INTRODUCTION
Christopher D. Nye
MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY
James Rounds
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
Interest in a particular topic can serve as a motivational force that drives individuals to focus attention, exert effort, and persist on related activities. The link between interest and behavior is intuitive. It makes sense that people are more likely to engage in tasks that they are interested in. This applies to all aspects of life—people watch tv shows, pay closer attention to school lectures, and pick hobbies that they believe will interest them. Interests can also guide career choices as people tend to choose academic majors, occupations, and jobs that they are interested in (Holland, 1997; Strong, 1943). As such, understanding interest in work, or vocational interest, can help to explain and predict how individuals will behave in the workplace.
There is a long history of research on vocational interests in the applied psychological literature. For example, some of the earlier writings on interests (at least as we think of them today) were published in the early 1900s (Savickas, 1999). Since that time, a substantial amount of research has been conducted and prominent theories of vocational interests (e.g., Holland, 1959, 1997) have been developed. In addition, these theories have had a substantial impact on organizational research, particularly in the area of person-environment (P-E) fit (cf. Schneider, 1987).
Despite these contributions and early excitement about the potential utility of vocational interests for predicting workplace behavior (Strong, 1943), research on this topic in organizational psychology declined drastically after the 1970s. In a recent review of the Journal of Applied Psychology (JAP), Sackett, Lievens, Van Iddekinge, and Kuncel (2017) noted that approximately 90% of the vocational interest articles in JAP were published between 1930 and 1979. In contrast, only seven interest articles were published in this journal between 1980 and 2008. Although this review only summarized a single journal, these results are representative of a broader trend in the organizational literature in which vocational interests have been ignored in recent research. As another example, interests have been almost completely left out of recent reviews of the employee selection literature (e.g., Cortina & Luchman, 2013; Ployhart, 2006; Sackett & Lievens, 2008; Schmitt, Cortina, Ingerick, & Weichmann, 2003) or have been mentioned only briefly in others (Ployhart, Schmitt, & Tippins, 2017), despite their potential to contribute to the selection process. As a consequence of the paucity of interest research in the recent organizational literature, both organizational theories and vocational interest theories describe workplace behavior and predict many of the same outcomes but have developed largely independently of each other.
More recently, the number of organizational studies examining vocational interests has begun to increase. For example, several recent studies have examined the importance of interests for predicting workplace behavior (Nye, Su, Rounds, & Drasgow, 2012, 2017; Van Iddekinge, Roth, Putka, & Lanivich, 2011). As a result of the increasing number of vocational interest studies, Sackett et al. (2017, p. 264) suggested that the period from 2009-present marked the “return of interest research.”
In addition to the increased empirical attention, there has also been a corresponding increase in the awareness of vocational interests in practice. Consequently, some organizations are now starting to consider using vocational interests for personnel selection (Rounds, 2013). For example, although the U.S. Military has a history of assessing vocational interests dating back to the 1950s (Ingerick & Rumsey, 2014), several branches of the U.S. military have recently initiated new efforts to develop and/or evaluate vocational interest measures for military personnel. For example, the U.S. Navy is exploring a measure known as the Job Opportunities in the Navy (JOIN) as a way to help individuals identify jobs in the Navy that they will be satisfied with. In addition, research is being conducted by the U.S. Army and Air Force to develop and validate new interest assessments, the Adaptive Vocational Interest Diagnostic (AVID) and the Air Force Work Interest Navigator (AFWIN), respectively.
Given the growing “interest” in vocational interest research, more empirical research is needed to integrate the various streams of interest research in the educational and vocational psychology literatures with existing theories of workplace behavior from the organizational literature. The purpose of the present book is to do just that and to describe the ways in which vocational interests can contribute to organizational research and vice versa. Interests are defined as an individual’s “trait-like preferences for activities, contexts in which activities occur, or outcomes associated with preferred activities that motivate goal-oriented behaviors and orient individuals toward certain environments” (Rounds & Su, 2014, p. 98). This definition suggests that vocational interests can play an important role in predicting a number of workplace phenomena such as job performance, training performance, motivation, job satisfaction, job choice, occupational/organizational diversity, work meaningfulness, and even retirement, among other topics. This book examines these issues and the potential contributions of vocational interests to workplace behavior research and practice.
