficacy, outcome expectations, and goals as being particularly relevant within the field of career development. Self-efficacy is an important component in that a set of self-beliefs specific to performance interacts with other personal, behavioral, and contextual factors. Outcome expectations are the individual’s imagined consequences of particular behaviors, such as physical reward, social approval, self-satisfaction, or the inverse of any or all of these. With goal setting, people are providing ways and means of organizing and guiding their behaviors over extended periods of time, thereby, increasing the likelihood that desired outcomes will be realized.

Lent et al. (1994) developed the following specific propositions to lay out their ideas behind social cognitive theory:
Proposition 1. An individual’s occupational or academic interests at any point in time are reflective of his or her concurrent self-efficacy beliefs and outcome expectations (p. 91).
Proposition 2. An individual’s occupational interests also are influenced by his or her occupational relevant abilities, but this relation is mediated by one’s self-efficacy beliefs (p. 92).
Proposition 3. Self-efficacy beliefs affect choice goals and actions both directly and indirectly (p. 96).
Proposition 4. Outcome expectations affect choice goals and actions both directly and indirectly (p. 97).
Proposition 5. People will aspire to enter (i.e., develop choice goals for) occupations or academic fields that are consistent with their primary interest areas (p. 97).
Proposition 6. People will attempt to enter occupations or academic fields that are consistent with choice goals, provided that they are committed to their goal, and their goal is stated in clear terms, proximal to the point of actual entry (p. 97).
Proposition 7. Interests affect entry behaviors (actions) indirectly through their influence on choice goals (p. 98).
Proposition 8. Self-efficacy beliefs influence career-academic performance both directly and indirectly through their effect on performance goals. Outcome expectations influence performance only indirectly through their effect on goals (p. 100).
Proposition 9. Ability (or aptitude) will affect career/academic performance both directly and indirectly through its influence on self-efficacy beliefs (p. 100).
Proposition 10. Self-efficacy beliefs derive from performance accomplishments, vicarious learning, social persuasion, and physiological reactions (e.g., emotional arousal) in relation to particular educational and occupationally relevant activities (p. 103).
Proposition 11. As with self-efficacy beliefs, outcome expectations are generated through direct and vicarious experiences with educational and occupationally relevant activities (p. 103).
Proposition 12. Outcome expectations are also partially determined by self-efficacy beliefs, particularly when outcomes (e.g., successes, failures) are closely tied to the quality or level of one’s performance (p. 104).

While dealing with developmental tasks occurring prior to career entry, Lent et al. (1994; 1996) suggested their framework could be viewed across the life span to include work adjustment, career and life milestones, and retirement. In agreement with Super’s (1990) view of cognitive learning theory as “cement”, holding together various segments of career development theory, Lent et al. (1994) saw their framework as an effort at unifying rather than proliferating additional theories and should also be viewed as “evolving constructions, subject to further empirical scrutiny” (p. 118).

Sociological Theory
Theorists paying attention to the impact of the social environment on career choice are classified as using a sociological approach, indicating they feel societal circumstances beyond the control of the individual contribute significantly to career choice and the individual’s task is to develop strategies allowing them to cope effectively with this environment (Osipow, 1983). Prior to 1967, sociological theory was concerned primarily with how the social status of one’s parents affected the level of schooling one achieved which in turn affected the occupational level one achieved, i.e., intergenerational mobility, and was primarily confined to imprecise verbal statements and rough classification of occupations into broad socio-economic groups, such as blue and white-collar workers.

Status attainment. Research by Blau and Duncan (1967) marked a shift into a more formal model of occupational or status attainment with the development of the Socioeconomic Index (SEI), a graded scale used to indicate the level of occupational status both desired by the young adult and the occupational status held by the parents. Blau and Duncan’s work, closely followed by Sewell, Haller and Portes (1969), Sewell, Haller, and Ohlendorf (1970), expanded of the intergenerational mobility theory to include intervening social-psychological processes, such as educational and occupational aspirations of the individual, parental and teacher encouragement of the individual for further educational attainment, and the individual’s peers’ plans for further educational attainment, along with parental status and parental years of schooling. Named the Wisconsin model, this model also included academic performance and standardized test scores as measures of ability.

