RIASEC interests and the Big Five personality traits matter for life success-But do they already matter for educational track choices?

OBJECTIVE: Educational track choices have far-reaching consequences because they are associated with long-term life success. Theoretical approaches and previous empirical research have nearly exclusively identified family background and achievement as determinants of these choices. Although students' educational track choices might fit their personality, individual differences in personality have not been explored. We investigated the effects of two personality aspects-RIASEC interests and Big Five traits-on hierarchically ranked track choices (vocational vs. general educational track), alongside family background and achievement. METHOD: We used two German data sets (TOSCA 10 study: N = 473; TOSCA study: N = 4,218) focusing on choices between the general educational track (leading to higher educational attainment) and the vocational track (leading to work life) at two different stages in educational careers. We ran several multiple (logistic) regressions. RESULTS: The results showed that certain aspects of students' personality matter for educational track choices. Accordingly, across both studies, students with high Investigative or Enterprising interests more often chose the general educational track, whereas students with high Social or Conventional interests more often chose the vocational track-after the Big Five personality traits, achievement, and family background were controlled for. The Big Five traits showed no or only small significant associations with educational track choices. CONCLUSION: These findings underscore the importance of considering individual differences when investigating important life outcomes such as track choices.

School or Work? The Choice May Change Your Personality.

According to the social-investment principle, entering new environments is associated with new social roles that influence people's behaviors. In this study, we examined whether young adults' personality development is differentially related to their choice of either an academic or a vocational pathway (i.e., entering an academic-track school or beginning vocational training). The personality constructs of interest were Big Five personality traits and vocational-interest orientations. We used a longitudinal study design and propensity-score matching to create comparable groups before they entered one of the pathways and then tested the differences between these groups 6 years later. We expected the vocational pathway to reinforce more mature behavior and curtail investigative interest. Results indicated that choosing the vocational compared with the academic pathway was associated with higher conscientiousness and less interest in investigative, social, and enterprising activities.

Stability and change in vocational interests after graduation from high school: A six-wave longitudinal study.

Vocational interests shape major life decisions and predict major life outcomes. Therefore, it is important to understand how vocational interests develop in young adulthood, a time when young people begin to make their own life decisions. In the present study, we investigated stability and change in vocational interests across a time span of 10 years, including the transition from high school to postsecondary education and the transition into the labor market. Using a large data set comprised of 3,023 German young adults, we provide descriptive information about the longitudinal development of vocational interests across 6 equally spaced time points. We investigated 5 different indicators of stability and change: rank-order stabilities, mean-level changes, changes in variance, profile stabilities, and profile differentiation, as well as gender differences in these indicators. We found high stabilities for the interest scales and interest profiles that increased even more across the period of 10 years. Substantial changes in mean levels occurred primarily in the context of the transition from high school to university, to vocational training, or into the labor market. As expected, there were gender differences in the mean levels, but the developmental patterns in the trajectories of vocational interests were very similar for men and women. Overall, our findings indicate that longitudinal studies with multiple time points are needed to extend knowledge about interest development. In addition, our findings demonstrate that considering normative social transitions may be key to better understanding longitudinal interest development. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Comparing memory skill maintenance across the life span: preservation in adults, increase in children.

The authors examined life-span differences in the maintenance of skilled episodic memory performance by assessing 100 individuals (10 -11, 12-13, 21-26, and 66-79 years old) 11 months after termination of an intensive multisession mnemonic training program (Y. Brehmer, S.-C. Li, V. Müller, T. von Oertzen, & U. Lindenberger, 2007). Skill maintenance was tested in 2 follow-up sessions, the first without and the second with mnemonic reinstruction. Younger and older adults' average performance levels were stable across time. In contrast, both younger and older children's memory performance improved beyond originally attained levels. Older adults' performance improved from the first to the second follow-up session, presumably profiting from instruction-induced skill reactivation. Results suggest that (a) skill maintenance is largely intact in healthy older adults, (b) older adults need environmental support to fully reactivate their former skill levels (cf. F. I. M. Craik, 1983), and (c) children adapt a skill learned 11 months ago to their increasing cognitive capabilities.

Vocational interests assessed at the end of high school predict life outcomes assessed 10 years later over and above IQ and Big Five personality traits.

Vocational interests are important aspects of personality that reflect individual differences in motives, goals, and personal strivings. It is therefore plausible that these characteristics have an impact on individuals' lives not only in terms of vocational outcomes, but also beyond the vocational domain. Yet the effects of vocational interests on various life outcomes have rarely been investigated. Using Holland's RIASEC taxonomy (Holland, 1997), which groups vocational interests into 6 broad domains, the present study examined whether vocational interests are significant predictors of life outcomes that show incremental validity over and above the Big Five personality traits. For this purpose, a cohort of German high school students (N = 3,023) was tracked over a period of 10 years after graduating from school. Linear and logistic regression analyses were used to examine the predictive validity of RIASEC interests and Big Five personality traits. Nine outcomes from the domains of work, relationships, and health were investigated. The results indicate that vocational interests are important predictors of life outcomes that show incremental validity over the Big Five personality traits. Vocational interests were significant predictors of 7 of the 9 investigated outcomes: full-time employment, gross income, unemployment, being married, having children, never having had a relationship, and perceived health status. For work and relationship outcomes, vocational interests were even stronger predictors than the Big Five personality traits. For health-related outcomes, the results favored the personality traits. Effects were similar across gender for all outcomes-except 2 relationship outcomes. Possible explanations for these effects are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record