New Technologies in Career Guidance: The Interactive Computer

Abstract

Beginning in the 1960's, the interactive capabilities of computers provided unprecedented opportunities for the development of computerized career guidance systems. Such systems offered individualized assistance in career decision making to large numbers of people at low cost. Recognizing that each user may present a unique combination of needs, experiences, circumstances, values, interests, skills, styles, and perceptions, a developer can enable a well-planned system to respond appropriately to these individual differences. A system can not only store, retrieve, and manipulate vast amounts of information, putting great resources at the fingertips of each user, but also bring together many variables personal, occupational, and educational --and combine them in distinctive ways for each client.These capabilities do not insure that the substance of any system will be of high quality. Much of a system's worth depends on its conceptual framework, the strength of its theory and rationale, the coherence of its functions and structures. The "black box" of theory underlying every system should be opened up and exposed to the light of scrutiny and evaluation.Examples from the principles, research, model, and structures for the System of Interactive Guidance and Information (SIGI) and SIGI PLUS are used to illustrate the links between theory and practice. 1 NEW TECHNOLOGIES IN CAREER GUIDANCE: THE INTERACTIVE COMPUTERTechnology in our lifetimes has been involved in many wondrous accomplishments, some of them beneficial, some of them disastrous, and some of them partaking of both benefit and disaster.At the simplest level, technological invention seems to begin by finding ways to amplify human powers. Tools and machines have been developed to do things that our human bodies and minds are accustomed to doing, but to do them faster, stronger, more efficiently, on a bigger scale. This does not mean that the products are necessarily better: for example, handcrafted objects are often valued more highly than their mass-produced counterparts.In career guidance, audiovisual technologies, such as motion pictures, videotape, or videodisk, are often used to g1ve young people an opportunity to observe, quickly and conveniently, the performance of tasks in many occupations. In this instance, audiovisual technology provides an extensive but relatively passive experience; it might well be followed by more intensive and active observation of a few selected occupations through personal visits, "job-shadowing," or hands-on tryouts. This example represents two complementary modes of acquiring information: one, through audiovisual technology, is extensive but relatively passive and vicarious; the other, through real-life experience, is more intensive, active, and participatory. The value of such complementarity is implicitly recognized in a limerick about the use of technology in sex education, a "hot" topic of discuflsion these days in the U.S.A.:The word has come down from the Dean That, with the aid of a teaching machine, King Oedi...

Valores y orientación profesional : líneas de investigación e intervención actuales

“…Katz (1988) recalca la importancia de las nuevas tecnologías en el uso de la orientación profesional de forma pasiva (por ejemplo, mediante audiovisuales) y de forma activa (por ejemplo, con programas informáticos interactivos). Consecuentemente con esta idea, el autor señala el programa informático SIGI y SIGI PLUS, desde la opinión de que "technology provides previously unequalled opportunities for applying human intelligence and judgment in the service of career guidance" (Katz, 1988:22).…”

“…Al respecto Katz (1988) argumenta que los ordenadores ayudan en el proceso de orientación, pero hay aspectos personales como son las necesidades, valores, intereses, circunstancias contextuales, planes, estilos de aprendizaje, entre otros, que son difíciles de captar por dicho ente tecnológico. A pesar de ello, lo intenta recoger en el programa SIGI y SIGI PLUS en forma de dominios o valores, que van asociados a las decisiones laborales, como son la independencia, el altruismo, ganar dinero o la seguridad.…”

“…293), los valores intrínsecos y extrínsecos reflejados por Super (1970), mediante el "Work Values Inventory", en comparación con los expresados en el manual Minnesota Importante Questionnarie (MIQ) (Gay et al, 1971). Aquí se amplia esta labor comparativa de los valores laborales con las propuestas de otros autores como el propio Descombes (1977), Katz (1988), los del grupo MOW (1987), Jensen (1993), Rokeach (1973) y Schwartz (1990Schwartz ( , 1999. La idea consiste en destacar aquellos valores comunes en dichos autores, para más tarde identificarlos con las competencias de acción profesional de saber ser y saber hacer.…”