Relationship of Interest Measurement from the Copsystem Interest Inventory (Form P) and the Strong Campbell Interest Inventory (SCII): Construct Validation of Two Measures of Interest at the College Level

Abstract

The 1969 revision of the Strong Vocational Interest Blank (SVIB) introducted to that instrument the concept of homogeneously keyed scales presenting 23 Basic Interest scales, and the 1974 revision, the Strong-Campbell Interest Inventory (SCII) integrated the six Holland types into the scoring in terms of six Theme scales (Campbell and Hansen, 1981)-29 scales in all. These changes acknowledging the theoretical structures of occupational interests make comparisons between the SCII constructs and other homogeneously keyed instruments more meaningful. The purpose of the present study was to provide construct validity data by evaluating the relationship between results obtained from the college level form of the Carrer Occupational Preference System, Interest Inventory, Form P (COPS-P) (Knapp-Lee, Knapp, and Knapp, 1983) and those of the Theme and Basic Interest scales of the SCII. Correlations were computed between the COPS-P scales and both the SCII Theme and Basic Interest scales for a sample of 122 college students. The magnitude of correlations between conceptually similar COPS-P and SCII Theme scales ranged between .29 and .72 with the median being .60. In virtually every instance the COPS-P scale was more highly related to the theoretically consistent SCII Theme scale than to any other Theme scale in the array. In a comparison of the COPS-P scales with the SCII Basic Interest Scales, an examination of relationships between those scales which have identical, or nearly identical, names did show a range in magnitude of .37 to .81 with a median of .68. The highest correlation was between the COPS-P Communication, Written scale and the SCII Basic Interest scale, Writing. The pattern of correlations between the COPS-P scales and the SCII Theme scales provided support for the theoretical constructs measured by the two instruments.