Effectiveness of a career time perspective intervention

The present study tested the effects of a time perspective intervention designed to increase an individual's orientation to the future. Because a future orientation constitutes a fundamental dimension in career choice attitudes and competencies, the intervention should, in addition to increasing future orientation, foster career development. Accordingly, the outcome measures addressed both future orientation (i.e., temporal continuity and optimism about the achievability of future goals) and career planning (i.e., planful attitudes and planning outcomes). The intervention was administered, separately, to two groups of tenth-grade students and two groups of college freshmen. The experimental groups, when compared to control groups, exhibited statistically significant increases in future orientation as they improved their sense of continuity between the past, present, and future and enhanced their optimism about the future. The intervention produced its largest effect size (.77) for more highly developed attitudes toward career planning among the experimental group. The intervention, however, did not immediately affect the quality of the students' planning outcomes. (C) 1998 Academic Press.