Holland’s Model
Holland’s (1959, 1997) model of vocational interests provides an underlying theme in many of the chapters in this book. Holland’s widely researched model of vocational interests is the dominant theoretical framework for understanding the structure and predictive validity of vocational interests. A major contribution of Holland’s work was suggesting that interests could be classified into six primary interest types: Realistic interests reflect preferences for working with things and in the outdoors; Investigative interests involve activities in the sciences (e.g., physical, social, medical); Artistic interests include preferences for activities that allow creative expression; Social interests reflect preferences for social interactions that involve teaching or helping people; Enterprising interests include preferences for persuasive roles such as management and sales positions; and Conventional interests are associated with activities in well-structured environments such as business settings. Collectively, these six interest types are known by their acronym as the RIASEC model.
Holland organized these six RIASEC types into a hexagonal structure as shown in Figure I.1. An advantage of this model is that it also illustrates the relationships between the six interests. Adjacent interest types should be the most highly correlated with each other, alternate types should be slightly less correlated, and opposite interests on the hexagon should be the least highly correlated. Although some have criticized the circumplex structure (Gati, 1991), Holland’s model has substantial empirical support. For example, Tracey and Rounds (1993) conducted a meta-analytic structural analysis of 104 RIASEC correlation matrices and found that both the quasi-circumplex and the circulent model adequately represented the data. Similarly, Day and Rounds (1998) and Day, Rounds, and Swaney (1998) demonstrated that the quasi-circumplex structure also fit well across diverse racial-ethnic groups.
Another major contribution of Holland’s (1959, 1997) work was that he suggested that environments can also be categorized using the six RIASEC dimensions. In other words, profiles of the six RIASEC types can be developed for both individuals and environments. A number of different approaches have been used to operationalize the interest profile of the environment. One approach is to use the interest profiles of job incumbents (Campbell & Holland, 1972; Donnay & Borgen, 1996; Holland, 1997). However, sampling becomes an issue when generalizing the RIASEC codes to occupations because incumbent samples are rarely representative of many ill-defined occupations. Another approach to operationalizing the environment interest profile is to use job analysis information about work activities and requirements (Holland, Viernstein, Kuo, Karweit, & Blum, 1972; McCormick, Jeanneret, & Mecham, 1972; cf. Rounds, Shubsachs, Dawis, & Lofquist, 1978). However, the most direct way of assessing the environment interest profile is to rate it directly. For example, researchers can use the Position Classification Inventory (PCI; Gottfredson & Holland, 1996) to assess the RIASEC profile of an occupation. With this measure, employees or supervisors rate the extent to which individuals in the job perform various work activities related to each RIASEC type. A related approach is to train subject matter experts to rate the RIASEC dimensions for each environment (Rounds, Smith, Hubert, Lewis, & Rivkin, 1999).
Because both individuals and environments can be categorized using the RIASEC dimensions, Holland (1997) suggested that the match (or congruence) between individuals and their environments would be closely related to their behavior. A growing body of research has provided empirical support for this prediction (e.g., Holland, 1997; Nauta, 2010; Nye et al., 2012, 2017) and this research is summarized in several of the chapters in this book. Given the substantial amount of empirical support for Holland’s model and his congruency hypothesis, this model has had a substantial impact on the study of vocational interests. As such, his model appears repeatedly throughout this book and is influential for many of the ideas expounded here. This largely represents the state of the literature and the impact that his model has had on the field.
Organization of This Book
Given the goals of this book, the chapters are organized into three sections. The chapters in Section 1 discuss topics related to the theory and measurement of vocational interests. These chapters focus on what interests are and how they can be measured. After discussing these issues, Section 2 reviews existing research on the value of vocational interests for predicting various work outcomes. The goal of this section is to discuss the theoretical and empirical implications of vocational interests at work and to identify how vocational interests fit in existing nomological networks of organizational variables. Finally, the chapters in Section 3 of this book describe how the broader work context can influence our understanding of vocational interests and their effects on workplace outcomes. Combined, the goal of these three sections is to review existing research and theory on vocational interests and to explore new and emerging topics in vocational interest research that can help to facilitate future research in this area. Below we provide a brief description of each chapter in this book.
