Career specialty preferences among psychology majors: cognitive processing styles associated with scientist and practitioner interests.

The authors investigated cognitive processing styles associated with interests in scientist and practitioner activities among a sample of undergraduate psychology majors who planned to attend graduate school. Results indicated that interests in scientist activities were associated with a greater motivation to engage in effortful processing (i.e., need for cognition). Interests in practitioner activities were not correlated with need for cognition. Contrary to theoretical expectations, neither interests in scientist activities nor in practitioner activities were related to ambiguity intolerance (i.e., preference for clear-cut solutions to problems).

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This study attempted to gain better understanding of career specialty choice in psychology by examining the relationship between cognitive processing styles and career specialty preferences among undergraduate psychology majors. Gelso's (1979) reflections on the scientist and practitioner traditions in psychology served as the theoretical context for the current study.

In the tradition of Paul Meehl (1972), Gelso (1979) offered a series of influential reflections on scientist and practitioner interests in psychology. Influential psychologists met in Boulder, Colorado, in 1949, establishing a model of training devoted to training psychologists as scientists and practitioners. Their training recommendations are referred to as the Boulder model. The Boulder model's goal has repeatedly been hindered by the perception among psychologists that there are groups of psychology students whose strong interests in empirical research are associated with a disdain for clinical practice and vice versa (Leong & Zachar, 1991). The perception that the Boulder model advocates unrealistic goals has led to the development of competing models, specifically practitioner programs leading to the Doctor of Psychology degree, and the clinical scientist model, which puts a primary emphasis on research (McFall, 1991; Peterson, 1976).

One does not have to believe that science and practice are incompatible to speculate on why some people are not inclined to favor integrating them. Gelso's (1979) answer was that doing scientific research is associated with effortful processing, particularly a preference for strict logical thinking and control of emotionality. He believed that the successful scientist must be committed to engaging in scientific thinking from the brainstorming and idea-generation phase to the interpretation of results phase. Additionally, Gelso asserted that the scientist must be able to detect ambiguities; however, the primary goal is to reduce the ambiguities of the phenomena under investigation.

As for practitioners, Gelso (1979) suggested that these individuals must be able to think and feel, but they must be able to cognize the world primarily through nonintellective processes and secondarily through the intellect. Gelso also asserted that practitioners must possess a strong belief in the therapeutic process while instilling hope in clients concerning their ability to change. Therapists must also possess the ability to tolerate the ambiguity endemic to treating clients.

After briefly reviewing the literature on career specialty interests, we attempt to translate Gelso's ideas on scientist and practitioner interests into testable hypotheses. More specifically, we propose examining the relationship between scientist and practitioner interests and preferences for effortful cognitive processing and ambiguity intolerance.

Career Specialty Choice in Psychology

As scientific disciplines develop, their research programs evolve from an initial consideration of broad questions to a narrower focus on more specific questions. An increasing interest in specific questions is also reflected in the evolution of vocational psychology. For instance, researchers exploring the trait-factor paradigm of vocational psychology initially investigated the relationship between general personality and general environment (Holland, 1959, 1985), whereas more recent research has begun examining the relationship between interests and career specialization (Gottfredson, Holland, & Ogawa, 1982; Holland, 1985).

Researchers have investigated the relationship between specialty choice and general vocational preferences (Gottfredson et al., 1982; Holland, 1985) and between specialty choice and theoretical orientation (Coan, 1979; Zachar & Leong, 1992, 2000). Studies by Assouline and Meir (1987) and Meir and Yaari (1988) indicated that career satisfaction was more related to congruent career specialty choice than it was to congruent career choice in general. Spokane (1985) has shown that the correlation between general occupational congruence and satisfaction rarely exceeds .30, but Assouline and Meir have shown that the correlation for intraoccupational congruence and satisfaction for a variety of occupations averaged .42. Meir and Melamed (2004) recently found a correlation of .46 for intraoccupational congruence and satisfaction for computer software professionals.

