Review of Literature

Although adolescents become progressively independent from par-ents in the high school years, they depend heavily on parents in the area of career development (Peterson, Stivers, & Peters, 1986; Sebald, 1989). Kotrlik and Harrison (1989) found parents to impact career choice more than students ’ counselors, teachers, friends, other rela-tives, or people working in the field of interest. Parents want to help their teens (Laramore, 1984; McDaniels & Hummel, 1984; Otto, 1984), and the resources needed to provide this assistance can be developed and enhanced through counseling (Middleton & Loughead, 1993; Otto, 1984; Peterson et al., 1986; Whiston, 1989). Because there has been little empirical investigation of parents ’ in-volvement in their teens ’ career development, the focus of the present study was exploratory. The purpose of the study was to determine the extent to which the following variables predicted parental involve-ment in career development: (a) amount of time the parent lives with the teen, (b) number of people financially dependent upon the parent, (c) parents ’ employment situation, (d) life events, (e) gender of the teen, (f) family composition, (g) family size, (h) parents ’ education