The Wisconsin model of status attainment has generated large amounts of research by Gottfredson and Becker (1981), Otto and Haller (1979), Hauser, Tsai, and Sewell (1983), Jencks, Crouse, and Meuser (1983), Sewell and Hauser (1975),and Treiman and Terrell (1975) drawing further conclusions that variables such as race, parents’ occupation, gender, marital status, family income, place of residence, and family status, i.e., two-parent or single parent household, interact with other significant variables affecting opportunities with regard to training or further education. While this additional research has refined the status attainment model, Hotchkiss and Borow (1990) felt no empirical study had challenged the basic results of the Wisconsin model. But, critics have been quick to argue, the model is still incomplete with lack of attention paid to rules of access to jobs, salary schedules, job security, and performance standards (Hotchkiss & Borow).

Economic theory attainment. Developed as a reaction to the status attainment model, the economic theory of schooling and competitive markets (Hotchkiss & Borow, 1990; 1996) hypothesized that many elements within the structure of work influence individuals’ sense of well-being in their work, such as whether one is a worker or a manager; individual chances for advancement; earning potential; job security; and possible discrimination. Economic theory is composed of human capital theory which purports that individuals make investments, i.e., amount and type of schooling, career choice, in their productive abilities intended to maximize their lifetime earning potential. The second part of economic theory is that of competitive markets based on the assumption that wages adjust to supply and demand within the labor market. Thus, employers are willing to employ more people when wages are low than when wages are high and conversely, fewer people when wages are high than when wages are lower. The outcome of economic theory is then maximum productivity within the economy because individuals have made the best choices for themselves and are being compensated according to their contribution to this productivity. Additionally, economic theory predicts that race and gender discrimination will dissolve under competitive pressures although empirical evidence demonstrates that minorities remain concentrated in low-status, low-income producing fields (Farley & Allen, 1987; Hauser, Tsai, & Sewell, 1983; Porter, 1974; Saunders, 1995; Tienda & Lii, 1987) while women also remain somewhat segregated by occupational fields and demonstrate lower earning power than men (Corcoran & Duncan, 1979; England & Farkas, 1986).

While Sonnenfeld and Kotter (1982) acknowledged the important contributions made by sociologists in establishing the relationship between parental occupation, status, and wealth and the income levels attained by the children, they felt these same sociologists have failed to take into account important changes in the social status of occupations, changes in the distribution of population into different occupations, and changes in these individuals themselves over a period of time.

Trait and Factor Theory
Theories of career choice have come about through attempts to understand the decision-making process humans go through in an effort to choose a career. In the early part of this century, a growing concern for the plight of American workers led Frank Parsons and others to focus on various methods of help, including “reforms in business, education, and other social institutions to prevent further exploitation of workers and to help workers choose jobs that matched their abilities and interests”(Brown, 1990a, p. 13).

Parsons put forth a three-step schema forming the basis of the “first conceptual framework for career decision making” (Brown, 1990a, p. 13) and the foundation of the vocational guidance movement (Srebalus et al., 1982; Super, 1983). This three-part model advocated personality analysis, i.e., whereby individuals gain understanding of both strengths and weaknesses of their personal attributes or traits; job analysis, i.e., given these traits, their conditions for success in occupations; and matching through scientific advising, i.e., make career choices based on the aforementioned information to provide the basis for career decision-making (Brown, 1990a; Herr & Cramer, 1988; McDaniels & Gysbers, 1992). Super (1983) concluded that Parsons' "theory of individual differences in aptitudes and traits which underlies the method of determining occupational ability patterns has been the cornerstone of vocational guidance" (p. 168).

Parsons' formulations are often referred to as the basis of trait and factor theory (Brown, 1990a; Brown & Brooks, 1990b). Klein and Weiner (1977) concluded the underlying assumptions and propositions of trait and factor theory are:
1. Each individual has a unique set of traits that can be measured reliably and validly.
2. Occupations require that workers possess certain very special traits for success, although a worker with a rather wide range of characteristics can still be successful in a job.
3. The choice of an occupation is a rather straightforward process, and matching is possible.
4. The closer the match between personal characteristics and job requirements, the greater the likelihood of success (productivity and satisfaction).

