Journal of Career Assessment

In spite of the proliferation of job/career Web sites and the many articles and books discussing how to use these sites in job searching, we know of no research dealing with career assessment on the Internet. In an effort to remedy this deficit, the authors located a multitude of career sites containing a bewildering array of offerings. The research reported here focused on 24 Web career sites identified as having no-cost career assessment. While easy to use, the sites provided only a moderate degree of test interpretation and fit into a schema of career planning only to a limited extent. The authors' subjective overall evaluation of these sites was not high (3.3 on a 5-point scale)—just above the mid-point of "Neither good nor poor." Ratings of the factors based on the National Career Development Association (NCDA) guidelines for career planning on the Internet tended to be low: few sites provided much information about the developers of the site, no site asserted that its assessment instrument was validated for self-use, and no site stated that the sites to which it provided links met NCDA guidelines. Most sites provided confidentiality only to a limited extent in that they generally did not ask for the visitor's name and password. The authors discuss implications of their research for career counseling professionals, for career research, and for career site developers.

A Kohonen self-organizing map—a type of artificial neural network similar to κ-means cluster analysis and multidimensional scaling— was used to classify clients into eight categories on the basis of objectively measured aptitudes. The resulting categories bear strong resemblances to major vocational typologies of persons and jobs, especially models proposed by Holland, Gottfredson, Ackerman, and Prediger. Applications of self-organizing neural networks are suggested for psychological assessment in general and career assessment in particular.

Using the social cognitive theory of career and academic behavior as a guide, we conducted a predictive validity study for the Quantitative and Verbal scales of the Task-Specific Occupational Self-Efficacy Scale (TSOSS). The Quantitative and Verbal TSOSS scale scores of a large group of undecided college freshmen were correlated with concurrent quantitative and verbal ability measures (SAT scores) and with subsequent quantitative and verbal performance in academic courses based on GPA. The TSOSS Quantitative scale was related to quantitative ability but failed to predict academic performance in quantitative courses. The TSOSS Verbal scale was unrelated both to a concurrent measure of verbal ability and to subsequent academic performance in verbal courses. These findings are used to provide a preliminary evaluation of the validity of the TSOSS Quantitative and Verbal scales.

The dimensionality of career indecisiveness has continually eluded researchers for several years. These measures have been either purely theoretical or purely empirical, neglecting the other domain. A relatively new instrument, the Career Decision Difficulties Questionnaire (CDDQ), is based on a taxonomy of decision-making difficulties. This study assesses the reliability and construct validity of the CDDQ, along with differences between decided and undecided groups. The sample included 268 university students. Convergent validity was assessed using the Career Decision Scale (CDS). Discriminant validity was assessed using measures of anxiety and social desirability. The CDDQ showed convergence with the CDS, and discriminated against both anxiety and social desirability. Differences between groups were statistically significant on most decision making difficulty scales. The results provide support for the reliability and validity of the CDDQ, suggesting that this measure may be useful in attempting to understand the multidimensionality of career indecisiveness and further assist in the development of a more comprehensive and accurate theoretical perspective of the construct of career indecisiveness.

This article examines the impact of two evaluation conditions on sex-typing of occupations in Israel: "vague instructions" (no specific criterion for assessing gender-based occupational stereotypes), and "gender-related capabilities" (i.e., gender attributes perceived as essential for practicing an occupation). The sample consisted of 614 respondents from four different educational groups: junior high school students, high school students, university students, and teachers. Sex-typing was examined according to three occupational categories: "feminine," "masculine," and "gender neutral," reflecting the representation of the genders in each field in Israel. On the whole it was found that in the "gender-related capabilities" condition respondents expressed less sex-typed perceptions of occupations than in the "vague instructions" condition. In addition, the findings revealed that the university students expressed less sex-typed perceptions than the other education groups in both evaluation conditions. Regarding the impact of gender, the female respondents were generally less sex-typed than the males regardless of evaluation condition. Several practical recom mendations are provided in an attempt to counteract sex-typing of occupations at different educational levels.

The relations between two measures of environmental congruence, skill utilization congruence, and group importance on the one hand, and three measures of well-being (satisfaction, anxiety, and somatic complaints) on the other, were measured. Participants were 118 reserve infantry soldiers constituting four infantry companies. A correlation of .37 was found between skill utilization and group importance and around .66 between each of these variables and satisfaction (all p < .01). Environmental congruence did not yield significant correlations with the well-being measures. The findings are interpreted by reference to specific features of the sample, and the theoretical and practical implications are considered.