Hartung, Borges, and Jones (2004) found that person matching predicted medical specialty choice from 43% to 60% of the time. In person matching, an individual's profile on a psychological test is matched to a best fitting profile in a target occupational group. Borges and Gibson (2004) studied differences in personality patterns between person-oriented and technique-oriented physicians, finding that technique-oriented physicians were more defensive, less likely to accept criticism, and less agreeable than person-oriented physicians. Additionally, Stratton, Witzke, Elam, and Cheever (2004) linked learning styles to career specialty choice, finding that interests in neurology and surgery were associated with higher preferences for self-study and lecture-based instruction, whereas interests in the practice of family medicine were correlated with preferences for group discussion and computer-based instruction.

Following similar lines of research as those just mentioned, Leong and Zachar (1991, 1993) investigated factors related to career specialty choice in psychology. Their basic premise was that students do not simply choose to become psychologists. They must eventually decide if they are going to pursue a degree in such specialties as clinical, counseling, social, cognitive, and developmental psychology.

To help students with this decision-making process, Leong and Zachar (1991) developed a scale called the Scientist-Practitioner Inventory (SPI). A series of studies over the past 15 years has found that interests in both scientist and practitioner activities are internally consistent and that scientist and practitioner interests are negatively correlated for graduate students and psychologists, but positively correlated for undergraduates (Aspenson et al., 1993; Leong & Zachar, 1991; Manning, Zachar, Ray, & LoBello, 2006; Zachar & Leong, 2000).

Zachar and Leong (2000) showed that these specialty interests predict the actual work behaviors of psychologists and the probable future behaviors of graduate students. In a related study with a sample of licensed psychologists, Brooks (1996) found that interests in scientific activities were correlated with the actual amount of time spent doing research and that interests in practitioner activities were correlated with the actual amount of time spent in therapy activities. The correlations between specialty interests and work activities were within the .30 to .40 range that Mischel (1968) and Nisbett (1980) considered to be the highest level of association attainable between traits and behavior.

Linking Career Specialty Choice With Cognitive Processing Styles

Cognitive processing styles refer to the characteristic, intraindividually consistent ways that people process or organize information. Such processing styles are thought to underlie personality traits and may underlie intraoccupation specialization traits as well (Sadowski & Cogburn, 1997). Two particular cognitive processing styles, need for cognition and ambiguity intolerance, clearly mirror Gelso's (1979) reflections regarding the difficulties associated with integrating the researcher and practitioner specializations.

The construct of need for cognition was introduced by Cacioppo and Petty (1982) and refers to the extent to which people choose to engage in and enjoy effortful thought. People who are low in need for cognition do not enjoy undertaking cognitive endeavors involving lengthy, arduous thought, and they will use strategies such as heuristics or mnemonic devices to save time and effort on such activities (Cacioppo, Petty, Kao, & Rodriguez, 1986; Cacioppo, Petty, & Morris, 1983). In contrast, individuals who are high in need for cognition enjoy spending significant amounts of time working on cognitive challenges, and they will generally take advantage of any opportunities to do so (Leone & Dalton, 1988). There has been considerable research in support of the need for cognition construct (see review by Cacioppo, Petty, Feinstein, & Jarvis, 1996).

Ambiguity intolerance has long been thought to be relevant to specialization in clinical practice given the inherent ambiguity of the therapy situation. Its converse, ambiguity tolerance, has been reported to be related to practitioner work satisfaction (Wittenberg & Norcross, 2001). Tolerance for ambiguity has been primarily defined as "the tendency to perceive ambiguous situations as desirable" (Budner, 1962, p. 29) as well as a "willingness to accept a state of affairs capable of alternate interpretations, or of alternate outcomes" (English & English, 1958, p. 24). People with a low tolerance for ambiguity tend to perceive ambiguous situations as threatening. They are, in general, not inclined to think probabilistically (Frenkel-Brunswik, 1948), and they may, at times, attempt to solve problems without sufficient information (Millon, 1957).

