Content analysis of CDQ from 1994-2003: implications and trends for practitioners and researchers from a decade of research.

A review of the content of The Career Development Quarterly (CDQ) was conducted for the period between 1994 and 2003. In total, 297 articles were published in CDQ during this period. The content analysis was based on content, authorship, and institutional affiliation. The principal areas of research were career development: life-span perspectives and women's workforce participation. Of the articles published during this period, 33% fell into 1 of these 2 categories. Compared with the previous analysis (W. Buboltz & M. Savickas, 1994), a change was noted in the amount of research in women's workforce participation, which rose from 1.4% to 12.8%, whereas research on career development interventions fell by approximately 50%. The authors discuss implications and areas for future research.

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Professional journals have a substantive history as a means of communication between researchers and practitioners. However, professional journals have also become a means for one discipline, based on a clear focal point of research, to differentiate itself from other closely related disciplines (Kuhn, 1962). Owing to both a proliferation of professionals oriented toward career development and to an extensive peer-review process, it can be assumed that the articles published in The Career Development Quarterly (CDQ) represent the extant body of knowledge as well as the current thinking of professionals in career development. Trends in journal content may also be said to reflect the current zeitgeist of the field (Buboltz, Miller, & Williams, 1999). As such, a content analysis is a useful tool to quantify the trends and changes that are occurring in a profession. The last content analysis was conducted a decade ago by Buboltz and Savickas (1994). During the last decade, there has been unprecedented career flux as well as an increase in the entry of women into the workforce (Hansen, 2001). In fact, many of the women who first entered the workforce are near retirement. These changes in workforce characteristics are creating avenues of research that simply did not exist a decade ago. With research standards (and job requirements) for both academicians and practitioners increasing, there is also the possibility that there have been changes in content areas of research, as well as changes in the institutional affiliations, since the last content analysis (Buboltz & Savickas, 1994). Our content analysis also provides information for individuals in graduate school to identify leading researchers in the field of career counseling and leading institutions. Future researchers may also identify areas about which articles are consistently published by this journal to identify trends of research in the field. Given these goals and the potential changes that have occurred over the last decade, a content analysis is useful to catalog these trends and changes as well as to identify areas that have been neglected in the research literature.

Method

In order to provide consistency, the method of content analysis used here largely follows the procedure used for the last analysis (Buboltz & Savickas, 1994), which was conducted 10 years ago. The first step in this procedure was to classify each of the 297 articles according to each of the 14 categories used by Fitzgerald and Rounds (1989); those categories were first articulated by Fitzgerald and Rounds as the key focal points of vocational literature. The 14 categories, as defined by Fitzgerald and Rounds, are decision-making process, reciprocal work and nonwork relationships, work-related stress and coping, personnel practices and issues, workplace justice, industrial-organizational measurement issues, leadership, assessment: vocational behavior, career development interventions, women's workforce participation, adjustment and development in organizations, vocational choice: person-environment (P-E) fit perspectives, career development: life-span perspectives, and job search. Buboltz and Savickas added an "other" category and a case studies category. In addition, we added the category of multicultural/diversity issues. We used an inclusive definition for the multicultural/diversity issues category and did not limit the category to just racial/ethnic diversity. In the prior content analysis conducted by Buboltz and Savickas, these articles (multicultural/diversity) were included in the other category (W. C. Buboltz, personal communication, May, 2005). In total, there were 17 content areas into which an article could be placed. Disagreement over content area was resolved by reanalysis of the article in question, followed by discussion until a consensus was reached. The next step was to catalog the articles in terms of authorship and institutional affiliation. In cases where there was more than one author, we used the mathematical formula devised by Howard, Cole, and Maxwell (1987). We used this system based on the idea that authorship order is according to the relative contributions of each author (American Psychological Association, 2002) and that as the number of authors increased, the amount of contribution that each author could make would necessarily diminish. According to Howard et al.'s methodology, each article's total value was 1.0, and so an article with only one author received 1.0 point for both affiliation and authorship. However, an article with two authors would be worth 0.6 point for the first author and 0.4 point for the second author. If an article was authored by three people, then 0.47, 0.32, and 0.21 points were awarded to each of the three authors, respectively. Four authors received 0.42, 0.28, 0.18, and 0.12 points, respectively; five authors received 0.38, 0.26, 0.17, 0.11, and 0.08 points, respectively. This same method was also used to award points for institutional affiliation. For authors who switched institutions during the analysis period, full credit was given to the institution listed in the article, because this most likely reflected the institutional support for that article.

