Construction of vocational interests scale for young Chinese

Abstract

Holland’s RIASEC vocational interest typology may not be fully applicable to Chinese populations, and adapting models from Western cultures directly may fail to address important constructs specifically tied to the Chinese cultural background. This study made an exploration into Chinese college students’ vocational interests and built a new self-report vocational interests scale based on Chinese university student samples. In study 1, researchers constructed a self-report vocational interests inventory developed from an item pool based on open-ended questionnaires and previous scales. Nine dimensions were identified through exploratory factor analysis: Artistic, Biotic, Conventional, Expressive, Investigative, Operational, Social, Enterprising, and Adventurous. In study 2, confirmatory factor analysis was employed to test its construct validity, and the indexes indicated good fit. Empirical evidence proved adequate homogeneity reliability and test–retest reliability, as well as sufficient concurrent validity with the Self-Directed Search. Thus, evidence lent support for the psychometrical properties of this scale. This exploratory research may expand our view of cross-cultural, vocational interest theories.