Effect of Mode of Interest Assessment on Clients Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy

Rachel A. Uffelman Linda Mezydlo Subich Nathan M. Diegelman Kimberly S. Wagner Rebekah J. Bardash The University of Akron
To compare the effects of three different modes of interest assessment on career decision-making self-efficacy, 81 career-undecided college students participated in one of the following four conditions: an assessment intervention using the Strong Interest Inventory, an intervention using one of two methods of applying the SelfDirected Search, or a no-treatment control group. Change in career decisionmaking self-efficacy from pre- to posttest was assessed. Career decision-making self-efficacy increased significantly for all three treatment groups, and in each case, pre-post differences for the treatment groups exceeded the pre-post difference for the no-treatment control group. Differences in outcomes among the three treatment groups were not observed. Keywords: career decision making, self-efficacy, college students, assessment

Interest assessment traditionally has been an integral part of the career counseling done on college campuses. Often this assessment involves use of the Strong Interest Inventory (SII; Harmon, Hansen, Borgen, & Hammer, 1994) or the Self-Directed Search (SDS; Holland, Fritzsche, & Powell, 1994), two of the three most used interest measures (Watkins, Campbell, & Nieberding, 1994). Such interest assessments are used by counselors to inform clients career decision making in the hope that the results may enhance the quality of clients career decisions (Brown & Lent, 1996). Yet, as Chartrand and Walsh (2001) pointed out, there is a pressing need to examine our assessment service delivery models (p. 249). In this study, we aimed to extend knowledge regarding the use

This research was supported by a grant from Commission VI of the American College Personnel Association. The authors wish to thank Susan I. Hardin for her contributions in developing the treatment protocols. Correspondence should be directed to the first author at urachel@uakron.edu. JOURNAL OF CAREER ASSESSMENT, Vol. 12 No. 4, November 2004 DOI: 10.1177/1069072704266651 2004 Sage Publications 366 366380

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of the SDS and SII in career counseling by comparing their effectiveness in increasing college students career decision-making self-efficacy. The construct of career decision-making self-efficacy derives from Banduras (1986) general self-efficacy theory. Self-efficacy is defined as a persons situationspecific beliefs that he or she can carry out the actions necessary to accomplish successfully a given task. According to the theory, level of self-efficacy is a primary determinant of various outcomes, including likelihood of undertaking a task, amount of effort expended in pursuing a goal, and degree of perseverance in responding to challenges or barriers to progress. Career decision-making self-efficacy is especially relevant to the endeavor of career counseling because persons with higher levels of career decision-making self-efficacy report more confidence in their ability to make academic and occupational choices (Taylor & Betz, 1983; Taylor & Popma, 1990). Importantly, this confidence has been associated positively with persons reported degree of vocational decidedness (Srsic & Walsh, 2001; Taylor & Popma, 1990). It also has been associated positively with considering a greater range of occupations (Church, Teresa, Rosebrook, & Szendre, 1992), having a more stable career pattern (Gianakos, 1999), and using a more rational and a less dependent decisionmaking style (Mau, 2000). Thus, career decision-making self-efficacy may be conceptualized as an essential component of adaptive career exploration processes and outcomes. Because a fundamental aim of career counseling is for counselors to assist clients in making good academic and occupational decisions, knowledge of how to augment clients career decision-making self-efficacy may be important. The research literature however provides meager guidance with regard to how to increase effectively clients career decision-making self-efficacy. One of the few available studies of how a career counseling intervention influences career decision-making self-efficacy is the work of Luzzo and Day (1999). They compared pre- and postintervention career decision-making self-efficacy scores of first-year college students who took the SII and received group feedback, took the SII and received no feedback, or were part of a no-treatment control group. They found that the college students who took the SII and received feedback in a group interpretive session evidenced increases in their career decision-making self-efficacy as compared to students who received no feedback on their SII results or who were members of the control group. Luzzo and Day suggested that their results are consistent with Banduras (1986) assertion that self-efficacy may be increased via performance accomplishments and verbal persuasion as these mechanisms were involved in the interpersonal group interpretation protocol used to provide their participants with SII feedback. Another way to conceptualize Luzzo and Days (1999) findings however is from the framework of Brown and Krane (2000). These authors reported on a series of meta-analyses of the career counseling outcome literature; the outcomes measured in the 62 studies included in their analyses varied but included career decision-making self-efficacy. Brown and Krane observed that the following five

