Individual Differences in the Career Decision-Making Process

A total of 98 seniors from Old Dominion University participated in an experiment designed to determine the nature of the relationships between the ability to cope with complexity as measured by the Career Path Appreciation interview, career decision-making as measured by the Career Development Inventory, intelligence as measured by grade point average and the Wonderlic Personnel Test, and preferred occupational complexity (as well as relationships among exploratory hypotheses). Regression analysis results indicated that ability to cope with complexity predicted career planning skills(as measured by the Career Planning subscale of the CDI), and grade point average (GPA) significantly predicted career decision-making skills (as measured by the Decision Making scale of the CDI) and knowledge of world of work (as measured by the World of Work scale of the CDI). Other significant correlational relationships were found.