150 CAREER CHOICE AND DEVELOPMENT
theories, whose distinctions are made compelling by the use to
which they are put. Because of their overriding importance, it is
worth comparing the differential and developmental perspectives
within vocational psychology, starting with the individual differ-
ences perspective.
The first project for vocational psychology, pioneered by Frank
Parsons (1909) at the beginning of the vocational guidance move-
ment, concentrates on occupations and the types of people who fill
them. This approach to vocational guidance identifies a few stable
traits or personality types that differentiate people in meaningful
ways relative to occupational requirements. It then uses tests to
measure these traits and systematically match individuals to fitting
occupations. Job success and satisfaction are the twin outcomes of
a congruent match between a person’s abilities and interests and a
position’s requirements and rewards.
The second project for vocational psychology, pioneered by
Donald Super (1953) after World War II, concentrates on how in-
dividual work lives unfold. This approach to career counseling elicits
work autobiographies from individuals and then identifies the schema
and thema that shape the narrative. It uses these patterns of meaning
to encourage individuals to implement their vocational self-concepts
in work roles, including movement to increasingly more congruent
occupational positions. This person-centered method permits coun-
selors and researchers to recognize the processes that construct and
develop an individual’s career through the life course. The career
perspective takes a longitudinal view of adaptational patterns; in con-
trast, the occupational perspective takes a cross-sectional view of per-
sonality types. Metaphorically, we might liken the differential approach
to comparing the characteristics revealed in photographs of six dif-
ferent people and the developmental approach to noting the changes
in six photographs of the same person taken at different times.
The developmental vantage point of constructing careers situ-
ates the meaning of careerin vocational psychology—the study of
vocational behavior and its development. The term vocationalrefers
to the responses an individual makes in choosing and adapting to