Qualitative Career Assessment Research Articles

Influences on Career Decisions: Collaborative systemic exploration of career influences with young Australian undergraduates

AbstractThe shifting labor market conditions paired with an increased responsibility to self‐negotiate career development have exacerbated employment uncertainties for many young undergraduate students. To support their career development, qualitative career assessment instruments facilitating reflexivity could play a role. This research focused on “Influences on Career Decisions” (ICD) and aimed to explore its use with young Australian undergraduate students and its potential in facilitating reflective careers and employment conversations. Six participants attended career interviews that utilized ICD. Findings revealed ICD's role in the facilitation of a collaborative and systemic career exploration process. Implications for career practice and research are outlined.

Reconstructing Stories of Career Adaptability Through the Integrative Structured Interview for Undergraduate University Students

Career adaptability (CA) is promoted as a skill to navigate the 21st-century labour market. With an emphasis on narrative career counselling as a more relevant form of practice for supporting the career development of people in such rapidly shifting times, it is important to explore the possibility of facilitating a narrative space through which people can tell and connect with their stories of career adaptability. Various qualitative career assessment instruments promote storytelling facilitation which is a major task of narrative career counselling. The Integrative Structured Interview (ISI) is one such qualitative career assessment instrument that facilitates systemic and context-sensitive career storytelling through the integration of quantitative and qualitative career assessments. This study explores the potential role of the ISI in assisting Australian undergraduate students to tell career stories in which the five dimensions of career adaptability can manifest. A theory-driven deductive thematic analysis based on the five dimensions of career adaptability informed data analysis. Key findings reveal the ISI can assist participants in telling stories of career adaptability. Findings also highlight the ISI’s role in providing participants with a systemic and context-sensitive understanding of their career interests through a systemic deconstruction of their Holland code.

Exploring the future career autobiography with young Australian undergraduate students: autobiographical opportunities for career storytelling and narrative change

ABSTRACT This study examined the Future Career Autobiography (FCA) with six Australian undergraduate students. The study aimed to explore: (1) the FCA as a qualitative career assessment instrument that facilitates career storytelling and reflexivity on future career plans and (2) the implications of narrative career assessment procedures that reflexively and systemically engage young students in career research. The findings confirmed some narrative changes in the participants’ FCA paragraphs. These changes were more substantial for participants with less certain career plans. The findings extended the evidence base for the FCA beyond its role in qualitatively measuring narrative change, as an instrument that promotes autobiographicity and facilitates reflexivity. By introducing the exit interview questions, this research substantiated FCA’s applications in practice and research.

Career development learning in childhood: a collaborative guidance approach in Spanish low-income contexts

ABSTRACT This research analyses childhood career development learning through a qualitative career assessment. To help children to make meaning of the career influences, culturally sensitive procedures were used. A case-study design has been carried out, using techniques such as mapping, family portrait, role-playing and self-portrait to unveil the process of 5-year old children's career development learning. The findings illustrate the process of meaning making of the children's system of influences in low-income contexts. They show the life themes that shape the construction of identities. The conclusion highlights the usefulness of qualitative career assessment in enhancing career development learning. The use of culturally sensitive procedures allows children to raise critical awareness about the factors that influence their career construction.

AKITA: A CAREER COUNSELING CASE FOR PRACTICE AND THEORETICAL REFLECTION

A case in the Hong Kong Chinese context is presented in this paper to illustrate the use of both quantitative (Holland's SDS) and qualitative career assessment (Card Sorts) to help a 16-year-old girl overcome career indecision. Guided by both Holland's Hexagonal Career Types Theory and Socio-Cognitive Career Theory, a career counsellor can promote a client's positive changes after two counseling sessions. This case supports Tracey's (2002) and Nauta et al.'s (2002) postulated bidirectional causal path between self-efficacy and interests. In addition, it highlights that partial match instead of perfect match between Self-directed search (SDS) scores and choice of academic major is more pragmatic or effective while performing quantitative assessment. Finally, it points to the need for establishing local SDS norms, examining the Holland codes for occupations in Hong Kong, and researching the link between congruence and maximal career outcomes in future research.