Section 1
As noted above, Section 1 provides a description of what interests are and how they can be measured. As such, Chapter 1 by Rong Su, Gundula Stoll, and James Rounds attempts to address the question “what is the nature of vocational interests?” In this chapter, they integrate two divided perspectives—interests as traits and interest as a psychological state—and propose a unifying theoretical framework of Trait-State Interest Dynamics. Using this framework, they discuss how vocational interests are organized and represented in the human mind, how they develop through the dynamic process of person-environment interaction, and how they influence individual behavior in many aspects of an individual’s work and life. Importantly, they also discuss the relationships between vocational interests and various other psychological characteristics such as personality, cognitive ability, motivation, values, and goals. Understanding these relationships is particularly important for understanding the unique contribution of vocational interests to organizational theories.
Although the chapter by Su et al. conceptualizes interests as both a trait and a state, the discussion in their chapter stems from the research literature on the more trait-like vocational interests. In contrast, Chapter 2 by K. Ann Renninger and Suzanne E. Hidi focuses on interest as both a cognitive and affective motivational variable that develops over time. They define interest as a psychological state as well as the predisposition to reengage particular content over time. These authors discuss their Four-Phase Model of Interest Development, which starts with an initial activation of interest and can progress to a well-developed interest. They explain the distinction between their discussion of interest and the discussion of vocational interests, and describe how a developmental approach to workplace interest could be beneficial. They point out that vocational interests represent later stages of the interest development process and can be developed with proper support.
After understanding the nature of vocational interests, these individual differences can then be measured. In fact, the history of research on vocational interests has been closely linked with the assessment of these individual differences. In Chapter 3, Michael Zickar and Hanyi Min review this history and several key advances in the assessment of interests over time. In this context, these authors discuss some of the key figures, including E. K. Strong and the various iterations of the Strong Interest Inventory and John Holland and the Vocational Preference Inventory, which have had a substantial influence on vocational interest research and the field of vocational psychology more broadly. They also discuss additional milestones in the history of interest assessment and more recent advances in interest assessment that have contributed to the use of vocational interests in the workplace.
Building on the history of interest assessments discussed in Chapter 3, Chapter 4 addresses psychometric considerations for modern interest measurement. In this chapter, Oleksandr Chernyshenko, Stephen Stark, and Christopher Nye discuss important dimensions of interest assessment, stimuli and response formats that are relevant for these assessments, and psychometric models that can help to advance the measurement of vocational interests in the future. These authors discuss the growing importance of basic interests (narrow dimensions of interest) and their utility for differentiating occupations and predicting work outcomes. In addition, they also discuss recent efforts to move beyond the broader RIASEC framework to identify additional dimensions of interest for occupational assessment. In sum, this chapter highlights potential directions for the next generation of vocational interest assessments and their use in the workplace.
Section 2
The development of high-quality measures paved the way for research on the utility of vocational interests for predicting attitudes and behavior. As such, Section 2 discusses research on the validity of vocational interests for predicting workplace outcomes. In Chapter 5, Christopher Nye, Sarena Bhatia, and Joshua Prasad discuss the relationships between vocational interests and a number of workplace outcomes, including job choice, job performance, job satisfaction, turnover, and career success. Importantly, these relationships are discussed in the context of current models of employee behavior including Campbell’s (1990) model of job performance. This chapter also emphasizes the importance of interest fit (or congruence) in the vocational interest literature. In contrast to other individual differences such as personality, there are not specific dimensions of interest that are relevant to all jobs. Instead, it is the match between an individual’s interests and his or her job that will be most important for predicting work outcomes.
Given the validity evidence discussed in Chapter 5, vocational interests may be useful for employee selection decisions. Therefore, Chapter 6 by Fred Oswald, Leaetta Hough, and Chen Zuo extends this discussion to note the implications of these relationships and additional factors that need to be considered in employee selection and classification settings. This chapter discusses not only the validity of vocational interests but also their incremental validity over other predictors of performance such as personality and cognitive ability. Another important consideration in this context is the potential for adverse impact and this chapter discusses previous research quantifying race and sex differences in vocational interests. Finally, the chapter ends by discussing issues related to the specificity of interests, faking on interest assessments, and the implications of vocational interests for the burgeoning “gig economy.”