Hypotheses

On the basis of Gelso's (1979) observations, we hypothesized that need for cognition and ambiguity intolerance would be positively correlated with interests in scientist activities. We also hypothesized that ambiguity intolerance would be negatively correlated with interests in practitioner activities. We also expected that need for cognition would be negatively correlated with practitioner interests.

Method

Sample

The participants in the current study were 100 undergraduates enrolled in a course on counseling psychology at a large midwestern university. Every participant included in this study was a psychology major who intended to apply to graduate school. The sample was 32% male and 68% female. Participants' average age was 22 years, with a standard deviation of 3.30 and a range of 19 to 47 years. The sample comprised mostly White Americans (84%); 9% were African Americans, and 3.6% were Asian Americans. Most participants in the sample (75.5%) intended to apply to either a counseling or a clinical graduate program.

Instruments

Scientist and practitioner interests were measured by Leong and Zachar's (1991) SPI, a 42-item instrument measuring interest in scientist activities and interest in practitioner activities. Each item is rated on a 5-point Likert scale, with anchor points ranging from very low interest (1) to very high interest (5). An example of a typical item from the Scientist scale is "writing research articles for publication." An example of a typical item from the Practitioner scale is "conducting a psychotherapy session with an individual client." The Scientist scale measures the facets of scientific interest using the following subscales: Research, Teaching, Academic Ideas, and Statistics and Design. The Practitioner scale measures facets of practitioner interest using the following subscales: Therapy, Expertise, and Testing.

Past research with graduate students has yielded coefficient alphas greater than .90 for both the Scientist and the Practitioner scales (Zachar & Leong, 1992). Replicating results from previous research with undergraduates (Kenney & Rohrbaugh, 1997; Leong & Zachar, 1991; Manning et al., 2006), interest in scientist activities and interest in practitioner activities were positively correlated at r = .39 (p < .01). In a longitudinal study, Zachar and Leong (2000) found that scientist and practitioner interests were stable over a 10-year period, with test-retest reliabilities ranging from .44 (p < .01) to .50 (p < .01) for scientist interests and from .37 (p < .01) to .73 (p < .01) for practitioner interests, depending on the nature of the participants in the sample.

For the current study, need for cognition was measured by Cacioppo, Petty, and Kao's (1984) 18-item Need for Cognition Short Form (NCSF). Cacioppo et al. (1984) suggested that the reliability of the short form is similar to the reliability of the original Need for Cognition scale (Cacioppo & Petty, 1982), with internal consistency coefficients in the high .80s, an assertion replicated by Sadowski (1993). Respondents indicate their agreement with items using a 9-point Likert-type scale ranging from very strong disagreement (-4) to very strong agreement (+4). High scores indicate a greater need for cognition.

Using the NCSF, Tolentino, Curry, and Leak (1990) found that college students who were high in need for cognition preferred activities that reflect intellectual effort. Sadowski and Cogburn (1997) found that students scoring high on need for cognition were also more likely to score high on the traits of Openness to Experience and Conscientiousness from the five-factor model of personality as measured by the NEO Personal Inventory (Costa & McRae, 1992).

For the current study, ambiguity intolerance was measured by Budner's (1962) Intolerance of Ambiguity Scale (IAS), which consists of 16 items, 8 of which are worded positively and 8 are worded negatively. Respondents indicate their agreement with items using a 7-point Likert-type scale ranging from very strong disagreement (1) to very strong agreement (7) for the positively worded items. The instrument measures both a person's dislike for ambiguous situations and his or her preference for certainty. High scorers seek definitive and final answers to problems.

