Counseling for Career Decision‐Making Difficulties: Measures and Methods

Abstract

Career indecision may be the primary reason people go to career counselors. Much effort has been exerted to identify and investigate the causes of clients' career decision‐making difficulties. With the aim of facilitating clients' career decision making, the use of career indecision assessments can promote the effectiveness and efficiency of face‐to‐face career counseling. The authors review three evidence‐based, cost‐free assessments derived from decision theory: the Career Decision‐Making Difficulties Questionnaire, the Emotional and Personality‐Related Career Decision‐Making Difficulties questionnaire, and the Career Decision‐Making Profile questionnaire. The unique features of these assessments are described, and the ways they can contribute to facilitating career decision making in career counseling are explored with a case study example.

Integrating Theory, Research, and Practice: A Viewpoint from a Member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Career Assessment

“…• and those with an informative partial score that is an aggregate of only some of the scales (e.g., the Career Decision-Making Adaptability score in the Career Decision-Making Profile [Gati & Levin, 2014]). …”

Mindfulness and Decision‐Making Style: Predicting Career Thoughts and Vocational Identity

“…Decision‐making, including decision‐making styles, remains an area of interest in the vocational and career development field (S. D. Brown, Hacker, & Abrams, 2012; Gati & Levin, 2014). Researchers have explored the relationships between decision‐making and vocational identity (Holland, 1997), negative thoughts (Sampson, Peterson, Lenz, Reardon, & Saunders, 1996b), mental health factors (Walker & Peterson, 2012), and a variety of other variables (S. D. Brown & Rector, 2008).…”

The Career Decision‐Making Difficulties Questionnaire: A Case for Item‐Level Interpretation

“…More recently, the CDDQ has been used to determine the differentiation and consistency of interests (Atitsogbe, Moumoula, Rochat, Antonietti, & Rossier, ). The CDDQ has been suggested as a useful tool for planning and guiding career interventions (e.g., Gati & Amir, ; Gati & Levin, ). CDDQ results directly show clients’ most salient difficulties, thereby allowing career counselors to better understand why a particular client has sought career counseling and then to prioritize the most relevant interventions for that client (Gati & Levin, ).…”

“…Career counseling aims to help clients make better career decisions (Gati, Krausz, & Osipow, ). This is often achieved initially through an attempt to understand what hinders clients’ career decision‐making processes (Gati & Levin, ). To this end, Gati et al () developed a comprehensive taxonomy of the difficulties that may impede the career decision‐making process or lead to a less than optimal choice.…”