Results

During the past 10 years (1994 to 2003, vol. 42 to vol. 52), CDQ has published 297 articles. The number of articles published per volume has been fairly stable over the past 10 years, ranging from 25 to 33 articles per volume. The trend of decreasing number of articles published per volume noted by Buboltz and Savickas (1994) appears to have stabilized over the past 10 years. A summary of the number of articles published per volume is presented in Table 1.

Content

Table 2 presents the frequency and percentage of the articles that were classified in the major categories for volumes 42 through 52. The largest category of articles for the 10-year period (21.0%) concerned career development: life-span perspectives. The second largest category, with 12.8%, was women's workforce participation, which was closely followed by multicultural/diversity issues with 12.5%. The categories other and career development interventions were the next two categories, with 11.4% and 10.7%, respectively. Together these five categories accounted for over 65% of the articles published.

Several other categories accounted for a fairly large percentage of articles published. These include decision-making process (5.7%), assessment: vocational behavior (7.7%), and case studies (5.7%). The remainder of the categories accounted for small percentages of the articles published, with two categories--industrial-organizational measurement issues (.3%) and leadership (.3%)--accounting for very small percentages.

Viewing the journal content across the years reveals no clearly definable trends in any given category. Although, there is some small variation within many categories, the same categories tend to have fairly consistent numbers across the years.

Compared with the previous content analysis (Buboltz & Savickas, 1994), there has been a shift in published articles in CDQ. Despite shifts in other categories, the area of career development: life-span perspectives has remained the Number 1 category for more than 30 years; however, the Number 2 category (career development interventions) in the previous study has decreased by about 50% and is now currently fifth. Showing a large increase from the previous study is the category of women's workforce participation (1.4% in the previous study to 12.8% in the current study), and it is the Number 2 category in the current study. Additionally, the other and the multicultural/diversity issues categories (newly added for this study) have either increased from the previous study or accounted for a large number of articles. It should again be noted that articles dealing with multicultural/diversity issues would have been included in the other category for the previous content analysis. Given that the other category comprised 3% of the articles in the prior analysis, this may be used as a basis for comparison with the current multicultural/diversity figure. In the previous study, two categories (career development interventions and career development: life-span perspectives) accounted for more than 50% of the articles published, compared with the current study in which these two categories accounted for only approximately 30% of the articles published. Finally, it should be noted that there was a fairly large increase in the number of articles in the category labeled "other" compared with the previous study (11.4% vs. 3.0%, respectively).

Authors

Table 3 lists and ranks the leading contributors (i.e., authors with a weighted contribution of 2 or greater) to CDQ for volumes 42 to 52 (1994-2003). For the 10-year period, 27 authors earned a weighted contribution of 2 or greater, and they accounted for over 29% of the articles published. The leading contributor was M. L. Savickas (8.4 weighted contribution), who was followed by E. L. Herr (6.6 weighted contribution) and S. G. Niles (4.9 weighted contribution). A comparison of the leading contributors in the current study with the leading contributors in the previous 10-year study by Buboltz and Savickas (1994) shows that 10 individuals who were the leading contributors in the current study were also leading contributors in the previous study. It is of interest that the leading contributor for the previous study is not even ranked in the current study. Several individuals who were not ranked in the previous study are ranked highly in the current study and have made significant contributions to the journal (P. J. Hartung, D. G. Zytowski, M. Pope, and Y. B. Chung, to name a few). Several leading contributors from the pervious study are also leading contributors in the current study (D. A. Jepsen, K. B. Hoyt, N. E. Betz, D. Brown, and S. G. Niles).