The Systems Theory Framework of career development: Applications to career counselling and career assessment

Since its inception, the Systems Theory Framework of career development has afforded ready translation into practice, especially into career counselling and qualitative career assessment. Through its clearly articulated constructs and the clarity of its diagrammatic representation, the Systems Theory Framework has facilitated the development of qualitative career assessment instruments as well as a quantitative measure. This article briefly overviews these practical applications of the Systems Theory Framework as well as its application in career counselling through a story telling approach. The article concludes by offering a synthesis of and considering future directions for the Systems Theory Framework’s practical applications.

Career counselling in South African higher education: Moving forward systemically and qualitatively

In the context of a rapidly transforming society, the present article discusses issues facing career counselling in higher education in South Africa. Using the Systems Theory Framework of career development, the article considers the multi-levelled and multi-layered national and international context in which the challenges facing career counselling are located. Through a case study of a Black South African higher educationstudent, an application of a qualitative career assessment approach is described as one practical response to these challenges. The opportunity for career counsellors to respond proactively by coordinating a systemic response to the limitations of their discipline in higher education in South Africa is proposed.

Career Psychology Research Challenges: A Systems Theory Response

International and South African debate on the future direction of career psychology has suggested a movement towards qualitative, narrative and storied approaches that are informed by the constructivist worldview. The My System of Career Influences (MSCI) reflection process is a qualitative career assessment tool developed in South Africa and Australia and derived from the constructivist Systems Theory Framework (STF) of career development. As a technique, the MSCI demonstrates versatility of application in one on one career counselling or in group settings such as classrooms. More recently, its utility as an innovative research tool has been explored. We overview the STF and the subsequent development of the qualitative career assessment tool, the My System of Career Influences. We describe examples of empirical investigations that use the MSCI as a research tool. The potential of this emerging body of research to address issues facing career development in the postmodern era and in South Africa specifically is discussed.

An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis of Adult Clients' Experience of My Career Chapter

This paper reports a study of adult clients' experience of My Career Chapter, which is a theoretically-informed, qualitative career assessment and counselling procedure. My Career Chapter engenders personal exploration through a client's writing and reading aloud a career-related autobiography, which is formulated on the basis of structured steps and a sentence-completion process. In a predominantly qualitative, mixed method design (i.e., QUAL+quan), interpretative phenomenological analysis of six interview transcripts constructed three major clusters representative of clients' experiences: implications for instructions and guidelines; induction of personal contemplation and self-reflection; and positive emotional experience. Secondary quantitative data aligned with the primary qualitative results. The results of this study were consistent with and extend upon previous research; and were indicative of the safety and potential of My Career Chapter as a narrative career assessment and counselling procedure for adults.

Systemic Influences on Career Development: Assisting Clients to Tell Their Career Stories

A challenge for career theory informed by constructivism is how to apply it in practice. This article describes a career counseling intervention based on the constructivist Systems Theory Framework (STF) of career development and the qualitative career assessment instrument derived from it, the My System of Career Influences (MSCI; M. McMahon, W. Patton, & M. Watson, 2005a, 2005b; M. McMahon, M. Watson, & W. Patton, 2005) refection process. The article provides an overview of the STF, describes the MSCI, and illustrates the application of the MSCI in a counseling process with an adolescent.

South African Adolescents' Career Development through the Lens of the Systems Theory Framework: An Exploratory Study

Adolescent career development has predominantly been studied in the context of middle class Eurocentric cultures and there have been calls for greater attention to the career development of non-dominant and disadvantaged groups. Further, there have been calls to explore career development in terms of its context and process. In this regard, the need for research measures and approaches sensitive to adolescents and particular cultures has been recognised. This is particularly the case in South African career psychology. The present study used a qualitative career assessment instrument, My System of Career Influences, to explore influences on the career development of disadvantaged South African adolescents living in a children's home. Consistent with previous international and national studies, parents were shown to be an important influence. Unlike previous studies, the influence of working overseas was also identified as an important influence. The MSCI was shown to be effective in providing insight into both the context and process of career development and as a research instrument that may be used with adolescents. Recommendations for future research are made.

