Executive and Career Assessment: Can Alternative Occupational Interest Measures Be Used Interchangeably?

Abstract

Psychological assessment is widely used in evaluating potential managers and other prospective or current employees in the context of internal selections or promotions. Yet, assumptions made about the interchangeability of alternative measures of the same psycho logical construct may be flawed. This article examines relationships among three widely-used measures of vocational interests: the Strong Vocational Interest Blank (Harmon, Hansen, Borgen, & Hammer, 1994), the Self-Directed Search (Holland, Fritzche, & Powell, 1997), and the Vocational Preference Inventory (Holland, 1985), each of which intends to measure (among other variables) Holland's (1997) six well-established occupational interest traits (Realistic, Investigative, Artistic, Social, Enterprising, and Conventional). The sample consisted of 497 respondents who completed at least two measures of occupational interests. Although there was considerable overlap among the corre sponding scales across the interest scales, much variance remained unexplained; this suggests that the measures cannot be used inter changeably, and that there are limitations in cross-study comparisons of the Holland constructs when the same instrumentation is not used. Moreover, when analyzed on the individual level, the tests frequently produced non-identical to highly dissimilar Holland high-point interest codes, suggesting the need for caution when interpreting the results of single tests. The paper identifies some of the implications of these findings for personnel selection and individual career assessment applications and makes recommendations for improvements of inter est assessment.

The Question of Integration and Criteria in Individual Psychological Assessment

“…Some measures of ability are more speeded than others. Many measures of interests are not sufficiently overlapping that the data from any one can be taken as the final word on a person's interests (see Lowman, Palmer, Santana, & Abbott, 2003). And, personality measures with the same labels (e.g., Introversion/Extraversion) are not all measuring the same constructs.…”

Interest, ability and personality characteristics of two samples of employed realistic males: Implications for management and assessment.

“…Concerning the measurement of occupational interest high point scores, it is clear from this research (see also Lowman et al, 2003) that it matters which interest measure is used to assess interests. The choice of measures can make a difference in terms of the high point interest profile that results and therefore the conclusions that may be reached about best-fitting occupations or implied personality and ability characteristics.…”

“…On the second measure of interests, Holland's (1985) Vocational Preference Inventory (which measures interests solely on the basis of respondents indicating liking or disliking for a series of occupational titles), the overall interest pattern was the same for the two groups and for the overall sample, R-I-E, essentially a technical interest pattern or, in the higher intellectual ability patterns, one commonly found among some types of engineers and technicians. Method variance probably explains the differences found between the group profiles; see Lowman, Palmer, Santana and Abbott (2003)…”

“…Of course, each of the three domains of interests, abilities, and personality characteristics is well-established and has an extensive literature in its own right. Occupational interests, among the most stable and predictable individual difference variables in psychology, have been well-validated in studies all over the world (e.g., Farh, Leong, & Law, 1998; Holland, 2007; Low, Yoon, Roberts, & Rounds, 2006; Lowman, Palmer, Santana, & Abbott, 2003; Savickas, Taber, & Spokane, 2002; Tracey & Rounds, 1993). Abilities (Carroll, 1993), including the “big g” of general intelligence but also the so-called primary abilities, such as spatial abilities (Shea, Lubinski, & Benbow, 2001) and mechanical abilities (Muchinsky, 2004) have been widely used in predicting successful job-related behavior (Schmidt & Hunter, 1998).…”

What Do Interest Inventories Measure? The Convergence and Content Validity of Four RIASEC Inventories

“…Only a few studies have examined the convergence of high-point codes from different inventories. We identified three studies that found that RIASEC high-point codes were not highly consistent across interest inventories (Harmon & Zytowski, 1980; Lowman et al, 2003; Savickas & Taber, 2006). In particular, Savickas and Taber (2006) showed that, between pairs of five interest inventories, exact three-letter high-point code matches only occurred at the frequency of 3–15%.…”