Table 4 lists the top-ranked (i.e., weighted contribution greater than 2) institutional contributors to CDQ for volumes 42 to 52 (1994-2003). For the period covered, 28 institutions attained a weighted contribution greater than 2, and they accounted for 50.6% of the articles published. It should be noted that 2 of the institutions ranked were not truly institutions but were individuals who listed their affiliation as private practice or consultant. The leading institutional contributor was Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine, followed by The Pennsylvania State University, University of Missouri-Columbia, The Ohio State University, and University of Maryland, College Park. These leading 5 institutional contributors accounted for over 18% of the articles published in CDQ.

A comparison of the leading institutional contributors in the current study with those in the previous study (Buboltz & Savickas, 1994) shows that 13 institutions in the current study were also ranked in the previous study. However, several institutions that are ranked in the current study (University of Missouri-Columbia, The Ohio State University, consultants, University of Iowa, and Ball State University, to name a few) were not ranked in the previous study.

Discussion

In the last 10 years, the content of CDQ has undergone substantive changes, yet the Number 1 content area has remained consistent. The category of career development: life-span perspectives remained the largest category of articles, similar to the results of the previous content analysis by Buboltz and Savickas (1994) 10 years ago. It should be noted that although it remained the Number 1 content area, the number of articles in this content area has decreased while the number of articles in other content areas has increased. The category of women's workforce participation and a new category of multicultural/diversity issues demonstrated the biggest increase in articles when compared with the previous study, and they now represent the second and third largest content areas, respectively. The largest decrease in article content was in career development interventions. A focus on multicultural issues in psychology has been referred to as the fourth force in counseling (Pedersen, 1990). It may be that the content change signifies a focus on the importance of contextual issues affecting career development rather then a previous focus on career development interventions.

The increase in the number of articles in the category that we labeled "other" may signify the diversity of the topics being published in CDQ compared with the number being published when the previous content analysis was done. The increase in the category other (i.e., articles that do not fit into any of the designated categories) may reflect the powerful changes that are occurring in the career and work environment. This increase may reflect the movement away from more traditional career views to a much broader meaning of career and its ramifications for a person's work/career life. In addition, the increase in the number of articles in this category may also reflect some of the changes that are occurring in the world of work and the interactions that individuals are experiencing with the current work environment.

It is notable that 10 leading contributors in the last 10 years were also leading contributors in the previous content analysis (Buboltz & Savickas, 1994). This demonstrates an achievement by these authors in sustaining quality publications in a specific content area over time. In addition, the ranking of the institutions was strongly affected by the ranking of the authors, with a large percentage of the leading institutions being the affiliations of the top contributors. Overall, the journal has continued the trend of diversity of contributors and their affiliations and geographic location and has increased in addressing diversity and multicultural issues in its content.

A major implication that can be drawn from this analysis is that CDQ provides a sound base of life-span career development and interventions that can lead to enhanced knowledge and skills of counselors. The analysis revealed that the journal focuses on many applied areas that would be of interest to career counselors. In addition, the broad range of areas covered by the journal could provide counselors with information about career areas that are not formally taught in courses but are emerging as important and substantive areas of research and interest.

Another implication of this analysis is that the content and authors have been fairly stable over the past 30 years, reflecting that CDQ may have a few core areas of content with an associated core of authors. The emphasis on the core areas demonstrates that CDQ has maintained a sharp focus. On the other hand, the increased number of articles that were classified as being in the other category and the addition of a multicultural/diversity issues category are evidence that CDQ has also provided an adequate outlet for the field to explore new avenues of research. Another implication is that there is a core of authors who consistently publish in CDQ and who provide leadership and stability for the field. Although having a stable core may be beneficial, if new authors and researchers do not emerge, a vacuum could develop. This could become problematic for the both CDQ and the field, because there will not be new authors actively developing a program of research in the career development field. To address the issue of a possible vacuum of authors and researchers in the career field and to encourage research in the field, it may behoove career professionals and organizations to development a variety of programs, such as mentorship programs, training programs, and other endeavors, that would promote publication of research by nonacademic professionals.

The addition of the multicultural/diversity issues category may suggest that career counseling is increasing its focus on contextual factors affecting career development and the counseling process rather than focusing on creating or evaluating career interventions. Eventually, a synthesis of career interventions that incorporate a multicultural/diversity focus may develop. The previous content analysis by Buboltz and Savickas (1994) did not include a multicultural/diversity issues category and had a substantially smaller other category. This suggests that CDQ as well as the field, has recognized and incorporated the importance of addressing multicultural issues in career development and counseling. This emerging trend in CDQ is consistent with the current focus on multicultural issues in the field of psychology (Sue, Arredondo, & McDavis, 1992).