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critical ingredients appeared most responsible for positive outcomes in extant career counseling outcome research: written exercises, individualized interpretations and feedback, world of work information, modeling opportunities, and attention to building support for choices within ones social network. More than one of these ingredients seem relevant to the work of Luzzo and Day; Luzzo and Days description of their intervention clearly included the opportunity for individualized feedback (despite the group interpretation format) and world of work information. It may be that these elements of their assessment intervention accounted for the significant increase observed in participants career decisionmaking self-efficacy. If more general mechanisms (i.e., those implicated by Brown & Krane, 2000) underlie Luzzo and Days (1999) results, use of assessment instruments other than the SII (e.g., the SDS) may result in similar client outcomes, but this has not yet been established. Given the practical and theoretical utility of Luzzo and Days findings, it seems important to extend their line of research to another interest measurethe SDS. Such an extension is of interest not only because of the widespread use of the SDS (Watkins et al., 1994) but because it may shed light on how the specifics of an assessment modality relate to increases in career decision-making self-efficacy. Indeed, career assessment with the SDS offers more procedural flexibility than that with the SII as counselors may choose to have clients complete the SDS alone and then meet to interpret results (much like the typical use of SII) or to work through the SDS booklet together in session. These different approaches conceivably could involve different numbers and intensities of Brown and Kranes (2000) critical treatment ingredients. Indeed, Brown and Krane speculated that the effectiveness of self-directed career interventions (i.e., the SDS) could be enhanced by incorporation of additional treatment ingredients as their results indicated an additive effect on outcome of including multiple critical treatment elements. The present study therefore had two purposes. The first was to extend the line of research of Luzzo and Day (1999) by investigating how two commonly used assessment tools, the SII and SDS, compare in their ability to influence clients career decision-making self-efficacy. It was hypothesized that administration and subsequent interpretation of either instrument would result in an increase in clients career decision-making self-efficacy greater than that observed for the notreatment control group. The second purpose was to examine whether varying degrees of incorporation of Brown and Kranes (2000) critical treatment ingredients in an assessment modality influence changes in career decision-making self-efficacy. This question was addressed by comparing the effects on career decision-making selfefficacy of alternate implementation methods for the SDS. Specifically, a collaborative, process-oriented approach to delivering and interpreting the SDS was compared to a more typical approach that involved the instrument being completed independently by the client and then interpreted by the counselor in a second session (similar to what is done typically with the SII). It was hypothesized

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that the process approach to the SDS would result in more change in career decision-making self-efficacy due to the greater opportunity for clients to receive modeling, feedback, and relevant information from the counselor over the two sessions they worked together (compared to the single interpretive session approach). Consequently, clients who experienced the process approach to the SDS were expected to demonstrate greater gains in career decision-making selfefficacy than were those who completed either the SDS or SII independently and subsequently received a SDS or SII interpretation. No differences were hypothesized between the latter groups.

METHOD Participants
Participants were 81 college students who were recruited via introductory psychology courses, ranging in age from 18 to 45 with a mean age of 23.67 years (SD = 6.61 years). Of the participants, 69% were women; 79% identified themselves as White/Caucasian, 15% identified as Black/African American, 5% identified as Asian American/Pacific Islander, and 1% identified as biracial. Participants were most commonly first-year students (47%), consistent with the typical college student seeking career counseling. The vast majority of participants (89%) had taken no other psychology classes beyond introduction to psychology. Based on their responses to a demographic questionnaire administered as part of the study, it was seen that the following descriptors captured the majority of participants previous and current job fields: food service (e.g., server, cook), sales/marketing (e.g., salesperson, cashier, telemarketer, customer service), clerical (e.g., secretary), laborer (e.g., factory worker, landscaper), human and public services (e.g., teaching, camp counselor, police officer), business/information technology (e.g., programmer, administrator), health care (e.g., nurse, aide), and military. High-point Holland (1997) codes of the participants in the three treatment conditions (as determined by the interest assessments used in this research) were as follows: 3% realistic, 18% investigative, 17% artistic, 42% social, 12% enterprising, and 8% conventional (RIASEC). These distributions are comparable to those obtained for college student populations as published in the SDS manual (Holland et al., 1994).