Holland’s personality theory. An offshoot of Parsons’ trait and factor theory and redesignated “person -environment (P-E) fit” (Rounds & Tracey, 1990), Holland's theory “sees people as choosing work environments that are congruent with their personality types” (Brown & Brooks, 1990b, p. 6). Developed in 1959, Holland's theory underwent revisions in 1966, 1973, and 1985. Holland saw his theory as structural or typological in that it attempted to organize a sea of information about people and jobs; interactive because careers and social behaviors were the outcomes of people and environments acting on each other; and a fulfillment model because as people seek employment, they are also attempting to reach goals that will utilitize their talents, skills, and interests (Holland, 1985a). Spokane (1996) stated that “modern trait position as represented by Holland’s theory has evolved into an enriched person-environment interaction model that reflects the inclusion of identity, information retieval and processing, and behavioral repertoires as essential components in the transactions individuals make with their environments” (p. 35).

Holland’s (1985a) assumptions were based on the idea that interests are one part of what is commonly called personality, therefore, vocational interests also describe an individual’s personality. Within personality, individuals have traits which might be described as preferences for school subjects, recreational activities, and/or work. Holland’s typology, i.e., study of types, contended that six basic personality types exist and all individuals, to some extent, resemble one of these types. The closer the fit between the individual and the type, the more likely the individual is to manifest behaviors and traits associated with that type.

Holland's (1985a) assumptions include:
1. Most persons can be categorized as one of six types: realistic (R), investigative (I), artistic (A), social (S), enterprising (E), or conventional (C). A type is a model against which we can measure the real person. Each type is the product of a characteristic interaction between a variety of cultural and personal forces, including peers, parents, social class, culture, and the physical environment.
2. There are six kinds of environments: realistic, investigative, artistic, social, enterprising, or conventional. Each environment is dominated by a given type of personality and each environment is typified by physical settings posing special problems and stresses.
3. People search for environments that will let them exercise their skills and abilities, express their attitudes and values, and take on agreeable problems and roles. The person's search for environments is varied in many ways, at different levels of consciousness, and over a long period of time.
4. A person's behavior is determined by an interaction between personality and the characteristics of environment. If we know a person's personality pattern and environment pattern, we can then forecast outcomes such as choice of vocation, job changes, vocational achievement, personal competence, and educational and social behavior.

While Holland (1966) originally set forth that an individual could be characterized as being a single personality type, he has since revised his theory (1973; 1985a) to suggest that while one personality type does dominate, personality patterns provide better descriptions of individuals. For example, while a person’s personality probably contains aspects of all six personality types (R, I, A, S, E, C), personality patterns, or subtypes, may be developed on the basis of the three prevalent types found within the individual’s interest profile. Thus, subtype SAE describes a person having social, artistic, and enterprising characteristics dominating the interest profile of that particular individual. Just as personalities can be characterized, environments, particularly work environments, can be characterized along the same lines by using the Holland typology.

In revision of his theory, Holland (1985a) introduced five key concepts in addition to his four basic assumptions:
1. Consistency: By using the hexagon to graphically represent the relationships between the personality types, Holland has defined the degree of personality consistency. The closer the types appear on the hexagon, i.e., when the first two letters of the subtype are adjacent on the hexagon, the more consistent the person is thought to be. Low consistency is separation of the first two code letters by two intervening letters.
2. Differentiation: Some people and environments more closely resemble a single type, thereby showing less resemblance to other types. Some others may more equally resemble several types. Those personality types resembling several types equally are said to be poorly differentiated while those closely resembling a single type are said to be highly differentiated.
3. Identity: Holland considered this construct necessary to support the formulations of personality types and environments. An individual having identity is said to have clear and stable goals, interests, and talents established.
4. Congruence: This is an example of the old idiom, Birds of a feather flock together, meaning persons tend to be happier and perform better in an environment providing the type of reward that is important to that person. For example, a Conventional personality type who enjoys working in a Conventional environment would be said to be a perfect fit , likewise, the least congruence occurs when persons and their environments are at opposite points of the hexagon, i.e., a Realistic personality type working in a Social environment.
5. Calculus: The hexagon not only presents a graphic representation of consistency between person and environment, but also the internal relationships of Holland’s theory, in that “ the distances between the types or environments are inversely proportional to the theoretical relationships between them” (1985, p. 5).