Counsellors' Personal Experience and Appraisal of My Career Chapter

This study investigated a qualitative career assessment and counselling procedure that was founded upon a constructivist, narrative approach to career counselling, My Career Chapter: A Dialogical Autobiography(McIlveen, 2006). Counsellors were trained in the use of the procedure and then applied it to themselves in an intensive workshop format. Intepretative phenomenological analysis was used for the research methodology. Counsellors were then interviewed to determine (a) their personal experience of My Career Chapter and (b) their appraisal of its alignment with a set of recommendations for the design and use of qualitative assessment procedures. Four superordinate clusters were derived from the data and these included my career chapter's relationship to theory, its administrative process, the counselling process, and the counselling relationship. The results indicated that My Career Chapter satisfied the recommendations for qualitative procedures. Possible amendments to the procedure were discussed.

Qualitative Career Assessment: An Overview and Analysis

Qualitative career assessments are theoretically based interventions that are grounded in constructivism. Constructivism is a departure from the traditional logical positive worldview that has influenced the development of many traditional career assessments. A central concept to constructivism is the importance of meaning, which can only be understood in relation to context. Qualitative career assessment is idiographic in nature, and the individual serves as the reference point in both identifying pertinent themes and interpreting the meaning of those events. Furthermore, there is often a focus on social processes and the understanding that one’s view of the world is not static and is concurrently influenced by historical and cultural contexts that are continually changing and developing. Qualitative assessment often is seen as a potentially useful method for attending to issues related to diversity in career assessment. Because the purpose of qualitative assessment often is to co-construct a working narrative, the clinician must be skillful enough to not misinterpret clients’ discourse or unduly influence clients’ understanding of the meaning of their experiences. In addition, the advantages of integrating qualitative and quantitative career assessments are explored.

Qualitative Career Assessment: Developing the My System of Career Influences Reflection Activity

This article reports on the development of a qualitative career assessment activity, the My System of Career Influences (MSCI) Reflection Activity. The article describes the process of developing and testing the instrument. The testing was conducted in two stages with adults and adolescents. Findings from Stage 1 indicate that the MSCI (pilot version) is a useful instrument that warrants separate versions for adults and adolescents. Findings from Stage 2 indicate that the MSCI (adolescent version) is a useful instrument that is appropriate for use with adolescents. Suggestions for future refinement and testing of the MSCI are presented.

Creating Career Stories through Reflection: An Application of the Systems Theory Framework of Career Development

The Systems Theory Framework (STF) of career development represents a metatheoretical account of career development that is consistent with the constructivist worldview. Presented as a framework of influences, the STF clearly illustrates the content and process of career development. The STF has provided the stimulus for the development of a qualitative career assessment process, a guided reflection titled ‘My System of Career Influences’ (MSCI) (McMahon, Patton, & Watson, 2003a). Using the content subsystems as aspects in a process of guided reflection, clients engage in the construction of their own career stories by reflecting on their system of career influences. A series of questions guide reflection on the meaning of these influences. The MSCI reflection activity may be completed individually, in groups, or with the assistance of a career counsellor or career teacher. The development and trialling of the MSCI will be outlined in this paper.

Developing Qualitative Career Assessment Processes

Assessment has been integral to career counseling since the early 1900s. During that time, the greatest amount of attention was focused on quantitative assessment. Thus, there is still very little to guide the development and conduct of qualitative assessment in career counseling. The authors present an overview of qualitative career assessment and its theoretical underpinnings and propose suggestions that could guide the development of qualitative career assessment instruments.

Using Qualitative Appraisal Strategies in Career Counseling

This article examines the role of qualitative career assessment strategies in career counseling. Their use, especially in enlivening the career counseling process, is emphasized. Four specific procedures—life career assessment, life line, genogram, and Super's (Super, Savickas, & Super, 1996) Life Career Rainbow—are discussed.