Analyzing the Career Counseling Phenomenon Term Paper

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Theories on Career Counseling

Selected theories

Trait and Factor Theory

Parsons, the theorist who developed the Trait and Factor theory, suggested that vocational support ought to be founded on three elements. Firstly, the individual, his/her personality, interests, abilities, resources, values, and ambitions must be clearly understood. According to Parsons, clinical interviews help glean this information. Secondly, knowledge regarding the sphere of work, including knowledge of each occupation's pros and cons, opportunities, requirements, and compensation ought to be acquired. The third key element is a logical link between the previous two elements. One can make rational decisions with regard to an individual's potential satisfaction within or appropriateness for a vocational post by relating the traits of a person to occupational factors, (Flanigan, 2011).

Rationale

Parson's theory has remained at the heart of the field of career counseling for a hundred years. The theorist first presented this concept in his work, "Choosing a Vocation," wherein he outlined the fundamental elements underlying the theory. However, theories coming under this category have faced criticism, owing to their unchanging nature, coupled with their failure at accounting for transformations in an individual's vocational orientation. In conjunction with this criticism, the field of career counseling has progressed, with social learning and developmental theories now dominating the field. In spite of this revolution in career counseling paradigm, the basic principle of individual-work environment fit persists, and has evolved and been incorporated frequently into other career counseling theories. The theory continues to be a valuable tool for career counselors (Flanigan, 2011). Theories under this category provide conceptual relevance to specifically isolated features of self, like personal orientations or abilities. They indicate matching career guidance and education models, assuming the value of linking specific individuals with suitable jobs (Law, 1996).

Social Learning Theory of Career Decision Making

Krumboltz (1996), when formulating a theory pertaining to the way people set about making career choices/decisions, stresses the significance action, behavior, and cognition (thinking/knowing) in this decision-making process. Krumboltz's SLTCDM (Social Learning Theory of Career Decision Making) deals with socially- and genetically- inherited attributes brought by individuals to the workplace. These characteristics interact with work environment and give rise to self-views, capable of influencing the individual's work and work-related behaviors. Contrary to other theories in initial career development, SLTCDM takes into consideration foreseeable modifications due to events in future.

Rationale

Mitchell and Krumboltz (1996) social learning model of career development emphasizes the self, together with cognitions and behavior pertaining to career-related decision-making. Krumboltz believes there are four aspects that interact and cause movement along the career path of an individual:

1. Genetic endowment: Inherited or innate aspects of a person;

1. Environmental conditions: These are normally not in a person's control, and include economic, political, social, and cultural factors;

1. Task approach competencies: goal setting, alternative generation, clarification of values, and collection of occupational information; and

1. Learning experiences: An individual is exposed countless times every day to associative and instrumental learning opportunities, from which he/she gains knowledge.

While categorized under 'social learning theories', the theory put forward by Krumboltz (1994) is actually regarding community interaction. The theorist describes career development with regard to individual-environment interactions, and distinguishes instrumental interactions, in which preferences favor activities wherein an individual succeeds, from associative interactions, in which preferences favor activities that a particular culture values. In case of both interactions, individual schemes (namely, beliefs with regard to oneself and the rest of the world) interact and get modified, to include learning from those interactions. According to Krumboltz, feedback, influence, and modeling are all a part of the process (Law, 1996).

Brief summary of Mrs. Jesmine Lim's occupational history

Forty-five-year-old Mrs. Jesmine Lim worked as an Information Technology (IT) systems development manager for thirteen years, prior to deciding to quit her job and stay home to aid her sons (then aged 8 and 10) with their school work. This career gap caused her to switch to a different career when she decided it was time for her to work again. Following a brief stint as contract teacher, Mrs. Lim enrolled in teacher training at age 36. She was always fond of teaching children, and her first venture into this field was in her junior college days, when she used to coach primary school students. In her opinion, everything has a reason. Her experience working in the IT industry helps add value to the job she is currently holding -- as a Chinese teacher at an all-girls Chinese school in Singapore -- in numerous immeasurable areas (The Sunday Times, 2014).