Past research on the IAS has yielded alpha coefficients ranging from .52 to .62 (DeForge & Sobal, 1989). Test-retest reliability coefficients included .85 for a 2-week to 2-month retesting, and .73 for a 6-month retesting (Budner, 1962; DeForge & Sobal, 1989). DeForge and Sobal found that among medical students, men with undergraduate majors in the natural sciences were more intolerant of ambiguity than were men who were not science majors.

Procedure

A survey that contained the previously described instruments was distributed by their professors to students in an advanced undergraduate course in counseling psychology. Students were told that their participation was voluntary and that they could withdraw at any time without penalty. Those who chose to participate in the study were given feedback about their specialty preferences in psychology toward the end of the semester. Data collection was repeated over three semesters with different students each semester to obtain a sufficient sample size.

Results

In the first set of analyses, the need for cognition and intolerance of ambiguity, as measured by scores on the NCSF and the IAS, were used as predictors in two multiple regressions equations--one for scientist interests and another for practitioner interests (as measured by scores on the SPI subscales). We used a simultaneous entry method whereby both variables were entered at one time. The results of the analyses are presented in Table 1. For scientist interests, the multiple correlation was .45. This was a significant correlation, F(2, 110) = 13.78, p < .01. Need for cognition was the only significant predictor in the model as indicated by the t test for its regression coefficient. The multiple correlation for practitioner interests was .15. This was not significant, F(2, 110) = 1.39, p > .05.

A second set of analyses, also presented in Table 1, were performed using scores on Leong and Zachar's (1991) SPI subscales as criterion variables. On the Scientist interest subscales, all of the multiple correlations were significant. The multiple correlation was .41 for the Research subscale, F(2, 110) = 11.3, p < .01, and .36 for the Teaching subscale, F(2, 110) = 7.95, p < .01. The multiple correlation was .52 for the Academic Ideas subscale, F(2, 110) = 20.49, p < .01, and .27 for the Statistics and Design subscale, F(2, 107) = 4.19, p < .01. In each of these equations, need for cognition was a significant predictor. Ambiguity intolerance was not a predictor. Neither need for cognition nor ambiguity intolerance predicted scores on the SPI Practitioner interest subscales.

Given that need for cognition and ambiguity intolerance were negatively correlated at r = -.47 (p < .01), we decided to also examine the zero-order correlations. The complete set of zero-order correlations is presented in Table 2, along with the means, standard deviations, and ranges of the measurements. The zero-order correlations between need for cognition and the SPI variables (i.e., the subscales measuring scientist and practitioner interest) paralleled what was found in the multiple regression equations, except that ambiguity intolerance was also a significant predictor for scores on the Academic Ideas subscale. With the exception of the correlation with the Academic Ideas subscale, ambiguity intolerance was unrelated to interest in scientist and practitioner activities.

Discussion

Summary of Major Findings

The current study demonstrates that an interest in scientist activities is correlated with a need for effortful cognitive processing. The full range of academic activities measured by the SPI were associated with a higher need for cognition, with interests in research activities and academic ideas having the strongest associations. The Academic Ideas subscale includes interests in activities described in subscale items such as "formulating a theory of a psychological process" and "developing new explanations of well-accepted empirical studies."

Contrary to expectations, ambiguity intolerance was not related to scientific and academic interests, with one exception. It was negatively correlated with academic ideas. We are reminded that an alternative name for Holland's scientist variable is Intellect--calling to mind the open-minded and cognitively complex traits associated with scientific reasoning throughout history, from Copernicus to Darwin and beyond.

Among undergraduate students, neither need for cognition nor ambiguity intolerance was associated with interest in practitioner activities. This is contrary to our hypothesis, which stated that ambiguity intolerance would be negatively correlated with practitioner interests.

Implications

The need for cognition construct represents Petty and Cacioppo's (1986) Elaboration Likelihood Model in persuasion research translated into what psychologists refer to as the study of individual differences. Social psychologists have discovered that different tactics of persuasion are needed for different types of people (Eagly & Chaiken, 1998; Petty & Cacioppo, 1986). For people who are cognitively active and inquisitive, the best tactic is to present well-reasoned arguments and let them draw their own conclusions. For people who are cognitively passive and uninvolved, it is better to make an emotional appeal and then draw conclusions for them. People with interests in scientific activities belong in the cognitively active group. Those interested in formulating hypotheses and writing research papers for publication are motivated to carefully consider evidence when making decisions.