Additionally, Holland (1985a) considered self-knowledge to be an important influence on career choice. Self-knowledge is the amount and accuracy of information an individual has about one’s self that will then allow one to make adequate career choices. Other important aspects of career choice include social pressures during childhood and, similar to Roe (1956), experiences with parents.

Many research studies have focused on Holland’s (1985a) concept of congruence finding that types generally aspire to, or already inhabit, fields matching their primary interests. Hecht’s (1980) study of nursing and Henry and Bardo’s (1987) study of premedical students found a majority of students evidencing primary interests that corresponded to theoretical expectations. When non-college-degreed males (Greenless, Damarin, & Walsh, 1988) and females (Mazen, 1989) were studied, they were found in work environments conforming to their predominant interests. Accordingly, positive relationships between congruence level and job satisfaction (Carson & Mowesian, 1993; Elton & Smart, 1988, Gottfredson & Holland, 1990; Rounds 1990) were found in adult workers although Heesacker, Elliott, and Howe (1988) did not find congruence and job satisfaction among sewing machine operators.

Holland and others working with him over the years have been prolific mainly in longitudinal studies with results showing “remarkable stability in the degree to which the theory has appeared to generate empirical support” (Osipow, 1983, p. 88). Holland's frequent longitudinal studies attempted to assess a variety of personal (1962a, 1963b, 1968), family (1962b), social (1964), and achievement (1963b) correlates pertinent to his theory. Additionally, studies by
Gottfredson and Holland (1990) and Meir and Navon (1992) looked at congruence.

Holland has also paid “attention to the development of means to measure personal attributes associated with the constructs of his theory” (Osipow, 1983, p. 299) with numerous revisions of the Vocational Preference Inventory (VPI) which originated in 1953, the Self-Directed Search (SDS) in 1971, the Vocational Exploration and Insight Kit (VEIK) in 1980, My Vocational Situation (MVS) in 1980 (Weinrach & Srebalus, 1990; Holland, 1966; 1973; 1985; Walsh & Osipow, 1983), Position Classification Inventory (PCI) (Gottfredson & Holland, 1991), and Career Attitudes and Strategies Inventory (CASI) (Holland & Gottfredson, 1994). In addition, Holland's "system was used to organize the profile scores for the SVIB-SCII (Strong Vocational Interest Battery-Strong-Campbell Interest Inventory)” in the revised 1981 version (Campbell & Hansen, 1981, p. 29) to form a “merger of paradigms that can be considered the most significant of all the innovation we have seen thus far” (Borgen, 1986, p. 85). The Holland types are also utilized in the new Strong Interest Inventory (SII) (Harmon, Hansen, Borgan, & Hammer, 1994), the ASVAB workbook (Department of Defense, 1993), and the Bolles Party Game, (Bolles, 1993).

Holland's work, regarded by Osipow (1983) as having mostly positive results has generated much research over the ensuing years “partly because of its simplicity, the available instrumentation, and the attempts Holland himself has made to relate his work to other systems in vocational development, such as the Dictionary of Occupational Titles and the Strong Vocational Blank” (p. 98). Additionally, Borgen (1986) stated the “amount of research generated by Holland's approach is unequaled in vocational behavior in the past 15 years” (p. 89). On the other hand, a criticism leveled at Holland’s theory by Sonnenfeld and Kotter (1982) is that while relationships between individuals’ personality traits and the occupations they chose have been established, Holland and his followers have simple and static conceptualizations of the occupational environment and fail to take into account that traits and demands of the workplace can change over time.

Holland (1985b) changed his definition of environment from the number of individuals of a certain type, i.e., a social environment consisting of people with social codes solving problems by interacting socially, inhabiting that environment to environments defined not only by the census of their inhabitants but also to include what the individuals actually did while in the environment. Spokane (1996) states that “Holland’s writing was full of rich material on the interaction of people in environments” (p. 38) belying the static model. Additionally, Betsworth et al. (1994) in exploring the possibility of locating interests on specific genes and activation of genetic influences determined that between 30 and 50 per cent of variance in occupational interests can be attributed to genetic sources, thereby somewhat vindicating the trait and factor theory.

