A test of Holland's environment formulations.

Abstract

One hundred and eighty-one occupations, for which reinforcer rating data were available, were classified into the six Holland environment models. Mean reinforcer scale scores were found to differ significantly among the six environments on 17 reinforcer scales, on 12 of which there were significant pairwise differences. Comparison of hypothesized and observed rank orderings of the six environments showed significant agreement on eight reinforcer scales. Comparison of mean score differences between alternating environments with those between opposite or adjacent environments were significantly in the hypothesized direction for three reinforcer scales. Multidimensional scaling of the six environments using correlation and <J 2 as measures of similarity showed the appropriateness of a two-dimensional solution, with an RCSIAE or REAISC ordering (compared with Holland's postulated RIASEC ordering). Position Analysis Questionnaire mean factor scores for five Holland environments were found not to fit a two-dimensional configuration. It is concluded that these occupational reinforcer and behavioral requirement data provide at best only modest support for Holland's environment formulations.Holland's theory of careers (Holland, 1959(Holland, , 1966(Holland, , 1973, initially concerned with vocational choice, has been broadened to a theory of personality (Osipow, 1973). Accordingly, Holland's concepts of personality type and environment model have been restructured and simplified and his typology revised (Holland, 1973). The heuristic value of these revisions is indicated by the more than 175 studies conducted to investigate various aspects and applications of Holland's theory. The majority of these studies dealt with Hol-

Validation Is Like Motor Oil: Synthetic Is Better

“…In addition, at least for cognitive measures, test score means increase as job complexity increases. With respect to occupational interests, Holland's model of interests has been linked to the job components of the PAQ (Hyland & Muchinsky, 1991;Rounds, Shubsachs, Dawis, & Lofquist, 1978).…”

Multidimensional Scaling Research in Vocational Psychology

“…Indeed, a number of additional applications are evident in the literature, including the areas of occupational reinforcers (Rounds, Shubsachs, Dawis, & Lofquist, 1978), perceptions of vocational counseling roles (Brook, 1979), potential work mobility (Aranya, Jacobson, 81 Shye, 1976), design of work environments (Kenny & Canter, 1981), job analysis and classification (Brown, 1967;Sackett, Cornelius & Carron, 1981;Smith & Siegel, 1967), and career preferences (Soutar & Clarke, 1983). The diversity of these applications bodes well for the future of multidimensional scaling in vocational psychology research.…”

The construct validation of Holland's model of vocational choice using PAQ job analytic information

“…Regarding the Census categories, she demonstrated that they better differentiated Data tasks than the other tasks but were similar to Holland in differentiating People and Things tasks. Finally, in comparison to occupational reinforcer data (comparable to Toenjes & Borgen, 1974;and Rounds et al, 1978) she demonstrated that types and levels could be differentiated by different patterns of reinforcers. In sum, this study was very supportive of Holland's typology illustrating that work activi ties, job requirements, and rewards could account for significant propor tions of variance in the Holland categories.…”

“…Multiple discriminant function analyses produced the correct ordering of the categories but the shape was not shown to be exactly hexagonal. Rounds, Shubsasch, Dawis, and Lofquist (1978) also examined ORP data on 181 occupations, plus, they included PAQ data in their analyses. They also found mean differences across occupations on the PAQ.…”

“…This is the direction my study will proceed. Rounds et al (1978) stated that "although Holland's theory is widely used, the validity of its environmental formulations has seldom been tested using measures of the environment rather than of the personality" (p. 614). Additionally, Gottfredson (1980) identified a number of caveats regarding occupational structure research.…”