Instruments
College students reactions to two measures of interest assessment, the SII (Harmon et al., 1994) and the SDS (Holland et al., 1994), were examined. The SII is a computer-scored inventory; the SDS is a hand-scored booklet. Both measures assess interests as organized by Hollands (1997) six interest areas (i.e., real-

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istic, investigative, artistic, social, enterprising, and conventional), and both are recognized as reliable and valid tools (Harmon et al., 1994; Holland et al., 1994). Self-Directed Search. The SDS (Holland et al., 1994) is a self-administered, hand-scored assessment instrument that measures career interests. Items are grouped according to Holland (1997) code and assess for interest in specific activities, competencies, and occupations as well as ability self-estimates. Item responses are summed to obtain scores for each of Hollands RIASEC categories, with the top three generally comprising an individuals Holland code. A wide range of research studies has demonstrated support for the reliability and validity of the SDS in assessing Holland code type (Holland et al., 1994; Spokane & Holland, 1995). For instance, Holland and Nafziger (1975) presented correlational data supporting convergent validity of the SDS with a range of other vocational assessment tools. Dumenci (1995) found support for convergent and discriminant validity of the SDS using hierarchically nested structural model tests. Scores on the SDS also have been demonstrated to relate significantly to self-efficacy expectations (Feehan & Johnston, 1999). Strong Interest Inventory. The SII (Harmon et al., 1994) is a computer-scored inventory that assesses a wide range of vocational interests. The measure consists of items corresponding to 211 occupational scales and 25 basic interest scales, grouped according to six general occupational themes based on the RIASEC model (Holland, 1997). Empirical support for the concurrent validity, predictive validity, and reliability of the occupational scales, basic interest scales, and general occupational themes is robust (Donnay & Borgen, 1996; Harmon et al., 1994). Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy Scale. Participants career decisionmaking self-efficacy was assessed with the Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy Scale (CDMSES; Betz & Taylor, 1994; Taylor & Betz, 1983), an often used and well regarded measure. The CDMSES is a 50-item self-report instrument that assesses self-efficacy expectations for completing a broad range of tasks related to career decision making. Respondents are asked to rate their perceived ability to complete the tasks on a scale from 0 (no confidence) to 5 (complete confidence). Item responses are summed to obtain an overall score. Prior investigations have shown internal consistency to range from .93 to .97, and CDMSES scores have correlated in expected directions with measures of self-esteem, career decisionmaking attitudes, and career decidedness (Luzzo, 1996). Reliability and validity evidence were also provided by Luzzo (1993). For the current sample, internal consistency reliability as measured by Cronbachs alpha was .94 for the pretest administration and .96 for the posttest administration. Demographic questionnaire. Basic demographic information (e.g., gender, age, race/ethnicity, year in school, self-reported grade point average [GPA], psychology courses taken, and recent work history) about the participants was gath-

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ered via a questionnaire designed for use in this study. Participants also reported whether they had declared a major and/or career path or what majors and careers they were considering. Those who identified a chosen major and/or career also rated their confidence that this choice would remain stable.

Procedure
Students were screened verbally prior to inclusion to verify that each was in a state of indecision about his or her career path. Specifically, students were asked prior to participation whether they had chosen a major and/or a career to which they aspired. Students who reported being fairly certain (i.e., greater than 60% certain that they would not change their career plans) of a career path were not included so as to maximize the samples similarity to actual career counseling clients. Following this screening, participants were assigned randomly to one of the four experimental groups. Because the SDS is flexible in its format and can be used as a counselor-free approach or as an adjunct to traditional career counseling (Holland et al., 1994), we examined two approaches to using the SDS. In one, the student completed the SDS alone and in a subsequent session discussed it with the counselor; in the other, the student and counselor together worked through the SDS in a collaborative, process-oriented manner over two sessions. Therefore, the four experimental groups were (a) assessment with the SDS followed by an interpretive session with a counselor, (b) process-oriented assessment/interpretation of the SDS over two sessions, (c) assessment with the SII followed by an interpretive session with a counselor, and (d) the no-treatment control group (see Table 1). These groups were comprised of 22, 19, 21, and 19 participants, respectively, and were similar in terms of participants age, F(3, 77) = .62, p >.05; gender, 2(3) = 1.72, p > .05; race/ethnicity, 2 (9) = 8.27, p > .05; year in school, 2 (12) = 8.30, p > .05; and self-reported GPA range, 2 (12) = 10.03, p > .05. Four counselors delivered the various treatments. Counselors ranged in age from 23 to 28, and three were women. They were all enrolled in a doctoral program in counseling psychology, and faculty in that program supervised their work delivering the interventions. All counselors were experienced in the administration and interpretation of the instruments. To ensure a high degree of uniformity among the counseling interactions, standard protocols for the SII and SDS standard and the SDS process administration and interpretation were used. Consistent however with the nature of career counseling, counselors were encouraged to individualize their discussions with participants. The two sessions for the three treatment groups took place an average of 14.20 (SD = 3.01) days apart (range = 5 to 21 days) to accommodate individuals schedules and mail-in scoring of the SII. Table 1 summarizes the four treatment intervention protocols. In the first session, all participants regardless of treatment group met individually with an