References

American Psychological Association. (2002). Ethical principles of psychologists and code of conduct. Washington, DC: Author.

Buboltz, W., Miller, M., & Williams, D. (1999). Content analysis of research in the Journal of Counseling Psychology (1973-1998). Journal of Counseling Psychology, 46, 496-503.

Buboltz, W., & Savickas, M. (1994). A 20-year retrospective of The Career Development Quarterly. The Career Development Quarterly, 42, 367-381.

Fitzgerald, L. F., & Rounds, J. B. (1989). Vocational behavior, 1988: A critical analysis. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 35, 105-163.

Hansen, L. S. (2001). Integrating work, family, and community through holistic life planning. The Career Development Quarterly, 49, 261-274.

Howard, G. S., Cole, D. A., & Maxwell, S. E. (1987). Research productivity in psychology based on publications in the journals of the American Psychological Association. American Psychologist, 42, 975-986.

Kuhn, T. S. (1962). The structure of scientific revolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Pedersen, P. (1990). The multicultural perspective as a fourth force in counseling. Journal of Mental Health Counseling, 12, 93-95.

Sue, D. W., Arredondo, P., & McDavis, R. J. (1992). Multicultural Competencies and Standards: A call to the profession. Journal of Multicultural Counseling and Development, 20, 64-88.

James M. Loveland, Walter C. Buboltz, Jonathan Schwartz, and Gina Gibson, Department of Psychology, Louisiana Tech University. Jonathan Schwartz is now in the Educational Psychology Department at the University of Houston. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to James M. Loveland, Department of Psychology, Louisiana Tech University, PO Box 10048, Ruston, LA 71272 (e-mail: [e-mail])

TABLE 1 Number of Articles in The Career Development Quarterly: Volumes
42-52, 1994-2003

Volume         Year  Number of Articles

Volumes 42-43  1994  33
Volumes 43-44  1995  32
Volumes 44-45  1996  31
Volumes 45-46  1997  29
Volumes 46-47  1998  29
Volumes 47-48  1999  25
Volumes 48-49  2000  27
Volumes 49-50  2001  28
Volumes 50-51  2002  31
Volumes 51-52  2003  32

TABLE 2 Content of Volumes 42-52, Years 1994-2003

Year and Volume  A     B     C     D     E     F     G     H

1994
  42-43           1    --    --    --    --     1    --     5
1995
  43-44           2    --     1    --    --    --    --     2
1996
  44-45           2     2    --     1     1    --    --    --
1997
  45-46           2     2    --    --    --    --    --     3
1998
  46-47           2    --     1     1     1    --     1     8
1999
  47-48           2    --    --    --    --    --    --    --
2000
  48-49           1     1    --     1     2    --    --     2
2001
  49-50           1     1    --     1     1    --    --    --
2002
  50-51           1    --     1    --    --    --    --     1
2003
  51-52           3    --     1    --     2    --    --     2
Total            17     6     4     4     7     1     1    23
Total %           5.7   2.0   1.3   1.3   2.3   0.3   0.3   7.7
1994 % (a)        6.9   2.9   0.5   3.0   1.5   0.3   0.3   9.2

Year and Volume  I     J     K     L     M     N     O     P     Q

1994
  42-43          10     8     1    --     2     1    --     4    --
1995
  43-44           6     2     2     2     8    --     1     2     4
1996
  44-45           2     7    --    --     4    --     2     3     7
1997
  45-46           2     1    --    --    10    --     3     4     2
1998
  46-47           2     3     2    --     3    --     1     3     1
1999
  47-48          --     4    --    --    12     2     1     2     2
2000
  48-49           1     5    --     2     5    --    --     3     4
2001
  49-50           3     4    --    --     7    --    --     7     3
2002
  50-51           3    --     1    --     4    --     6     1    13
2003
  51-52           3     4    --     1     7    --     3     5     1
Total            32    38     6     5    62     3    17    34    37
Total %          10.7  12.8   2.0   1.7  21.0   1.0   5.7  11.4  12.5
1994 % (a)       24.5   1.4   4.5   9.5  26.7   0.6   5.6   3.0  --