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An explanation of Mrs. Jesmine Lim's career history

Social Learning Theory of Career Decision-Making (SLTCDM)

The basis for Krumboltz's approach is the social learning theory put forward by Bandura, who identified three main kinds of learning experience:

a) Associative: This stems from first-hand experience as well as reinforcement when a person (Mrs. Lim in this instance) associates a former affectively neutral stimulus or event with one that is emotionally laden.

b) Instrumental: Such learning arises from first-hand experience, when persons such as Mrs. Lim receive positive reinforcement for any behaviors, and related cognitive skills.

c) Vicarious: When a person (Mrs. Lim in this instance) acquires new skills and behaviors through the observation of others' behavior, or through new ideas and information from sources like books, television, and films (Witchger, 2011).

The focus of this theory is on making clients aware of alternative options when it comes to deciding upon a career; it utilizes the "triadic reciprocal interaction" principle (in which learning is considered an interaction of genetic endowment and environment) and stresses associative and the role of instrumental learning. Consequently, the key tools or concepts at the practitioner's disposal are modeling and reinforcement. Applying this model to practice entails an attempt of the practitioner to recognize and rectify clients' incorrect beliefs with regard to the process of decision-making (Witchger, 2011). The theory was formulated for addressing the following questions:

Why individuals enter certain jobs or educational courses;

Why individuals sometimes change direction at some point of life;

Why they express a range of preferences for various activities at distinct points in life (Witchger, 2011).

Four factors linked to SLTCDM are considered influential in Mrs. Lim's choices, namely, 1) special abilities and gender endowment, 2) environmental events and conditions, 3) task approach competencies, and 4) learning experiences.

Owing to the complex link of the aforementioned influencing elements, individuals such as Mrs. Lim form beliefs or generalizations that reflect their personal reality. Such beliefs with regard to self and the sphere of work have an influence on their perspective on learning novel skills; this ultimately influences their actions and aspirations. The application of task approach competencies in career-related decision-making relies on appropriate learning. For achieving the best career development, an individual needs exposure to the broadest possible array of learning experiences, irrespective of differentiators, such as gender, race, etc. Interaction among genetic characteristics, environmental influences, and learning experiences leads to task approach competency development (Witchger, 2011). In case of Mrs. Lim, these include:

Personal performance standards;

Emotional responses; and Work habits.

Mrs. Lim's previously-acquired task approach competencies employed in her novel role as an educator/teacher, impact teaching task outcome, and might also, themselves, undergo modifications.

Every person possesses a unique learning experience history which leads to their respective occupational choice. Typically, individuals fail to recall the specific sequence or nature of their learning experiences. Instead, they remember the general conclusions they arrived at, from them (for instance, Mrs. Lim claims that she has always loved teaching). The two key learning experience forms identified under the SLTCDM theory are:

1. Associative learning experiences, in which people perceive an association between no less than two groups of environmental stimuli (like observation, hearing or reading about occupations)

1. Instrumental learning experiences comprising of:

1. Previous stimuli/circumstances (a brief job as contract teacher, in Mrs. Lim's case);

1. Behavioral responses (both covert and overt); in Mrs. Lim's case, she has claimed she has always loved teaching;

1. Consequences (a career switch from IT to teaching) (Witchger, 2011).

SLTCDM explores career development and decision making from a novel standpoint (Krumboltz, 1998). Decisions pertaining to career are centered on a person's learning via the environment, unplanned events, and genetic influences. In this context, counselors practice "planned happenstance" when the perspective of the client is of "planfulness," broadmindedness, and self-reliance. Unplanned occurrences are viewed as a valuable and normal component of life.

This study's conceptual framework is grounded in the Social Learning model of Bandura (1977). The assumption is that an adult human being is intelligent and a problem solver, and is not passively controlled by his/her environment. The origins of this theory lie in the following behaviorist idea: the performance of human beings is governed by learning, and suggests that individuals learn from each other via observation, modeling and imitation. Furthermore, the environment is another source of learning for individuals. Such learning is controlled by the self-estimated ability of individuals to interact effectively with other people.....

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