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Table 1 Treatment Groups and Experimental Design

Session 1 Group SII SDS standard Pretest CDMSES CDMSES Session SII completed alone SDS started alone SDS started with counselor Session SII interpretation with counselor SDS completed and interpreted with counselor SDS completed and interpreted with counselor Session 2 Posttest CDMSES

CDMSES

SDS process

CDMSES

Control

CDMSES

CDMSES CDMSES

Note. SII = Strong Interest Inventory; CDMSES = Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy Scale; SDS = Self-Directed Search.

experimenter, were verbally screened for career indecision, gave informed consent, filled out a demographic form and the CDMSES pretest, and set up an appointment for a second session to take place approximately 2 weeks later. For the three active treatment groups, counselors were available to answer questions as needed. Postcards were sent or follow-up phone calls were made to all participants as a reminder about the second appointment. Of participants who attended an initial session, 84% completed both sessions. There was no difference in pretest CDMSES scores between participants who completed both sessions and those who completed only the first session, t(94) = .49, p >.05. Control group. In the first session, participants in the no-treatment control group were excused immediately following completion of the demographic form and CDMSES pretest. Upon returning for their second sessions, those in this group filled out the CDMSES posttest. They then were debriefed and given a copy of the SDS and Occupations Finder to take with them for their personal use along with information about receiving career counseling through the university counseling centers. SII group. In the SII group, in the first session, participants completed the CDMSES and the entire SII after reading its instructions. In the second session, participants in this group received an interpretation of their computer-generated SII profile. First, counselors attempted to establish rapport by going over the demographic form with participants and getting some background information about them. Next, participants were given some background information about Hollands theory and how it structures the SII assessment. Participants were given a description of the six types and were asked to self-rank their top three types.

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Counselors explained the hexagon and how the types participants chose fit into the hexagon. The codes identified by the SII were compared and contrasted with participant-derived codes. Next, the General Occupational Themes, Basic Interest Scales, and Occupational Scales were interpreted. Occupations were examined in descending order of interest similarity, with counselors attempting to summarize participants interest patterns based on what participants indicated was interesting or useful. Finally, Personal Style Scales were described and participants standings on each were discussed. Counselors explained that scores had to do with how participants like to work rather than what participants like to do or their abilities. Throughout the interpretation, counselors attempted to integrate information across different sections of the SII and checked in with participants to explore how results corresponded to or contrasted with participants views of themselves. Counselors discussed with participants how they could use the SII information in their career decision-making process and gave them the completed SII materials to take home. Finally, participants filled out the CDMSES posttest and were debriefed. Clients varied in their responses to these sessions, and lengths ranged from 16 to 50 minutes (M = 31.00, SD = 9.39). One-way ANOVA revealed that these SII interpretation sessions varied in length depending on the counselor, F(3, 16) = 3.29, p < .05, and post hoc analyses showed that one counselors session lengths differed significantly from those of two other counselors. This counselors average session length for SII participants was 40.60 minutes (SD = 8.79) as compared to mean lengths of 27.33 (SD = 5.05) and 27.29 (SD = 9.72) minutes for the other two counselors. This difference in session length however was unrelated statistically to CDMSES score changes. SDS standard group. In the standard SDS group, in the first session, participants completed the CDMSES and the demographics form. They also completed the SDS after reading its instructions but were instructed not to compile the three-letter code on the Summary Code page and to leave the code boxes blank in the daydreams section of the SDS. This was an attempt to limit participants awareness of the meaning of Holland codes prior to their second session to ensure similarity with the other treatment conditions. When these SDS participants returned for their second sessions, they were treated as were participants in the SII condition in that counselors attempted to establish rapport by going over the demographic form and gathering background information. Next, counselors explained Hollands theory and how it structures the SDS assessment. Participants were given a description of the six types and were asked to self-rank the top three. Counselors next explained the hexagon and how the three types participants chose fit into the hexagon. Next counselors discussed participants responses in the various SDS sections and attempted to discern patterns in the participants responses. Counselors and participants discussed the participants responses in the Daydreams, Activities, Competencies, Occupations, and SelfEstimates sections, with counselors asking participants to share the experiences

