The Relationship Between Holland\u27s Personality Types and School Activities with Middle School Students

The study examined the preferred enjoyment and participation in school related activities using Holland\u27s (1985) (RIASEC) theory of vocational personality types as a foundation for the study. Using a quantitative exploratory research approach, the proposed study examined two assumptions: (a) each student anticipating how much he/she would enjoy or prefer to participate in certain activities is related to his or her dominant personality type more than activities chosen by students with other dominant personality types and (b) the extent in which each student has participated in certain activities is related to his or her dominant personality type more than students with other personality types. Students enrolled in the sixth, seventh, and eighth grade completed Holland\u27s (1985)Self-Directed Search, The Scale of School Related Activities, and The Survey of Participation in Extracurricular Activities created by the researcher. Data were analyzed by using one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) to compare sample means to determine if there was sufficient evidence to infer that the means of the corresponding population distributions differed based on the student\u27s dominant personality types, where the independent variable represented the six (RIASEC) personality types and the dependent variable represented activities. Post-hoc analysis related to the first assumption revealed significance in dominant Realistic, Investigative, Artistic, Social, and Enterprising types scoring higher in enjoyment or preference to participate in activities aligned with their dominant personality type more than activities chosen by students with other dominant personality types. Post-hoc analysis related to the second assumption revealed significance in dominant Realistic, Investigative, and Artistic types scoring higher in the extent of participation in certain activities aligned with their personality type more than students with orther dominant personality types. The main conclusions drawn from the study suggest that Holland\u27s (1985) (RIASEC) theory has implications for recognizing individual differences concerning student interest in middle school. This research argues for school administrators to take a more comprehensive approach in developing strategies to increase student participation in school by examining the psychological mechanisms involved in the interaction between person and environment