The structure of vocational interests in Filipino adolescents: A combined emic-etic study.

摘要

The current study examines the structure of vocational interest in Filipino adolescents using a combined emic-etic approach. Although much literature exists that compares vocational interest structure in non-Western and Western cultures, no published study using an emic approach, or a Philippine sample, was identified in the literature review for this study. Furthermore, the vast majority of cross-cultural investigations of vocational interest structure have been conducted at the scale-level.; An indigenous instrument incorporating a comprehensive list of occupations and majors, and expressly designed for use with adolescents in the Philippines, was designed by cross-cultural psychologists with expertise in the population studied. The instrument was administered to 503 high school students from a private K--12 school, about 60 miles south of Manila. Exploratory factor analysis (principal axis extractions with varimax rotation) of the interest test items was conducted to derive indigenous Philippine interest dimensions. The dimensions of the final nine-factor solution were labeled Courses, Unskilled/Semi-skilled Labor, Science/Intellectual, Male-dominated, Commerce/Office-work, Humanities, Government/Law, Education, and one dimension remained unlabeled because it was uninterpretable. Multidimensional scaling was used to determine if the structure of the indigenous data could be represented by a circular or hexagonal shape, as is the case in the Western model.; Findings supported some similarity in interest dimensions between the Philippines and Western cultures, but culture-specific elements emerged as well. Specifically, the first hypothesis, that indigenous Philippine interest dimensions could be identified and reliably measured, was supported. The second hypothesis, that indigenous interest dimensions would resemble, or overlap with, Holland's six interest dimensions, but also exhibit some culture-specific aspects, was also supported. Finally, the last hypothesis, that the relationships among the indigenous Philippine dimensions, and the relationships among the Philippine measures of Holland's types, could be represented by Holland's circular structure, was not supported. Cultural-specific elements are discussed.