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that formed the basis for their responses and noting patterns of interest. In the Self-Estimates section, counselors noted patterns in participants answers and asked participants to clarify with whom they were making comparisons and on what basis or evidence. Finally, the summary code was calculated and counselors explained the consistency of the code, the differentiation, and the various possible permutations. The codes identified by the SDS were compared and contrasted with participant-derived codes. The occupational titles corresponding to the derived Holland code that were of interest to participants were noted and compared/contrasted with those in the Daydreams section. Throughout the process, similar to interpretations in other conditions, counselors asked participants whether the results made sense, if they had questions, how the findings fit with how participants thought about themselves, and if the results seemed accurate. Counselors ended by summarizing the themes that emerged from interpreting the SDS and linking these with background information previously obtained. Counselors addressed how participants could use the results in the future and what plans the participant had for proceeding after the session. Finally, participants were given the completed SDS materials to take with them and completed the CDMSES posttest and were debriefed before leaving. These sessions ranged in length from 22 to 55 minutes (M = 32.95, SD = 8.39). One-way ANOVA confirmed that session length for this group did not vary by counselor, F(3, 17) = .27, p > .05. SDS process group. Subsequent to completing the CDMSES and demographic form in the first session, participants in the SDS process condition completed the first portion of the SDS in collaboration with the counselor. For this treatment group, strategies for discussing results were taken and adapted from Harmon et al.s (1994) general strategies for interpreting the SII. First, counselors attempted to establish rapport by going over the demographic form with participants and getting some background information about them. Next, participants started to work on the SDS, beginning with the Daydreams section and continuing through the Activities and Competencies sections. Counselors and participants together discussed the significance of participants competency rating responses, with the counselor asking follow-up questions about the liked and disliked activities marked by participants. Counselors also commented on overall patterns of liked and disliked activities. After completion of the first three SDS sections, the first session was ended. These first sessions ranged in length from 25 to 45 minutes (M = 37.26, SD = 5.67). One-way ANOVA confirmed that first session length for this group did not vary by counselor, F(3, 15) = .86, p > .05. When the participants in the SDS process condition returned for their second sessions, counselors oriented them by briefly reviewing what had been discussed in first session. Then counselors and participants started where they had left off by completing the Occupations section (with counselors asking what about various occupational titles sounded interesting or not appealing), the Self-Estimates section (with counselors clarifying with whom participants were making com-

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parisons), and the Summary Code page. Next, counselors introduced Hollands theory and how it structures the SDS assessment, as in the SII and SDS standard conditions. The codes derived from the SDS were compared and contrasted with participant-derived codes. Finally, the summary code was examined again and counselors explained the consistency of the code, the differentiation, and the various possible permutations. The occupational titles that were of interest to participants were noted and compared/contrasted with those in the Daydreams section. Throughout the process, similar to interpretations in other conditions, counselors asked participants if the results made sense, if they had questions, how the findings fit with how participants thought about themselves, and if the results seemed accurate. Counselors ended by summarizing the themes that emerged from interpreting the SDS and linking these with background information previously obtained. Counselors addressed how participants could use the results in the future and what plans the participant had for proceeding after the session. Participants were given their SDS materials to take with them, and they completed the CDMSES posttest and were debriefed before leaving. These second sessions ranged in length from 18 to 42 minutes (M = 28.00, SD = 7.65). Oneway ANOVA confirmed that session length for this group did not vary by counselor, F(3, 16) = 1.23, p > .05.

