Are you interested? A meta-analysis of relations between vocational interests and employee performance and turnover

A common belief among researchers is that vocational interests have limited value for personnel selection. However, no comprehensive quantitative summaries of interests validity research have been conducted to substantiate claims for or against the use of interests. To help address this gap, we conducted a meta-analysis of relations between interests and employee performance and turnover using data from 74 studies and 141 independent samples. Overall validity estimates (corrected for measurement error in the criterion but not for range restriction) for single interest scales were .14 for job performance, .26 for training performance, -.19 for turnover intentions, and -.15 for actual turnover. Several factors appeared to moderate interest-criterion relations. For example, validity estimates were larger when interests were theoretically relevant to the work performed in the target job. The type of interest scale also moderated validity, such that corrected validities were larger for scales designed to assess interests relevant to a particular job or vocation (e.g., .23 for job performance) than for scales designed to assess a single, job-relevant realistic, investigative, artistic, social, enterprising, or conventional (i.e., RIASEC) interest (.10) or a basic interest (.11). Finally, validity estimates were largest when studies used multiple interests for prediction, either by using a single job or vocation focused scale (which tend to tap multiple interests) or by using a regression-weighted composite of several RIASEC or basic interest scales. Overall, the results suggest that vocational interests may hold more promise for predicting employee performance and turnover than researchers may have thought.     

Reconsidering vocational interests for personnel selection: the validity of an interest-based selection test in relation to job knowledge, job performance, and continuance intentions

Although vocational interests have a long history in vocational psychology, they have received extremely limited attention within the recent personnel selection literature. We reconsider some widely held beliefs concerning the (low) validity of interests for predicting criteria important to selection researchers, and we review theory and empirical evidence that challenge such beliefs. We then describe the development and validation of an interests-based selection measure. Results of a large validation study (N = 418) reveal that interests predicted a diverse set of criteria—including measures of job knowledge, job performance, and continuance intentions—with corrected, cross-validated Rs that ranged from .25 to .46 across the criteria (mean R = .31). Interests also provided incremental validity beyond measures of general cognitive aptitude and facets of the Big Five personality dimensions in relation to each criterion. Furthermore, with a couple exceptions, the interest scales were associated with small to medium subgroup differences, which in most cases favored women and racial minorities. Taken as a whole, these results appear to call into question the prevailing thought that vocational interests have limited usefulness for selection.     

Getting interested in interests for employee selection: Key concerns and areas for future research

The paper by Wille and De Fruyt suggests that vocational interests should be used throughout the human resources cycle and provides a useful model that can facilitate the application of interests throughout this process. This commentary builds on their review to discuss the unique benefits and challenges of implementing vocational interests in the employee selection process. Using research from the employee selection literature, we also discuss potential solutions for many of the issues raised by Wille and De Fruyt. Therefore, our commentary is meant to supplement the focal article and answer specific questions about why and how vocational interests can be used in this high-stakes setting.     

Usefulness of Gati's Hierarchical Model of Vocational Interests for Career Counselors

Career counseling is complicated and involved, requiring counselors to use a conceptual framework to help guide them through the process. Using a case study, the author demonstrates how Gati's hierarchical model of vocational interests can assist counselors in working with clients concerned about their careers.     

高校毕业生择业焦虑的心理教育实验研究

通过组织择业心理辅导小组对毕业生择业焦虑进行干预,考察其心理教育效果.采用实验组、对照组前后测实验设计,以《高校毕业生择业焦虑问卷》和《状态-特质焦虑量表》为测量工具.结果表明,实验组(n=18)与对照组(n=34)的后测结果差异显著,实验组与对照组的前后测结果差量之间有显著差异,对前测结果进行控制的协方差分析也表明实验组与对照组的组间差异显著.说明研究所设计的小组心理辅导与行为治疗相结合的心理教育方案是帮助毕业生克服择业焦虑的有效方法,可用于毕业生择业心理教育.     

The General Factor of Personality (GFP) and Vocational Interests: a Test of Social Effectiveness at the Behavioral and Genetic Level

Journal of Business and Psychology - Previous studies have examined how personality models (e.g., Big Five, HEXACO) relate to vocational interests. We adopt a novel approach by testing the...     

Neglected aspects and truncated appraisals in vocational counseling: Interpreting the interest-efficacy association from a broader perspective: Comment on Armstrong and Vogel (2009)

Invited commentary on Armstrong and Vogel's (2009) article on interpreting the interest-efficacy association stimulated an appraisal from a broader perspective. Like empirical research, scale development, and theorizing emanating from social cognitive career theory (SCCT), their conclusion about the importance of assessing both interests and self-efficacy in applied settings and speculations about the developmental sequencing of these attributes need to be evaluated in the context of what decades of longitudinal research reveal are critical determinants of educational and vocational choice, performance after choice, and persistence. For our interventions to be effective and our theory development to be meaningful, we must ensure that innovative measures possess incremental validity relative to cognitive abilities and educational-vocational interests, which are already well established as salient predictors of long-term educational-vocational outcomes. Broader historical, philosophical, and scientific perspectives are provided to enhance practice, research, and theory development. These broader perspectives reveal how well-positioned vocational counseling is for further advances if it builds on (rather than neglects) its longstanding tradition of developing a cumulative psychological science.     

