Integrating personality and career adaptability into vocational interest space

The relations between interests, personality and career adaptability were explored in two separate studies. In the first study, the RIASEC measure Occupational Preference Scale was applied along with personality inventories HEXACO-PI-(R)-100 and IPIP-50 on a sample of 602 university students and young adults. In the second study, PGI-Short, HEXACO-60 and Career Adapt-Abilities Scale were applied on a sample of 981 high-school graduates. Results from both studies were discussed together, and general conclusions about overlapping of interests, personality and career adaptability domains were drawn on the basis of correlational analyses and property vector fitting. Both studies have shown weak to moderate relations between interests and personality. In the HEXACO framework, it was found that Openness to Experience was positively related to creative interests, Emotionality was positively related to social interests and negatively related to technical interests, Extraversion was positively related to social and managing interests, and Honesty–Humility was negatively related to interests for business and finance. In the Big Five framework, Agreeableness was related to Social and Artistic interests, and Intellect to Artistic interests. The HEXACO personality domains showed predictive advantage for explaining interests in comparison to Big Five dimensions. The relation between career adaptability and interests was weak, and almost negligible when personality was included in hierarchical regression analysis. Career adaptability was weakly related to highly prestigious interests. Adaptability facets Concern, Control and Confidence were oriented toward data pole of interest space. The general factor of interests was weakly correlated with Openness Extraversion, Career Adaptability, and adaptability facets Confidence and Curiosity. Observed findings are as expected and in line with previous research.     

How do affected interests support global democracy?

In this paper, I critique one way of arguing for global democracy on grounds of affected interests and defend another. A famous argument for global democracy, which I call the Demos-Based Argument, attempts to justify global democracy based on the claim that affected interests vindicate individual claims to democratic participation or representation. I analyze and evaluate the Demos-Based Argument and consider different ways of interpreting and justifying its crucial premise: the Principle of Affected Interests. The result is that the argument fails. One lesson of the discussion of the Demos-Based Argument is that the most promising, though eventually unsuccessful, justification of the Principle of Affected Interests is utilitarian. Given the failure of the Demos-Based Argument, the question suggests itself if there is another way to argue for global democracy on utilitarian grounds. I will outline a promising alternative argument for global democracy, which I call the Direct Argument. Like the Demos-Based Argument, the Direct Argument is based on affected interests and ultimately on utilitarianism, but unlike the former, the Direct Argument avoids the detour over stating a criterion for individual claims to democratic participation and representation.     

经济全球化的若干伦理思考

经济全球化已经成为当代社会的客观事实和发展趋势。经济全球化的实质是人类利益实现形式的转换与更新。经济全球化中,不同利益主体需要遵循一定的道德要求,即全球伦理,以实现稳定的经济秩序和自身的利益。但全球伦理的实现是一个漫长而艰苦的过程,需要克服一系列价值观和价值取向的障碍,乃至冲破政治上霸权主义的干扰。     

Structure of RIASEC scores in China: A structural meta-analysis

A structural meta-analysis was conducted to evaluate the fit of four different representations of the relations among RIASEC types, [13] and [14] circular order model, Gati’s (1991) three-group partition model, Rounds and Tracey’s (1996) alternative three-group partition model, and Liu and Rounds’ (2003) modified octant model, on 29 RIASEC correlation matrices collected from Chinese participants. The randomization test of hypothesized order relations was used to evaluate model fit. The results indicated that Holland’s model had the worst fit and was lower than it is fit in US samples; while Gati’s and Rounds and Tracey’s models had best fit. The fit of the Liu and Rounds’ model lay between the fit of Holland’s model and the other models. There was minimal difference in this ordering of model fit across instrument, age, gender and region. These results are interpreted with respect to differences in Chinese culture relative to the US.     

Stability and change in interests: A longitudinal examination of grades 7 through college

The joint issue of stability and change of interests in adolescence and early adulthood was investigated longitudinally over three years in three different grade cohorts. The patterns of structural stability, mean stability, rank order stability, and profile stability as well as how these patterns were moderated by gender were examined based on three cohorts of grades 7 and 8 (n = 3191), grades 9 and 10 (n = 6818), and grades 11 and 12 (n = 1078) using the Personal Globe Inventory-Short (Tracey, 2010). Results indicated that adherence to the RIASEC circular model was high and stable; there was a lack of appreciable change in interest means; interests were stable; interest crystallization, profile, and pattern were stable. While the results supported late adolescence and early adulthood being a stable period for interests in general, more changes were found among male and younger students. The implication of the current study was discussed along with its limitations and suggestions for future research.     