RESULTS
Preliminary analyses indicated that the four treatment groups (i.e., SII, SDS standard, SDS process, and no-treatment control) did not differ in their pretest scores on the CDMSES, F(3, 75) = 1.49, p >.05. Furthermore, initial repeated measures analyses of pre- and posttest CDMSES scores for the four counselors indicated no counselor and no counselor by treatment group effects (all ps >.05). Thus, it was concluded that no significant group differences in career decisionmaking self-efficacy were present at the outset and that data across counselors could be aggregated. To test the hypothesized treatment effects, a repeated measures ANOVA with pretest and posttest CDMSES scores as the within-subjects factor and treatment group membership as the between-subjects factor was computed. Results of this repeated measures ANOVA indicated significant time, F(1, 77) = 74.00, p <.001, and time by group, F(3, 77) = 4.51, p <.01, effects. Based on Cohens (1988) classification system, these results correspond to an effect size approaching moderate for time (partial 2 = .49) and a small effect size for the time by group interaction (partial 2 = .15). This indicates that the entire samples CDMSES scores changed between pre- and posttest administrations and that the amount of change in CDMSES scores varied across the four groups. Means and standard deviations for the CDMSES at pre- and posttest are summarized in Table 2. As can be seen, the mean CDMSES score at pretest for the

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entire sample was 3.75 and at posttest it was 4.00. Yet when the groups are examined separately, it can be seen that the mean CDMSES score for the notreatment control group was relatively stable from pre- to posttest (Mpretest = 3.80, Mposttest = 3.87), but the mean CDMSES scores for the three treatment groups increased .24 to .37 points from pre- to posttest for the three active treatment groups. Indeed, post hoc analyses of these scores using paired t tests indicated significant (p < .05) increases from pre- to posttest for all three of the active treatment groups but no such increase for the no-treatment control group. Effect sizes for the two SDS groups could be classified as medium-large to large (.68 for the SDS process group and .84 for the SDS standard group), and the SII group evidenced a small to medium effect (.41) (Cohen, 1988).

DISCUSSION
The current study sought to increase understanding about the effects of three modes of interest assessment on career clients career decision-making selfefficacy. Consistent with the underlying assumptions of and data regarding the effective components of career counseling (Brown & Krane, 2000) and the findings of Luzzo and Day (1999), significant increases in career decision-making self-efficacy were observed for participants in all three active treatment groups (i.e., SII, SDS standard administration, and SDS process administration). Furthermore, students who received no career counseling intervention showed essentially no gains in career decision-making self-efficacy over a 2-week period, suggesting that interest assessment and interpretation in general is effective in enhancing self-efficacy about career decision making. Contrary to our hypothesis however, pre-post changes in career decisionmaking self-efficacy did not differ reliably among the three active treatment groups. In particular, we expected that the greater counselor contact inherent in the SDS process administration would lead to greater increases in CDMSES scores due to greater opportunities for modeling and individualized interpretation and feedback. Our results however suggest that varying levels of the critical ingredients identified by Brown and Krane (2000), at least as was operationalized in the present research, did not differentially influence changes in career decisionmaking self-efficacy scores. It may be that the modest increase in counselor contact inherent in the SDS process group was insufficient to affect significantly participants scores. Future work that systematically controls and varies the dosage of certain critical treatment ingredients (per Brown & Krane, 2000) would help clarify this issue. Perhaps a comparison between a truly counselor-free assessment and an approach including counselor interaction and interpretation would clarify this issue. The present lack of differences in career decision-making self-efficacy for the three active treatment groups is consistent with the recent meta-analysis by Whiston, Brecheisen, and Stephens (2003). These researchers found few differ-

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Table 2 Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy Scale (CDMSES) Means and Standard Deviations for Treatment Groups at Pre- and Posttest
Pretest CDMSES Treatment Group SII SDS standard SDS process Control Total sample n 22 21 19 19 81 M 3.82 3.55 3.84 3.80 3.75 SD .59 .46 .41 .44 .49 Posttest CDMSES M 4.06 3.92 4.14 3.87 4.00 SD .58 .44 .44 .44 .49 t 3.29* 9.50** 5.45* 1.64

Note. CDMSES mean scores could range from 1 to 5, with higher scores indicative of greater selfefficacy for career decision making. SII = Strong Interest Inventory; SDS = Self-Directed Search. *p < .01. **p < .001.