The discussion of the empirical relationships between interests and work outcomes continues in Chapter 7 where Teresa Cardador describes the links between interest fit and work meaningfulness. This author discusses various pathways to meaningful work and how vocational interests can map onto each one of these pathways. To help facilitate this discussion, she proposes a framework for understanding the contexts in which fit should create meaningful work and how organizations can help employees to find meaning by leveraging their work environment and their experiences on the job.
Another key outcome of vocational interests is turnover. Holland (1997) predicted that interest congruence should lead employees to stay on the job longer. Although research has demonstrated the validity of vocational interests for predicting workplace withdrawal behaviors, more research is needed to understand other types of withdrawal such as retirement. In Chapter 8, Laura Venz and Mo Wang discuss how interests can contribute to retirement decisions. They suggest that although interests are positively related to job tenure, they may also be the driving force behind retirement decisions and make theoretical predictions about when and how interests might facilitate this process. These authors also discuss the relevance of leisure interests for retirement decisions and the activities that are performed during retirement.
In Chapter 9, Robert Hogan and Ryne Sherman suggest several new directions for vocational interest research in the workplace. Specifically, they note that the concepts of employability and career success have been relatively understudied but that interests can contribute to the prediction of each of these outcomes. In addition, they discuss the conceptual relationships and distinctions between values, needs, personality, and interests and the roles that these individual differences can play in understanding and predicting employee behavior.
Through their effects on individual outcomes, vocational interests can also influence organizational outcomes and the broader work context. In Chapter 10, Ann Marie Ryan and Danielle King discuss how interests can contribute to diversity within an organization. Past research has demonstrated that there are sex and (slightly smaller) race differences in vocational interests. Therefore, these authors discuss how these subgroup differences might impact an organization’s efforts to recruit and retain a diverse workforce. In addition, they also note that a diversity of interests may be a good thing in a group and may contribute to overall group/team performance.
Section 3
Finally, the chapters in the third section of this book describe the role of interests in the broader work context. In Chapter 11, Jason Huang, Shan Ran, and Mengqiao Liu discuss vocational interests in the global work environment. These authors review past research on the generalizability of vocational interests and their relationships with other variables across cultures. They identify several areas in which research findings have varied and suggest future directions for examining vocational interests across cultures. Importantly, these authors recommend conducting more studies in non-U.S. countries as a way to further understanding of the role of culture in the measurement and use of vocational interests.
In Chapter 12, Bart Wille and Filip De Fruyt discuss stability and change in vocational interests during adulthood. This chapter reviews the evidence showing that the rank order of trait vocational interests are relatively stable yet the mean levels can change over time. These authors propose a model of adult interest development that suggests that both stability and change occur through an individual’s interactions with his or her work environment and the progression of person-environment fit over time. In addition, they discuss the implications of these processes in the context of recent changes to the nature of work that involve greater job flexibility and career mobility, an aging workforce, and an increased need to maintain a competitive workforce in a global business environment.
In Chapter 13, the final chapter, David Hambrick, Alexander Burgoyne, and Fred Oswald discuss the relationship between interests and expertise. Specifically, they propose that interest plays a key role in the development of expertise. Expert performance requires both ability and deliberate practice and interests help to determine who will be sufficiently motivated to engage in and sustain long-term deliberate practice over time. These authors describe these effects in the context of the Multifactorial Gene-Environment Interaction model of expertise (Ullén, Hambrick, & Mosing, 2016) and suggest future longitudinal research to examine the role of interests in the context of other factors that can influence the development of expertise over time.
Concluding Thoughts
The first goal of this book is to integrate organizational psychology research with the vocational interest literature. Both of these literatures examine individual behavior on the job, but theories and models of vocational interests have been largely ignored in the areas of organizational research where they could contribute the most. As such, the second goal of this book is to help facilitate research on the topic of vocational interests in the organizational literature. Although other recent books have focused on the use of vocational interests in educational or social psychology (e.g., Renninger & Hidi, 2016; Silvia, 2006) and vocational psychology (e.g., Savickas & Spokane, 1999), these books have devoted little space to addressing how vocational interest research can be applied within organizations. The present work attempts to fill this need.
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