Career Developmental Theory
Super (1990) said his theory is neither integrated, comprehensive, nor testable, but “segmented, formed from a loosely unified set of theories dealing with specific aspects of career development, taken from developmental, differential, social, personality, and phenomenological psychology and held together by self-concept and learning theory” (p. 199). Super credited Buehler and Lazarsfeld’s longitudinal studies of the work and related lives of men and women plus Davidson and Anderson’s work on occupational histories of a representative sample of American men leading him to want to better understand how career development unfolds and why careers develop as they do (Super, 1983).

A second area of influence, self-concept theory, came from writings of Rogers and Bordin, who suggested an individual’s behavior is a reflection of that individual’s self-descriptive and self-evaluative thoughts (Osipow, 1983) or, as Super (1963) expressed this, “an individual’s self concept is his concept of himself, not inferences made by outside others” (p. 5). Super (1957; 1963) and Super, Crites, Hummel, Moser, Overstreet, and Warnath (1957) identified the elements, or processes, of self-concept as formation, translation, and implementation of the self-concept.

Self-concept formation (Super, 1963) is composed of several phases with the first being exploration which is an ongoing, essential process. Infants look at their fingers; adolescents admire the poem written or the birdhouse built with their own hands; and older workers adapt methods of performing work tasks in view of physical or psychological changes the person may have undergone. Super (1990) stated that the self and its environment are objects of exploration as they develop and change throughout the life span.

Self differentiation (Super et al., 1957) is the second phase of self-concept formation as individuals begin to see themselves as separate and different from those surrounding them. Babies recognize their hands as parts of their own bodies rather than those of their mothers; adolescents become aware that they do not talk as much as their friends or that they dress differently from their friends; and first-time job holders see differences in their approach to clients from that of fellow employees.

Identification (Super, 1963) takes place at much the same time as differentiation. Tyler (1951; 1956) pointed out the disparity between women’s work roles and those of men in the formation of children’s interests and aptitudes. Douvan (1976), Douvan and Adelson (1966), and Patterson (1973) agree with Tyler in stating the prominence that occupation achieves in men’s lives and the variety of male roles visible not only in work, but also in sports and recreation, tend to channel boys’ identification along occupational lines while girls’ identity development focuses on the feminine role of which jobs are only partial expressions of self.

Role playing (Super et al., 1957) accompanies or follows identification. Role-playing may be imaginative or participatory, but does allow one the opportunity to try a role on for size and to see the validity of the developing self-concept. This role playing may take the form of a small child walking like the father, batting left-handed because an idolized ball player bats left-handed, or stating aspirations of becoming a doctor because a doctor aided the child when ill. Reality testing normally follows role-playing. Our everyday life offers many opportunities for this to take place, such as child’s play, i.e., Can I hit enough home runs to be on the school team?; school courses, i.e., How can I be a nurse or doctor if I cannot stand the sight of blood?; extracurricular activities, i.e., Just how hard is it to make it on the stage in New York?; or part-time employment, i.e., Do I want to deliver pizzas or sell cosmetics forever? Reality testing can strengthen or contradict developing self-concepts as these concepts have now been tried out in the real occupational world (Super, 1963).

The second process of self-concept development is that of translation. Translation (Super et al., 1957) take place in three ways: (a) identification with an adult may lead to a desire to portray this occupational role, but the role may be discarded when subjected to reality testing; (b) role playing or reality testing can lead to the discovery that one’s self-concept and the role concepts are congenial; or (c) attributes of the individual are thought to be important in a certain field of work, leading to conformation that one might do well and enjoy this field of endeavor.

The third phase of self-concept development is implementation, or actualizing, as education is completed and the person enters the actual workplace or professional training is entered (Super, 1963). The potential lawyer is accepted by a prestigious law school. The premed student enters medical college, proud of a developing professional identity. Engineering graduates get their first jobs and see their nameplates on their own doors. Or the high school dropout who never did well academically is fired from yet another entry-level job, reinforcing an already poor occupational self-concept.

