individuals with similar social codes and who solved problems by
interacting socially), environments were now defined not only by
the census of their inhabitants but by an analysis of data (level of
data, people, items from job analysis data) concerning what those
individuals actually did in their environments. This change was
aptly described as a shift from “incumbent-based” to “public-record-
based” environmental measurement (Gottfredson & Richards,
1999). A second change in the 1980s was a shift in emphasis from
theory construction to vocational intervention (Holland, Magoon,
& Spokane, 1981). This change paralleled the success of the SDS
(Holland, Fritsche, & Powell, 1994) and the change of hands to its
present publisher, Psychological Assessment Resources—an innov-
ative and consumer-driven publisher devoted to enhancing and
expanding the intervention capabilities of the SDS.
The 1990s showed a renewed interest in the theory and its revi-
sion, as well as in the question of convergence among career theories
(Savickas & Lent, 1994)—a surprisingly vigorous research program
on the underlying structure of vocational interests with an increasing
emphasis on the cultural validity of the theory (Day & Rounds,
1998) and an equally vigorous debate on the complex nature of inter-
ests (Hogan & Blake, 1999; Savickas & Spokane, 1999). Recent
research reviews examined the large, accumulated research literature
on person-environment congruence in Holland’s theory (Devinat,
1999; Spokane, Meir, & Catalano, 2000; Tinsley, 2000), increasingly
with an interest in the cultural context of the theory (Spokane,
Fouad, & Swanson, 2001). That work continues unabated on the
theory, instruments, and research paradigms popularized by Holland
is a tribute to the theory’s enormous heuristic value.
A Practical Model of Person-Environment Interaction
Holland’s theory describes the nature or disposition of the individual
worker. He uses six basic personality-interest types and classifies the
composition of the work environments in which those individuals
function, according to a parallel set of constructs. The interaction
of certain types (and subtype combinations) with specific environ-
378 CAREER CHOICE AND DEVELOPMENT