Gelso's (1979) claim that scientific activity is geared toward the detection and reduction of ambiguity may reflect rigorous experimental thinking, but as he famously pointed out in the same article, there is more to science than experimental research. In areas in which scientists have to think probabilistically and consider the importance of error in measurement, ambiguity is endemic.

The lack of association between ambiguity intolerance and scientist interests may also be explained by Sadowski and Cogburn's (1997) demonstration that need for cognition is correlated with Openness to Experience as conceptualized by the NEO Personality Inventory. On the NEO Personality Inventory, the ideas facet is essentially a measure of need for cognition, whereas openness as a whole would be associated with tolerance for ambiguity--especially by means of the values facet (Costa & McCrae, 1992).

With respect to interests in practitioner activities and intolerance of ambiguity, conducting therapy with clients is an ambiguous activity, and requires an ability to tolerate uncertainty. It is surprising that we did not find significant negative correlations between practitioner interests and intolerance for ambiguity in the current study. It should be noted that the absence of such a negative correlation may be a function of using an undergraduate sample.

On the basis of findings from a study by Manning et al. (2006), we suggest that undergraduate psychology majors are inclined to indiscriminately romanticize the activities of clinicians and claim some interest in those activities irrespective of their actual interests. A student may not learn about the open-minded nature of being a practitioner until later in training.

Another possibility is that clinical and counseling psychology students with high practitioner interests and a preference for clear-cut solutions will adopt more behavioral and cognitive-behavioral approaches to treatment. Given the developmental aspects of a professional identity as a psychologist, the use of graduate student and professional-level samples to cross-validate the findings from the current study are clearly indicated.

Implications for career counselors and professors who are mentoring and advising undergraduate students should be considered. Students need accurate information when making both career choices and specialization choices. The construct of enjoying effortful cognitive processing is fairly easy to understand. Rather than discussing potential activities such as SPI Item 21, "writing papers for publication," students could be told that interests in the kinds of activities performed by psychologists are associated with an appreciation for and enjoyment of thinking about things and wanting to think for yourself. Students may be able to more accurately report their need for cognition level than they are to report their interests in activities with which they have limited experience. Like the old Academic Comfort Scale on the Strong-Campbell Interest Inventory (Campbell & Hansen, 1981), students high in need for cognition might be told that they could be disappointed were they not to pursue further study. Need for cognition may also be relevant for choosing between master's and doctoral programs.

Limitations

The purpose of the current study was to examine the relationship between cognitive styles and scientist and practitioner specialty preferences. The sample was limited in that the participants came from an undergraduate course in counseling psychology, and a majority of the participants were planning to pursue graduate studies in clinical or counseling psychology. It would also be helpful for future research to study students interested in a specialization of a more experimental nature, such as social and physiological psychology.

Furthermore, the study consisted of a predominately White, female sample. Future research could focus on attending to a more diverse sample. The generalizability of this study is limited because of the high proportion of female students and the lack of representation from ethnic minorities. Although this is an important limitation, it seems important to note that this sample is an accurate representation of students who are entering graduate school in psychology, who are mostly women (American Psychological Association Research Office, 2003).

Additionally, as with all correlational research, the findings from this study cannot indicate a causal relationship between cognitive processing styles and career specialty interests in psychology. Interests are not abilities. Whether need for cognition is related to later success in scientist activities such as research and teaching is an important question. Need for cognition may be more or less important in different specialization and/or research areas as well. The issue of differences between specialization tracks is an important one.