Super (1990) enunciated fourteen propositions concerning the role of abilities and interests, self-concepts, life stages, and person-situation interactions in his theory. These include:
Proposition 1. People differ in their abilities, interests, and personalities.
Proposition 2. By virtue of these differing characteristics, they are qualified for a number of occupations.
Proposition 3. Occupations require a characteristic pattern of abilities, interests, and personality traits, with tolerances sufficient to allow a variety of occupations for each individual and variety within each occupation.
Proposition 4. Vocational preferences and competencies along with environments in which people live and work, and therefore self-concepts, change over time and with experiences, making choice and adjustment a continuous process.
Proposition 5. This process of change may be called a maxicycle, a series of life stages, i.e., growth, exploration, establishment, maintenance, and decline, and may be subdivided into (a) the fantasy, tentative, and realistic phases of the exploratory stage, and (b) trial and stable phases of the establishment stage. A minicycle of new growth, exploration, and establishment takes place in the transition from one stage to the next.
Proposition 6. Parental socio-economic level, mental ability, personality characteristics, and opportunities to which one is exposed determines the nature of the career pattern, e.g., occupational level attained, sequence, frequency, and length of trial and stable jobs.
Proposition 7. Facilitation of the process of maturation of abilities and interests, aid in reality testing, and development of self-concepts can by guided.
Proposition 8. Career maturity is a hypothetical construct with a brief history and does not increase monotonically.
Proposition 9. Facilitating the maturing of abilities and interests through reality testing can guide one through the life stages.
Proposition 10. The process of career development is that of developing and implementing self-concepts by a synthesizing and compromising process in which the self-concept is a product consisting of the interaction of inherited aptitudes, neural and endocrine makeup, opportunity to play various roles, and evaluations of these roles by superiors and peers.
Proposition 11. The process of synthesis and compromise between individual and social factors, self-concept and reality is that of role playing whether in fantasy, counseling, or real life activities such as school, extracurricular activities, or part-time jobs.
Proposition 12. Life and work satisfactions depend on the extent the individual finds outlets for abilities, needs, interest, personality traits, and self-concepts within a work situation and way of life that promotes growth and exploratory experiences.
Proposition 13. People’s degree of satisfaction with work is proportionate to the degree to which they have been able to implement self-concepts.
Proposition 14. Work and occupation provide a focus for personality organization for most men and some women, although this focus may be peripheral, incidental, or even nonexistent with focus instead on leisure activities or homemaking .

Super (1981) proposed individuals enter occupations they see as most likely to permit self-expression based on this individually developed self-concept. Super (1983) additionally suggested that vocational behaviors engaged in while developing and implementing self-concept are a result of the person’s stage of life development and external environmental conditions; i.e., vocational decisions arrived at during adolescence are based on different happenings and ideas than those decisions made during middle age.

From Buehler, Super (1957) also obtained the idea of life stages, or more specifically, growth, from birth to roughly age 14; exploration, from ages 15 to 25; maintenance, covering approximately 40 years from age 25 to age 65, and decline, till death. From Davidson and Anderson’s research and later work by Miller and Form (1951), Super added the idea of career patterns with career behavior of individuals following general patterns recognizable as predictable after study of the individual. Career patterns may be stable, in which a career is entered relatively early and permanently; conventional, in which several jobs may be tried before settling on a stable job; unstable, several trial jobs leading to what might be considered temporary stability but soon disrupted; and multiple trial, a series of stable jobs, but jobs that remain entry-level (Osipow, 1983).

Super (1957) maintained the proposition that each of his two major life stages, i.e., the exploratory and the establishment, have several substages. The exploratory stage is composed of the tentative substage, the transition substage, and the uncommitted trial substage. As these names suggest, a gradual vocational concern is awakened starting in late childhood. The tentative, exploratory questions of childhood become stronger as in early adolescence, youngsters begin to realize the importance of preliminary vocational decisions. Further evaluation, modification, and/or crystallization of decisions then lead to the next stage of development.

