George D. Yonge

A longitudinal study of personality and choice of major

Abstract Several aspects of Hollands theory of vocational choice are examined using freshman and senior Omnibus Personality Inventory (OPI) and freshman Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) data for 833 men. It was found that freshman, senior, and change scores on the OPI and that SAT scores are related to senior major field of study, classified into the six Holland types. There are differences in both personality and ability among those who persisted in the same type of major for 4 yr, and there are differences among those who change to a different type of major from the freshman to the senior year. Further, there is Limited evidence that within certain types of major, particularly the Realistic type, persisters and those who enter this type of major resemble each other more on some personality characteristics than do persisters and those who leave this type of major. Generally, evidence in support of Hollands theory is based on relationships which have been well established and known for a long time. More explicit expectations derived from this theory are only weakly supported or not supported at all. Indeed, Hollands theory is not adequate to the task of shedding much light on the obtained results.

The significance of the concepts ‘elemental’ and ‘fundamental’ in didactic theory and practice

The ‘elemental’ refers to the essentials of the contents that make them accessible to a child. The effects on a child of contents that are mastered are the ‘fundamental’. In a fruitful didactic unlocking (presentation) it is possible for a child to achieve considerably more insight than merely an understanding of the learning content. The child (learner) gains insight into reality itself, and even into means of dealing with it. There is a path from the elemental to the fundamental that should always be kept in mind, and kept open by a teacher. The elemental has an unlocking function and facilitates presenting the contents to a child, but it is valid didactically only if it is transformed into a fundamental learning experience by a child/learner. The elemental‐fundamental approach, if used appropriately, leads to effective teaching that culminates in genuine learning. This, in didactic terminology, is referred to as ‘categorical forming’. Contents that have been mastered become part of a child’s intellectual possession by means of which the becoming person can gradually cope with present and future life‐world situations and the life challenges they encounter.

The Bem Sex-Role Inventory Reexamined

533 women and 361 men undergraduates were administered the 20-item masculine and the 20-item feminine scales of the Bern Sex-role Inventory. Factor analyses of the 40 items produced for both men and women 6 interpretable factors: nurturance, dominance, autonomy, bipolar M-F, competition, and leadership. Thus the inventory appears to be very complex. Nevertheless, multiple correlations (R) of the 40 items with the total masculinity and femininity scores separately produced an R = .75 for the masculinity scale and R = .86 for the femininity scale. Most of the items with significant contributions to each of the scales were consistent with the original scoring used by Bem.

Personality Correlates of the College and University Environment Scales

by an interaction between individual and environment ...&dquo; (Pace, 1963, p. 3). The recent studies by Astin (1964a, b), Astin and Holland (1961), Pace (1962), and Stern (1962) reflect attempts to provide measures of objective characteristics of learning environments. The methodologies provided by these investigators have given impetus to a body of research focussed on the interaction between student and environmental characteristics. An assumption underlying this body of research seems to be that student and

The Bem sex-role inventory: use with caution if at all.

A critical evaluation is made of the measure of psychological androgyny (difference, scores) derived from the Bern Sex-role Inventory. On the basis of this evaluation and an illustration of the shortcomings of this measure, it is recommended that the inventory not be used as a measure of androgyny.

Some Concerns about the Estimation of Learning Potential from the System of Multicultural Pluralistic Assessment.

After considering how an estimate of learning potential (ELP) is derived from the System of Multicultural Pluralistic Assessment, it was shown that most of the characteristics of ELP deemed to be important are generated by statistical artifacts. It was also noted that the fundamental assumption underlying ELP is without supportive evidence. ELP should not be used to make judgements about individual children or other educational decisions.

FEMALE'S SEX-ROLE EXPECTATIONS AND MAJOR FIELD OF STUDY

In an attempt to replicate the findings of Hawley, 19 women majoring in Engineering, 15 in the Biological Sciences, and 19 in English completed a questionnaire indicating their personal and their assumed sex-role expectations of significant men in their lives. Neither expectations were related to major field of study; however, personal and assumed expectations were significantly correlated (.53 for the total sample). Hawleys conclusions do not appear to be as clear-cut as she assumed. Some suggestions for research were made.

FEMALE SEX-ROLE EXPECTATIONS AND AUTHORITARIANISM

38 male and 38 female university students were classified by a median split on the Autonomy scale from the Omnibus Personality Inventory as authoritarian and non-authoritarian. Subjects also completed a modified version of a questionnaire developed by Hawley (1971) dealing with traditional versus androgynous female sex-role expectations. The five scores derived from this questionnaire are: Woman as Partner, Woman as Ingenue, Woman as Homemaker, Woman as Competitor, and Woman as Knower. As anticipated, authoritarian subjects held more traditional expectations. Men were significantly more traditional than women on two of the five scores, Woman as Homemaker and Woman as Competitor.

CONTEXT, MEANING, AND TRANSFER OF VERBAL BEHAVIOR

Two experiments, with 54 and 60 college Ss, respectively, had paired-associate words varied either in or out of a sentence context in training; had stimulus, response or both S-R similarity varied in 3 lists of paired-associate words or sentences between training and transfer; and had the meaning relationships of words within the 3 lists of paired-associate words or sentences between training and transfer varied in six ways: unrelated, synonyms, antonyms, homonyms, associates, and identical. Both experiments were designed as 2 (context) by 3 (lists) by 6 (meaning) with repeated measures for meaning. In Exp. I, the paired-associate words for the transfer task were not in a sentence context and in Exp. II the same paired-associate words were in a sentence context. The results indicated that there was reliably greater transfer for words that had homonym, associate or identical than unrelated, synonym, or antonym meaning relationships between training and transfer. This was true whether the paired-associate words were in or out of context in training or in transfer. Only when the training and transfer tasks were in context was there more transfer of learning due to context than no context. Contrary to the theory of transfer, there was no difference due to S, R, or S-R similarity being varied between training and transfer.

Comments: The Transfer of Meaning: Comments on the Di Vesta and Walls Study

In this note I should like to stress the significance of the study by Di Vesta and Walls (1967), say a few words of caution regarding their data, qualify some of their conclusions, and suggest that functional fixedness studies, when viewed from a broader perspective than transfer theory, have important epistemological as well as psychological implications. In slighting transfer theory per se, I am questioning neither the validity nor fruitfulness of this perspective.