Holland's vocational models: A study of work groups and need satisfaction

This study was designed to investigate two topics: (1) the concurrent validity of Holland's theory for employed men, and (2) the pattern of needs associated with occupations exemplifying each of Holland's vocational models. Concurrent validity was investigated by administering the Vocational Preference Inventory to 230 male workers well established in occupational milieus that match Holland's six vocational environments. With the exception of the Realistic scale of the VPI, the five remaining vocational scales distributed eight work groups, identified as representative of each of Holland's six vocational models, in a comparable fashion according to their interests. Empirical results on two nonvocational scales (Masculinity and Status) support Holland's vocational models.     

The relationship between vocational interests and job satisfaction: Reconciliation of divergent results

It was hypothesized that congruency of vocational interests with present occupation would be positively related to job satisfaction for long job-tenured employees, and would be unrelated to satisfaction for short job-tenured employees. In two samples of 54 and 47 middle managers, the hypothesis was supported for satisfaction with work and supervision. This differential pattern of correlations may help explain the inconsistent relationship between vocational interests and job satisfaction obtained in past studies.     

Validation of the multicultural personality questionnaire in the context of personnel selection

The present data provide support for the reliability of the Multicultural Personality Questionnaire among a sample of job applicants (n=264). Factor analysis confirmed five factors: Cultural Empathy, Open‐Mindedness, Social Initiative, Flexibility, and Emotional Stability. Moreover, the data largely support the construct validity of the MPQ. Correlations with the Big Five were in the expected direction, and as predicted, Cultural Empathy and Social Initiative were both positively related to socially oriented vocational interests and Flexibility to artistic interests. Against our predictions, Cultural Empathy, Open‐Mindedness, and Flexibility appeared to be related to verbal intelligence. A comparable pattern of relations of the Big Five with intelligence and vocational interests was found. Finally, the MPQ scales predicted variance in an indicator of overall behaviour above the Big Five, supporting its incremental validity. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Psychometric properties of the Chinese Self-Directed Search (1994 edition)

In this study, we (a) examined the measurement equivalence/invariance (ME/I) of the Chinese Self-Directed Search (SDS; 1994 edition) across gender and geographic regions (Mainland China vs. Hong Kong); (b) assessed the construct validity of the Chinese SDS using [Widaman, 1985] and [Widaman, 1992] MTMM framework; and (c) determined whether vocational interests are measured equivalently by Chinese SDS subtests. Confirmatory factor analyses suggested that males and females from Mainland China and Hong Kong interpreted the instrument in conceptually similar manner. Also, the Chinese SDS demonstrated sound construct validity. However, we found that like-named interests were not measured equivalently by the SDS subtests.     

The Roles of Personality Traits and Vocational Interests in Explaining What People Want Out of Life

Life goals reflect people’s aspirations of what they want to become and what kind of life they want to live. In two student samples from the United States (N = 385) and Iceland (N = 1338), we used hierarchical regression and relative weights analyses to first replicate Roberts and Robins (2000) finding that Big Five personality traits predict major life goals, and then to test whether vocational interests have incremental validity in explaining major life goals over and above personality traits. Overall, vocational interests explained larger amounts of variance in major life goals than personality traits, and added incremental validity above and beyond personality traits. Expectations about specific linkages were largely confirmed across the two samples, providing implications for theory and practice.     

Convergent and Discriminant Validity of Five Interest Inventories

This study investigated whether interest inventories that purport to measure the same constructs actually yield scores that correspond. The study examined the empirical relation of scores for similarly and same-named scales on five widely used interest inventories: the Campbell Interest and Skills Survey, the Kuder Occupational Interest Survey-Form DD, the Self-Directed Search, the Strong Interest Inventory-Skills Confidence Edition, and the Revised Unisex Edition of the ACT Interest Inventory. Comparisons were made among scores for (a) vocational interests measured by homogeneous, rationally based scales; (b) occupational interests measured by heterogeneous, criterion-based scales; and (c) self-efficacy for RIASEC tasks. The participants consisted of 80 women and 38 men employed as career counseling practitioners and professors. Results from analyses of multitrait-multimethod matrices indicated that similarly and same-named scales correlated moderately and that, with few exceptions, these matched scales demonstrated convergent and discriminant validity. These conclusions were interpreted by distinguishing between the linguistic explication and operational definition of constructs in theories of vocational and occupational interests. The implications of these interpretations were considered for both the science of vocational psychology and the practice of career counseling. Future research should investigate both the profile validity and the interpretive validity of interest inventories that yield scale scores derived from different scaling strategies.     