Two additional concepts within Super’s theory are developmental tasks which occur within the life stages and career maturity. Developmental tasks are those with which “society confronts individuals when they reach certain levels of biological, educational, and vocational attainment” (Super, 1990, p. 210). The five developmental tasks occurring within Super's (1990) exploratory stage are that:
1. Students begin to demonstrate concern with vocational choice. Students of middle school age are entering the early stages of adolescence with opportunities to make certain choices, such as course selection. Super (1957) rather succinctly described choice as a “process, rather than an event” (p. 184) with unlimited small choices gradually narrowing an individual's possibilities to a few promising options and, potentially, limiting the individual's future undertakings (Kuder, 1977).
2. Students will begin to seek out increased vocational information, and exhibit comprehensive and detailed planning. The student will begin gathering specific information necessary to make decisions when faced with the need to make them. Faced with additional opportunities to make choices, adolescents will practice making decisions in order to better learn the decision-making process (Super, 1990).
3. Students will demonstrate increasing consistency of vocational choice. The young person should be encouraged to hold one vocational choice (i.e., an occupational title) long enough to gain substantial information about that choice. The student should study occupational groups, particularly the group in which the individual’s vocational choice falls, to gain needed information about the groups and, in addition, should investigate occupational levels within groups to learn educational and skill requirements to enter at various levels. Having obtained this information, the student should study clusters of occupations to learn job similarities and also learn what is involved in working in the occupation.
4. Students will begin to demonstrate the crystallization of traits relevant to vocational choice. During this time of stabilization of traits, students need support as they stabilize interests, exhibit patterning of interests, maximize their career maturity, begin to make independent vocational decisions, develop realistic attitudes, and gain an appreciation for work (Super, 1990).
5. Students will also begin to demonstrate increasing wisdom of vocational preferences. An important achievement is the alignment of preferences with abilities when childhood fantasies of what work ‘might be’ begin to disappear and reality comes to the forefront. During this time, students will make an effort to participate in activities complementary with interests and preferences.

The second concept, career maturity, is the individual's “readiness to cope with the developmental tasks appropriate to the age and level one finds oneself” (McDaniels & Gysbers, 1992, p. 48). Super stated (1983) that we may expect vocationally mature behavior to appear differently based on the context provided by the individual’s life stage, e.g., “ a vocationally mature fourteen-year-old will be concerned with assessing personal interests and abilities to reach the goal of deciding on an educational plan while the vocationally mature forty-five-year-old person is concerned with ways to maintain career status in the face of competition from younger workers” (Osipow, 1983, p. 157).

An instrument, the Career Questionnaire, with the primary focus of measuring vocational or career maturity, was developed by Super, Bohn, Forrest, Jordaan, Lindeman, and Thompston (1971). This then evolved into the Career Development Inventory (CDI) in 1972 with updates in 1979 and 1981 (Westbrook, 1983). The CDI was further updated by Thompson, Lindeman, Super, Jordaan, and Myers (1984) to measure two affective variables: career planning and career exploration, and two cognitive characteristics: information about work and occupations and knowledge of the principles for career decision making. Super was influential in Crites’ development of the Vocational Developmental Inventory (1961; 1965) which later became the Career Maturity Inventory (1978) for use with young people and the Career Adjustment and Development Inventory (1979) for use with the adult population. Westbrook and Parry-Hill developed the Cognitive Vocational Maturity Inventory (1973) emphasizing cognitive rather than attitudinal aspects of vocational maturity. Super (1983) was also influential in Bowlsbey’s development of DISCOVER, a computerized counseling system. In addition, Nevill and Super (1986) developed the Salience Inventory (SI) to assess work-role importance while the Adult Career Concerns Inventory (ACCI) developed by Super, Thompson, and Lindeman (1988) measures concern with the tasks of Exploration, Establishment, Maintenance, and Disengagement.

Numerous studies in addition to Super's own prolific work have been conducted over the ensuing years with most “supporting the idea that occupational choice represents the implementation of self-concept” with results “providing an impressive amount of empirical support for the general aspects of Super's theory” (Osipow, 1973, p. 163). Salomone and Slaney (1978) and Kidd (1984) examined the role of self-concept with regard to socio-economic conditions. Their findings indicated that along with intelligence, interests, and social status, socio-economic condition was an important determinant of career development. Self-concept research was also done by Healy (1968) and Morrison (1962) with middle-class students in secondary schools and universities.

Much additional research has been done with regard to Super’s vocational maturity concept. Fitzgerald and Crites (1980), Harmon (1974), Lunneborg (1978), and Richardson (1974) conducted studies with both female and male high school and college students. Gribbons (1964) and Gribbons and Lohnes’ (1966; 1968; 1969) longitudinal research tested the hypothesis that occupational choice is indeed a sequential, developmental process. Results indicated that during the time period of eighth to tenth grades, overall awareness of interests and values in relation to the educational-vocational decisions increased, but many educational-vocational decisions were still made based on irrelevant information.