Predicting occupational interests and choice aspirations in Portuguese high school students: A test of social cognitive career theory

The predictive utility of social cognitive career theory’s (SCCT) interest and choice models was examined in a sample of 600 Portuguese high school students. Participants completed measures of occupational self-efficacy, outcome expectations, interests, social supports and barriers, and choice consideration across the six Holland (1997) RIASEC types. The integrated interest-choice model fit the data well across Holland types and generally supported the hypotheses that self-efficacy and outcome expectations jointly predict interests, and that interests mediate the relations of self-efficacy and outcome expectations to choice consideration. Contrary to SCCT, however, social supports and barriers related to choice consideration indirectly, through self-efficacy, rather than directly. The implications of these findings for further research on the cross-cultural validity of SCCT are considered.     

Testing the choice model of social cognitive career theory across Holland themes: A meta-analytic path analysis

Social cognitive career theory (SCCT; Lent, Brown, & Hackett, 1994) seeks to explain the factors that shape educational and vocational interests and choices. We used meta-analytic path analyses to synthesize data (from 1981 to 2008) relevant to SCCT’s interest and choice hypotheses, organizing the literature according to Holland’s (1997) broad occupational themes. Sufficient data were available to test (a) a 6-variable version of the interest/choice model in the Realistic, Investigative, and Enterprising themes, and (b) a 4-variable version of the model in the Artistic, Social, and Conventional themes. Analyses of both model versions were generally consistent with theoretical expectations. However, tests of the 6-variable model indicated better support for representing the pathways from contextual variables to choice goals as being partially mediated by self-efficacy and outcome expectations rather than as producing only direct linkages to goals. We consider implications of the findings for theory, research, and SCCT-based interventions.     

The development of conceptual interests in young children

We conducted a longitudinal analysis of the relative intensity and duration of interests associated with conceptual domains between the ages of 4 and 6 years, respectively. Results indicated a significant portion of preschool children do sustain an interest in conceptual domains during some portion of their childhood. Expected gender differences were found, with boys more likely to express an interest in a conceptual domain than girls. A latent growth curve analysis revealed that the probability of exhibiting a conceptual interest declined as school began, though the rate of that decline was similar for both boys and girls. Potential explanations for the decrease in conceptual interests as school begins are considered.     

Longitudinal relations of self-efficacy to outcome expectations, interests, and major choice goals in engineering students

We examined the nature of the temporal relations among the core person variables in the social cognitive model of academic and career choice [Lent, R. W., Brown, S. D., & Hackett, G. (1994). Toward a unifying social cognitive theory of career and academic interest, choice, and performance [Monograph]. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 45, 79-122.]. Participants were 209 students taking beginning level engineering courses at either a predominantly White or a historically Black university. They completed measures of self-efficacy, outcome expectations, interests, and goals near the end of two consecutive semesters. Path analyses indicated support for a model in which self-efficacy served as a temporal precursor of outcome expectations, interests, and goals. There was less support for a model in which the latter variables produced reciprocal paths to self-efficacy. Implications for future longitudinal research on SCCT’s (social cognitive career theory’s) choice hypotheses are discussed.     

Social cognitive model of adjustment to engineering majors: Longitudinal test across gender and race/ethnicity

We conducted a longitudinal test of a social cognitive model of academic adjustment in a sample of 732 engineering students. The model, designed to explain students' satisfaction with and intentions to persist in their majors, integrated features of social cognitive career theory's (SCCT) segmental models of satisfaction, interest, choice, and performance (Lent & Brown, 2006; Lent, Brown, & Hackett, 1994). Students completed measures of academic support, self-efficacy, outcome expectations, interests, satisfaction, positive affect, and intended persistence at three time points (at the end of their second, third, and fourth semesters in engineering). A bidirectional version of the model offered good fit to the data, both in the larger sample and across gender and racial/ethnic groups. Self-efficacy was the most reliable direct predictor of academic satisfaction and intended persistence across the third and fourth semesters, though other social cognitive variables also contributed, either directly or indirectly, to predictions at one time point or the other. We consider implications of the findings for further research and practice on academic adjustment and persistence in STEM fields.