Whether Gelso's (1979) ideas about tolerance of ambiguity's importance for specialization in clinical practice become more relevant during graduate training than they are for undergraduates is also an open question. The low alpha coefficients for the IAS most likely attenuated the correlations as well. Contrary to theoretical expectations, it seems likely that a more reliable variable would have suggested that scientist, not practitioner, interests are associated with increased tolerance for ambiguity.

Finally, future research could examine general personality constructs as predictors of career specialization interests in psychology. The importance of openness to experience has already been noted. Other facets of openness, such as trying new things (actions), emotionality (feelings), and authoritarianism (values), might also be worth exploring (Costa & McCrae, 1992).

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Frederick T. L. Leong, Department of Psychology, Michigan State University; Peter Zachar, Department of Psychology, Auburn University Montgomery; Lisa Conant, Department of Neurology, Medical College of Wisconsin; Dwight Tolliver, Department of Psychology, University of Tennessee. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Frederick T. L. Leong, Michigan State University, Department of Psychology, Psychology Building, East Lansing, MI 48824 (e-mail: [e-mail]).

TABLE 1 Need for Cognition and Intolerance of Ambiguity Predicting
Scientist and Practitioner Interests

                                           Adj.       Need for Cognition
Variable                   R    [R.sup.2]  [R.sup.2]  B     SE B  [beta]

Scientist interests        .45  .20         .19        .30  .06    .48*
  Research (b)             .41  .17         .16        .14  .03    .46*
  Teaching (b)             .36  .12         .11        .05  .01    .38*
  Academic Ideas (b)       .52  .27         .26        .05  .01    .49*
  Statistics & Design (b)  .27  .07         .05        .05  .01    .30*
Practitioner interests     .15  .02         .01        .04  .05    .09
  Therapy (b)              .20  .03         .02        .03  .03    .11
  Expertise (b)            .06  .00        -.00       -.01  .01   -.07
  Testing (b)              .16  .02         .01        .01  .01   -.15

                           Intolerance of Ambiguity
Variable                   B     SE B  [beta]        F (a)  p

Scientist interests         .55  .63    .08          13.78  < .001
  Research (b)              .36  .32    .11          11.30  < .001
  Teaching (b)              .07  .14    .05           7.95  < .002
  Academic Ideas (b)       -.07  .10   -.06          20.49  < .001
  Statistics & Design (b)   .24  .19    .13           4.19  < .05
Practitioner interests     -.41  .50   -.08           1.39  > .05
  Therapy (b)              -.35  .34   -.11           2.16  > .05
  Expertise (b)            -.07  .15   -.05           0.22  > .05
  Testing (b)              -.01  .09   -.01           1.38  > .05

(a) F(2, 110). (b) Subscales of the Scientist-Practitioner Inventory.
*p < .01.

TABLE 2 Descriptive Statistics for all Measures (N = 110) and Zero-Order
Correlations: Need for Cognition and Intolerance of Ambiguity With
Scientist and Practitioner Interests Plus SPI Subscales

                                      Intolerance
                           Need for   of
Variable                   Cognition  Ambiguity    M       SD     Range

Scientist interests         .44*      -.15          63.90  13.42  32-95
  Research (a)              .40*      -.11          31.64   6.66  13-48
  Teaching (a)              .35*      -.13          12.02   2.88   6-18
  Academic Ideas (a)        .52*      -.30*          9.03   2.41   3-15
  Statistics & Design (a)   .24*      -.01          11.01   3.71   2-20
Practitioner interests      .13       -.13          81.99   9.58  58-102
  Therapy (a)               .14       -.09          52.80   6.55  37-64
  Expertise (a)            -.04       -.01          18.77   2.84  11-25
  Testing (a)               .15       -.08          10.61   1.89   6-18
Need for cognition         --         -.47*        114.36  21.40  36-156
Intolerance of Ambiguity   -.47*      --             4.44   2.08   1-12

(a) Subscales of the Scientist-Practitioner Inventory (SPI).
*p < .01.