Super’s life-span, life-space theory “has the virtue of building upon aspects of the mainstream of developmental psychology and personality theory with considerable utility for both practice and research in vocational psychology” (Osipow & Fitzgerald, 1996, p. 143). Borgen (1986) called Super “a superordinate thinker whose theory reflects an encyclopedic approach to scholarship” concluding that “Super’s comprehensive conceptual work has splendidly stood the test of time [in that] new ideas and trends are immediately comparable with his work” (p. 278). But specific suggestions for theoretical and empirical concerns regarding racial/ethnic minorities are assessed by Fouad and Arbona (1994), Leong (1995), and Fouad and Bingham (1995).

Super (1983) espoused "early vocational guidance and counseling for exploratory purposes and progress through a series of learning experiences so that choices would emerge from experience" (p. 31). Additionally, because Super envisioned life as linked stages with minicycles of growth, exploration, establishment, maintenance, and decline (McDaniels & Gysbers, 1992; Super, 1990), “career development should focus on decision making over the life span . . . (and) not be restricted to occupational choice only” (McDaniels & Gysbers, p. 50).

Interest Inventory Developmental History
Parsons (1909), a pioneer in vocational guidance, and other counselors working with him in Boston around the turn of the century saw a strong need for individual analysis, individual occupational study, and counselors who were able to share with the counselee the interpretative activities necessary for successful vocational guidance, but the “lack of adequate techniques of individual analysis meant that most of that work relied on self-analysis” (Super, 1942, p. 2). Establishing the Vocations Bureau in Boston, Parsons chose to help adolescents to identify their capabilities and to choose jobs with reasonable success expectations. In order to accomplish this, Parsons suggested young people read biographies, observe workers on the job, and examine then-existing occupational descriptions.

Early researchers such as Alfred Binet, Arthur Otis, and Lewis Terman began studying individual differences in intelligence and developing tests to measure these differences prior to World War I (Super, 1983). Because of the need to classify large numbers of new entrants into the Army and to assign them to appropriate types of military jobs, the Army built on previous research and pioneered the use of intelligence testing and developed special aptitude tests. Those technologists, interested in providing tools for practitioners who were involved in these efforts, led the way in the development of instruments and methods and their use in personnel selection, training, and vocational counseling (Super, 1981).

Between 1935-40, the Minnesota Employment Stabilization Research Institute (MESRI), which developed psychological tests and methods for the assessment of the abilities and interests of the unemployed, studied the reeducation potential and problems faced by the unemployed and demonstrated methods of retraining and reeducation. Super (1983) finds the result of MESRI’s work to be the creation of what became known as occupational ability patterns (profiles) providing evidence of the feasibility of measuring many dimensions of individual differences and using these in vocational guidance and placement.

From the impetus of the Minnesota work came the development of the Dictionary of Occupational Titles (DOT; U.S. Department of Labor, 1940) which presented data concerning the working conditions, worker requirements, and employment opportunities in various occupations. The DOT, General Aptitude Test Battery (Dvorak, 1947), and the Occupational Outlook Handbook, (U.S. Department of Labor, 1949) provided badly needed tools to counselors who had been “handicapped by many (previous) information voids” (Srebalus et al., 1982). Available to defense contractors and the military at the end of the Depression era, these new tools provided for classification and assignment of men and women gearing up for the World War II effort.

As World War II ended, other organizations sprang up, evolved, and gained momentum. The pre-World War II Cooperative Test Service became the Educational Testing Service with a focus on testing and providing guidance for college admissions (Super, 1983). With similar objectives of testing and guidance, the American College Testing program provided the launching pad for John Holland in the development of his theory of occupational choice as a process of matching one’s self with a job situation (Holland, 1973). Career counselors were now able to rely on tests and measurement devices and a library of occupational information with both references for clients and technical manuals for counselor use (Srebalus et al., 1982) in their counseling efforts.

The early 1950s brought new and important contributors to the field of career development and counseling, such as Eli Ginzberg (Ginzberg et al.,1951), Anne Roe (1956), and Donald Super (1957). These theoreticians began to look at psychological variables, such as the process of human development, and how these variables affect career choice. Whereas prior to this time, vocational decisions had been considered a one-time decision made in adolescence, now emphasis shifted to viewing a vocational decision in the context of the person’s developmental history. These radical new ideas broke drastically from the traditional trait and factor theory.

Virginia R. Richards, EdD