Note. A = decision-making process; B = reciprocal work and nonwork
relationships; C = work-related stress and coping; D = personnel
practices and issues; E = workplace justice; F = industrial-
organizational measurement issues; G = leadership; H = assessment:
vocational behavior; I = career development interventions; J = women's
workforce participation; K = adjustment and development in
organizations; L = vocational choice: person-environment fit
perspectives; M = career development: life-span perspectives; N = job
search; O = case studies; P = other; Q = multicultural/diversity issues.
(a) Percentages according to Buboltz & Savickas (1994) study.

TABLE 3 Leading Contributors to The Career Development Quarterly:
1994-2003

Author               Total Articles  Weighted Contributors  Rank (a)

Savickas, M. L.      9               8.4                     1
Herr, E. L.          7               6.6                     2
Niles, S. G.         9               4.9                     3
Jepsen, D. A.        6               4.8                     4
Hartung, P. J.       7               4.7                     5
Zytowski, D. G.      4               4.0                     6
Sampson, J. P.       7               3.7                     7
Pope, M.             6               3.7                     8
Chung, Y. B.         4               3.6                     9
Lent, R. W.          5               3.1                    10
Blustein, D. L.      4               3.0                    11.5
Hansen, L. S.        3               3.0                    11.5
Hoyt, K. B.          3               2.6                    14.5
Betz, N. E.          3               2.6                    14.5
Brown, D.            3               2.6                    14.5
Bowlsbey-Harris, J.  3               2.6                    14.5
Luzzo, D. A.         5               2.5                    17
Cook, E. P.          3               2.5                    18
Shahnasarian, M.     3               2.4                    19
Young, R. A.         4               2.3                    20
O'Brien, K. M.       4               2.2                    21
Bloch, D. P.         2               2.0                    24.5
Fouad, N. A.         4               2.0                    24.5
Stoltz-Loike, M.     2               2.0                    24.5
Prince, J. P.        2               2.0                    24.5
Watts, A. G.         2               2.0                    24.5
Rayman, J. R.        2               2.0                    24.5

Note. Only authors with a weighted contribution of 2 or greater were
included in the table.
(a) Authors who were tied in weighted contributions were given a ranked
average.

TABLE 4 Leading Institutional Contributors to The Career Development
Quarterly: 1994-2003

                                      Weighted      Percentage
Institution                           Contribution  of Total    Rank (a)

Northeastern Ohio Universities        13.5          4.51         1
  College of Medicine
The Pennsylvania State University     13.4          4.49         2
University of Missouri-Columbia        9.7          3.22         3
The Ohio State University              9.3          3.12         4
University of Maryland, College Park   9.3          3.09         5
Florida State University               8.3          2.76         6
Consultant                             8.2          2.75         7
University of British Columbia         7.0          2.33         8
University of Iowa                     6.2          2.07         9
Private practice                       5.8          1.94        10
University of Virginia                 5.8          1.93        11
Ball State University                  4.1          1.37        12
Kent State University                  4.1          1.35        13
Iowa State University                  4.0          1.33        14
University of Minnesota-               3.9          1.31        15
  Minneapolis
University of Cincinnati               3.9          1.29        16.5
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee      3.9          1.29        16.5
Georgia State University               3.7          1.24        18
University of Akron                    3.4          1.13        19
Kansas State University                3.0          1.00        21.5
State University of New York at        3.0          1.00        21.5
  Albany
Hebrew University                      3.0          1.00        21.5
Indiana University of Pennsylvania     3.0          1.00        21.5
Southern Illinois University-          2.6          0.87        24.5
  Carbondale
University of North Carolina at        2.6          0.87        24.5
  Chapel Hill
Tel Aviv University                    2.4          0.79        26
University of Kansas-Lawrence          2.3          0.78        27
University of South Florida            2.3          0.75        28

Note. Only institutions with a weighted contribution greater than 2 were
included in the table.
(a) Institutions that were tied in weighted contributions were given a
ranked average.