Holland Codes

The Holland Codes or the Holland Occupational Themes (RIASEC) refers to a theory of careers and vocational choice (based upon personality types) that was initially developed by American psychologist John L. Holland.—Amy Lunday The Holland Codes or the Holland Occupational Themes (RIASEC) refers to a theory of careers and vocational choice (based upon personality types) that was initially developed by American psychologist John L. Holland. The US Department of Labor ETA has been using an updated and expanded version of the RIASEC model in the 'Interests' section of its free online database O*NET (Occupational Information Network) since its inception during the late 1990s. Holland's theories of vocational choice, The Holland Occupational Themes, 'now pervades career counseling research and practice.' Its origins 'can be traced to an article in the Journal of Applied Psychology in 1958 and a subsequent article in 1959 that set out his theory of vocational choices The basic premise was that one's occupational preferences were in a sense a veiled expression of underlying character.' The 1959 article in particular ('A Theory of Vocational Choice,' published in the Journal of Counseling Psychology) is considered the first major introduction of Holland's 'theory of vocational personalities and work environments.' Holland originally labeled his six types as 'motoric, intellectual, esthetic, supportive, persuasive, and conforming.' He later developed and changed them to: Realistic (Doers), Investigative (Thinkers), Artistic (Creators), Social (Helpers), Enterprising (Persuaders), and Conventional (Organizers).' Holland's six categories show some correlation with each other. It is called the RIASEC model or the hexagonal model because the initial letter of the region is equal to R-I-A-S-E-C when it is expressed as a circle connecting the regions of high correlation. Professor John Johnson of Penn State suggested that an alternative way of categorizing the six types would be through ancient social roles: 'hunters (Realistic), shamans (Investigative), artisans (Artistic), healers (Social), leaders (Enterprising), and lorekeepers (Conventional).' According to the Committee on Scientific Awards, Holland's 'research shows that personalities seek out and flourish in career environments they fit and that jobs and career environments are classifiable by the personalities that flourish in them.' Holland also wrote of his theory that 'the choice of a vocation is an expression of personality.' Furthermore, while Holland suggests that people can be 'categorized as one of six types,' he also argues that 'a six-category scheme built on the assumption that there are only six kinds of people in the world is unacceptable on the strength of common sense alone. But a six category scheme that allows a simple ordering of a person's resemblance to each of the six models provides the possibility of 720 different personality patterns.' Prediger constructed the scale of 'work task' and 'work relevant abilities' based on Holland's model, and carried out factor analysis and multidimensional scale analysis in order to clarify the basic structure. As a result, two axes of Data/Ideas and Things/People were extracted. Although Prediger's inquiry did not start from interest per se, it eventually led to the birth of models other than RIASEC, suggesting that the structure of occupational interest may provide a basic dimension. In the United States, the energetic trial is being made with the aim of the new model which surpasses Holland hexagon model in 1990's. Tracey & Rounds's octagonal model is one such example. Based on the empirical data, they argue that occupational interests can be placed circularly in a two-dimensional plane consisting of People/Things and Data/ldeas axes, and the number of regions can be arbitrarily determined. According to their model, only Holland's hexagonal model does not adequately represent the structure of occupational interest, and it is possible to retain validity as an octagonal or 16 square model if necessary. Tracey, Watanabe, & Schneider conducted an international comparative study of job interests among Japanese and U.S. university students, and the results suggest that the Tracey & Rounds's octagonal model is more fitted to Japanese students than Holland's hexagonal model. Tracey & Rounds criticizes that the conventional models of occupational interest structure do not correctly depict the positional relationship of occupations because they neglect occupational prestige, i.e., 'social prestige' or 'high socioeconomic status' and proposes a spherical model that assigns occupations to a 3-dimensional space incorporating occupational prestige. In this model, 18 regions of interest are displayed on a spherical space. The left hemisphere has a high status area, with Health Sciences at the top. The right hemisphere has a low status area, with Servise Provision as the lowest ground.