ences in outcome across varied career counseling modalities, with only counselorfree approaches consistently producing poorer outcomes. The findings of Whiston et al. bolster the interpretation that our failure to find group differences reflects the true comparability of assessment modes. This is notable in that it suggests that all three of our assessment approaches are viable choices in career counseling practice and all three intervention/assessment modes may be equally effective in increasing career decision-making self-efficacy. Given the research supporting the centrality of career decision-making self-efficacy to the career exploration process (e.g., Church et al., 1992; Gianakos, 1999; Mau, 2000; Srsic & Walsh, 2001; Taylor & Betz, 1983; Taylor & Popma, 1990), this interpretation is encouraging as it offers practitioners support for their use of whichever interest assessment method best fits their style, clientele, or resources. Alternatively, it is also possible that our three assessment modes do address different needs or differentially complement diverse characteristics presented by career clients. As such, the three modes may be differentially effective in enhancing career decision-making self-efficacy for particular clients, but this may have been masked in the present research by our use of random assignment to the treatment groups. That is, levels of relevant individual differences may have been distributed equally among the treatment groups so we did not see group differences in the dependent variable. Further research to identify individual difference variables that may make certain forms of interest assessment more helpful for some clients seems warranted. An especially interesting implication of the lack of differences between the three active treatment groups concerns the difference in length of time spent with a counselor. Participants in the SDS process group received roughly twice as much individual contact with a counselor compared to participants in the SII or SDS standard groups. Yet, the lack of difference in career decisionmaking self-efficacy changes among these groups suggests that increases in career

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decision-making self-efficacy cannot be attributed simply to time spent individually with a counselor. Again, further research into the manner in which time is used in counseling could help clarify this issue. Finally, as the present work contributes to a body of knowledge that is relatively new and limited in scope (cf. Chartrand & Walsh, 2001), it seemed reasonable to consider further the descriptive pattern of the present results despite the lack of statistically significant differences among the three active treatment groups. Consequently, we made a closer examination of the pre-post CDMSES scores across the three active treatment groups and noticed the SII group displayed the smallest increase in CDMSES scores and the SDS standard group experienced the largest increase. Because the CDMSES taps confidence in ones own ability to make career-related decisions and because Bandura (1986) asserted that performance accomplishments are the most effective manner of increasing self-efficacy, we speculate that this difference may be due to the amount of independent thinking required of clients using each tool. In other words, the SII requires relatively little independent thinking because the client responds to items and receives a standardized printout of results that is then interpreted by a counselor. On the other hand, the SDS standard administration requires careful consideration by the client; he or she must navigate the process and consider the results with less guidance by a counselor. Also, in this study, participants in the SDS process group were guided by a counselor throughout the experience; those in the SDS standard condition navigated the instrument alone in the first session. It could be that those in the SDS standard group thus had greater opportunity to increase their performance accomplishments because there was greater chance that any learning would be attributed to the clients own effort. In addition, the SDS measures interests as well as self-rated abilities, and the SII taps only interests; attention to a larger array of career-related self-constructs could account for the slightly greater amount of observed change. As previously noted, this pattern does not seem to be attributable to the amount of time spent with a counselor. Of course, the replicability of this pattern (including determination of whether it might reach statistical significance with a larger sample) and the practical significance of the degree of pre- and posttest difference are open to question and require additional investigation.

Limitations
Although the present study used a relatively small sample of student clients, its attempt to isolate the effects of different modes of interest assessment on career decision-making self-efficacy is an offsetting strength. In addition, its use of a comparative methodology is an important extension of previous research. Furthermore, the limitations inherent in the use of student clients were at least partially minimized by screening individuals prior to the intervention to ensure a basic level of career indecision. The use of standard treatment protocols and four different counselors (cf. Luzzo & Day, 1999) for the three interventions and the

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failure to find counselor effects across treatment groups adds to our confidence that the observed treatment effects are genuine. However, it is important to note that interest assessment is only one aspect of career counseling and that many other factors are likely important in assisting a client in making a career choice. In particular, it seems important in future work to look further at individual differences that may play a role in career counseling process and outcome. Finally, it should be noted that the sample was comprised mostly of White/Caucasian women, and this limits the generalizability of our findings.

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