Remembering Donald G. Paterson: Before the separation between industrial-organizational and vocational psychology

This article discusses the disconnect between industrial-organizational (I-O) and vocational psychology in the context of Donald Paterson’s career, an applied psychologist who bridged both disciplines. Paterson’s interests in both vocational guidance and personnel selection suggest that these fields are interwoven, despite the prevailing gap separating them in science and practice. Current trends in I-O psychology are discussed that suggest the field is beginning to reconsider the importance of vocational psychology in the modern workplace. We argue that I-O psychology would benefit from such a reconnection by acknowledging its ethical responsibility to improve the workplace for both management and the worker.     

An application of Strong's validity criteria to basic interest scales

E. K. Strong, Jr.'s (Vocational interests of men and women, Stanford, Calif.: Stanford Univ. Press, 1943) four propositions for interest-inventory validity andJ. L. Holland's (Making vocational choices: A theory of careers, Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1973) hexagonal classification system were synthesized in order to adapt a traditional procedure for determining the construct validity of occupational interest scales to the validation of basic interest scales. The procedure was tested using a sample of 4035 males and 3671 females whose interest inventory results as high school students and whose majors as college seniors could be assigned Holland codes. Results of the study indicate that this procedure can be used to assess the construct validity of inventories using basic interest scales.     

Are Gender Differences in Vocational Interests Universal?: Moderating Effects of Cultural Dimensions

Are men and women more similar or different in their interests in careers? This question has propelled decades of research into the association between gender and vocational interests. However, our understanding of this question in an international context remains limited. In this study, we examined gender differences in vocational interests across national and cultural contexts by exploring whether national cultural dimensions would be associated with gender differences in the structure and mean levels of vocational interests in people/things, ideas/data, and prestige. Our findings support similarity in the structure of vocational interests for men and women across 42 countries based on two major models on interests. General trends of gender differences in interests emerge such that in comparison to men, women tend to report a large preference for working with people (versus things; d = 1.04), and smaller preferences for working with ideas (versus data; d = 0.29) and with prestige (d = 0.18). National cultural dimensions appear to moderate gender differences in interests beyond the influences of national gender inequality. Specifically, gender differences in interests in people (versus things) tend to be larger in countries of higher uncertainty avoidance and higher indulgence whereas gender differences in ideas (versus data) tend to be larger in countries of higher indulgence, uncertainty avoidance, and lower power distance. This study highlights how a better conceptualization of the influences of culture can inform vocational psychologists, gender studies researchers, and career counselors’ work with men and women in understanding their vocational interests.

     

Choosing the best method for local validity estimation: relative accuracy of meta-analysis versus a local study versus Bayes-analysis

This study assessed the relative accuracy of 3 techniques--local validity studies, meta-analysis, and Bayesian analysis--for estimating test validity, incremental validity, and adverse impact in the local selection context. Bayes-analysis involves combining a local study with nonlocal (meta-analytic) validity data. Using tests of cognitive ability and personality (conscientiousness) as predictors, an empirically driven selection scenario illustrates conditions in which each of the 3 estimation techniques performs best. General recommendations are offered for how to estimate local parameters, based on true population variability and the number of studies in the meta-analytic prior. Benefits of empirical Bayesian analysis for personnel selection are demonstrated, and equations are derived to help guide the choice of a local validity technique (i.e., meta-analysis vs. local study vs. Bayes-analysis).     

Predictive validity of the medical specialty preference inventory

Medical schools can assist students by providing them with quality career counseling to help them choose a medical specialty. Many schools use interest inventories to help identify students’ specialty interests. This study examined the predictive validity of one such inventory, the Medical Specialty Preference Inventory (MSPI). In a longitudinal design, we used discriminant function analysis to examine how well students’ scores on the MSPI fit their chosen medical specialty one year later. The MSPI correctly predicted students’ future medical specialty choice 58.1% of the time. These results can help career advisors interpret MSPI scores, and identify students’ most likely medical specialty choice, as well as their second most likely choice.     

The resurrection of vocational interests in human resources research and practice: Evidence,challenges, and a working model

A large number of studies conducted over the past two decades reconsidered and supported the validity of vocational interests for predicting a range of important work outcomes. Yet to date, interests remain relatively underused in professional settings, in part because discussions of why, how, and where to use interest assessment tools in an evidence-based manner are lacking and often incomplete. In this article, we briefly review and summarize the available evidence to then further discuss ways in which interest assessment can support various stages of the human resources (HR) cycle, including recruiting, selecting, retaining, and developing employees. From this overview, a number of challenges and apparent paradoxes are derived when working with interests, which may hinder the effective application of these assessments. Therefore, we propose a new working model that treats interest assessments both as “select-out” and “select-in” tools, to identify personal attributes that can either be “must-haves” for an organization in the short term, but at the same time can represent “unique potential” for that organization in the long term. Throughout the text, we also discuss where additional research is needed to further substantiate the use of interests in the HR cycle.