Vocational Interests and Career Goals: Development and Relation's to Personality in Middle Adolescence. Journal of career assessment

Cross-sectional research implies a close relation of vocation interests, goals, and traits, yet little is known about their reciprocal development over time. This longitudinal study examined develop-ment of Things/People (T/P) and Data/Ideas (D/I) vocational interests and career goals in relation to Big Five personality traits among 292 Swiss adolescents with a cross-lagged panel design with two measurement points over 1 year from seventh to eighth grade. Interests and goals were significantly related within time and showed significant interactions across time. Traits related significantly and equally to interests and goals within time and predicted their development across time except for T/P goals. Goals and interests possessed incremental validity above traits in affecting each other. Implications include the need to account for dynamic processes in the development of goals and interests and their systematic relation to traits in theory and practice. Keywords vocational interests, career goals, career aspirations, personality, adolescent career development, developmental systems theory Personal interests and goals are important constructs in understanding human motivation an