A Problem of Personality: Scientist and Practitioner Differences in Psychology

Abstract

Differences between scientists and practitioners have been one of the most consistent and controversial topics throughout the history of American psychology. Even though tnany qualitative arguments and indirect quantitative studies have been offered in the literature, scientist and practitioner personality perspectives have never been tneasured directly. We have done so in this study, and we argue that these differences can be conceptualized within a personality framework. Results of our study demonstrate that interest in scientist activities and interest in practitioner activities were both predicted by theoretical orientations and vocational personality styles. Scientist and practitioner interests were predicted by these variables in opposite directions. We conclude by noting that while the conflict between scientist and practitioner personality styles is often said to be solvable by appropriate education, training models provide only partial solutions. It would be useful for training models to examine the role of personality differences in scientist-practitioner orientations in order to design realistic progratns and objectives.The nature of the discord between scientists and practitioners has been debated throughout the history of American psychology. The preferred work settings of some psychologists consist of secluded research labs full of a complex array of equipment such as surgical tools and banks of amplifiers. Other psychologists' preferred work settings are intimate therapy rooms each containing two chairs and a tape recorder. Vast

Career Specialty Preferences Among Psychology Majors: Cognitive Processing Styles Associated With Scientist and Practitioner Interests

“…Past research with graduate students has yielded coefficient alphas greater than .90 for both the Scientist and the Practitioner scales (Zachar & Leong, 1992). Replicating results from previous research with undergraduates (Kenney & Rohrbaugh, 1997;Leong & Zachar, 1991;Manning et al, 2006), interest in scientist activities and interest in practitioner activities were positively correlated at r = .39 (p < .01).…”

Career interests of students in psychology specialties degrees: psychometric evidence and correlations with the RIASEC dimensions

“…The area of artistic interest was positively correlated with the I-O dimension, and negatively correlated with educational interests. The positive correlation may conceal the social and research components that are evident in I-O psychology (Zachar and Leong, 1992). The negative correlation between artistic and educational interests may simultaneously explain the positive correlation between educational and both realistic and enterprising.…”

“…However, psychology students who follow different specializations can also be characterized by other RIASEC profiles. For example, despite the fact that interest in research appears positively related to the investigative and artistic types, in practice, it appears to be positively associated with the social type (Zachar & Leong, 1992).…”

“…Currently, many researchers have used the RIASEC and the Scientist-Practitioner Inventory (among others) to provide vocational counseling to help students make career choices in psychology (e.g., Camp & Chartrand, 1992;Leong & Zachar, 1991;Zachar & Leong, 1992). However, these instruments do not specifically focus on the areas in psychology, such as educational, I-O, and clinical psychology.…”

Lesson Learned: Using Clinical Examples for Teaching Research Methods

“…Students express significant preferences for 'human interest courses' (e.g., psychopathology or personality) and even 'scientific psychology' courses (e.g., physiological or cognitive psychology) over courses in research methods or statistics (Rajecki, Appleby, Williams, Johnson, & Jeschke, 2005). This preference may stem from a student's view of the vocational activities of psychologists, his or her motivation for taking psychology courses (Gallucci, 1997), the student's personality (Holmes & Beins, 2009;Zachar & Leong, 1992), or some combination of these.…”