African Americans: Diverse people, diverse career needs

Racial and Disability Identity

“…However, such approaches may reinforce erroneous assumptions of homogeneity within groups and ignore important variability within groups. For example, African Americans differ widely on attributes associated with career participation (e.g., education, disability, prior occupational experiences, interests), which adds to the complexity of the career counseling process with members of that population (Kimbrough & Salomone, 1993;Mpofu, 2005;Worthington et al, 2005). Similarly, persons with disabilities show significant within-group diversity in education, race (skin color), and type and severity of disability as well as in other career-related attributes (Belgrave & Jarama, 2000;Belgrave & Walker, 1991;Curnow, 1989;Harley & Alston, 1996;Melchiori & Church, 1997).…”

“…For example, individuals from a racial minority background have less access to employmentrelated networks (Brown & Pinterits, 2001;Wilson, Turner, Liu, Harley, & Alston, 2002;Worthington et al, 2005), which constrains their career opportunities. Racial minorities also have unique occupational preferences that are explained, in part, by people from their background that they model (Kimbrough & Salomone, 1993;Miller, Springer, & Wells, 1988). For example, African Americans have a higher preference for occupations in the social, enterprising, and conventional domains; Asian Americans in the investigative and realistic domains; and European Americans in the investigative, realistic, and artistic domains.…”