RELATION BETWEEN EXPLORATORY AND CHOICE FACTORS AND DECISIONAL PROGRESS

This study tested the hypothesis that a positive relation would exist between progress in career decision making and (a) academic choice and vocational preference congruence, (b) circumscribed vocational preferences with respect to field and level, and (c) adaptive exploratory activity. Using a sample of college students, canonical correlation analysis along with semi-partial multivariate models were used to assess the mutual and unique shared variance between the nature of choice variables and the three variables used in tandem to assess decisional progress (i.e., vocational self-concept crystallization, vocational commitment, and pre-implementation readiness). The results revealed that only the exploration constructs were consistently associated with the measures of decisional progress. The measures of field and level consistency were modestly related to the progress variables, while the congruence variables emerged as nonsignificant predictors. The results were related to research and theory. © 1994 Academic Press, Inc.