Personality Factors and Inhibited Career Development: Testing the Unique Contribution of Shyness

This study evaluated the hypothesis that shyness is uniquely associated with delayed development of personal resources for dealing with career tasks during the college years. In addition to shyness, the set of relevant personality factors included academic self-esteem and dysphoria. Canonical correlation and semipartial analysis were used to assess the mutual and unique variance associated with these three personality factors and a set of career development variables pertinent to college students in late adolescence. Results revealed that shyness was uniquely related with vocational self-concept crystallization and aspects of vocational maturity (e.g., attitudes toward planning), but unrelated with indexes of self and environmental exploration. Academic self-esteem was only related to vocational self-concept, while dysphoria evidenced no unique association with any career variables. Implications of the expected and unexpected findings are discussed.