Student Demographics & Occupational Objectives

IN SELECTED OCCUPATIONAL OBJECTIVES

The conducted study examined whether differences in the student demographics of age, gender, religion, and family yearly income were associated with differences in junior and high school students' degree of interest in each of 18 vocational objectives.

According to Ornstein and Hunkins (1993), there have been several challenges confronting vocational educators regarding the determination of students' interest in occupational objectives. In other words, distinguishing between students who are interested in different vocational objectives is difficult.

One way in which researchers have attempted to determine differences in students' degree of interest in various vocational objectives has been to examine whether their interests differ in relation to student demographics. Unfortunately, these studies have yielded somewhat mixed findings. For example, Webb (1988) found that college choice and college major were systematically related to the personal and background characteristics of a sample of high school juniors. Similarly, Thomson (1992) found that the ethnicity of high school seniors was related to their degree of interest in the health profession.

Demographics were not, however, found to be a determining factor in the perceptions of students toward vocational objectives in a study conducted by Smith (1998). The purpose o

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estionnaire is to examine how you feel about several vocational objectives or areas of work. Please use the scale provided on the next page to rate the extent to which you personally would be interested in each one of the several vocational objectives that are listed on the following page. Rating Scale 1 = Strongly Interested 2 = Interested 3 = Marginally Interested 4 = Not Interested at all Vocational Objectives/Areas of Work ___Business ___Construction (e.g., building homes, general shop skills, electrical skills, plumbing, carpentry, masonry skills) ___Agriculture (e.g., plant science, pasture and forage crop production, dairy production) ___Veterinary Medicine ___Medicine or Health occupations ___Technical repair (e.g., auto work, air conditioning, television repair, etc.) ___Police or Prison work ___Physical sciences or math ___Behavioral sciences (e.g., psychologist, sociologist, etc.) ___Arts (painting, sculpture, etc.) ___Home Arts (interior decorating, furnishing) ___Restaurant/Cooking fields (being a cook or a chef) ___Working at a hotel (travel coordinator, reservation clerk), ___Computer work (e.g., programmer, data processor) ___Foreign Languages ___Cosmetology ___Transportation were asked to make recommen
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Approximate Word count = 3245
Approximate Pages = 13 (250 words per page)

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