The vocational interests of black males

Journal of Vocational Behavior, 1,153-158 (1971)

The Vocational

Interests of Black Males1

PAUL C. HAGER Berea College

CHARLES F. ELTON University of Kentucky

The Strong Vocational Interest B&k (SVIB) was administered to all incoming freshmen at Berea College. Of the group of 190 men, 150 were white and 40 were black. Black freshmen males were found to differ sign& cantly from white males on a bipolar factor of interest in social service (working with people) vs. interest in the physical sciences (f = -3.96, p < .OOl, one-tailed test). It is unlikely that differences in the socioeconomic backgrounds of the two groups account for the findings since Berea College, by policy, admits primarily students from low income families.

Studies of occupational interests among blacks have centered primarily on questionnaire and interview surveys of the educational and occupational aspirations of high school students. Earlier studies had suggestedthat while the aspirations of black youth were high, the actual expectations were unrealistic, given the realities of the opportunities open to blacks (Deutsch, 1960; Johnson, 1941). More recent studies indicate that blacks want to attend college as often as do whites and while both blacks and whites seek whitecollar occupations, blacks less often expect to work in these occupations (Cramer, Campbell, & Bowerman, 1966; Lott & Lott, 1963). Bayer and Boruch (1969) reported the probable’major field of study and probable career occupation for 5,384 black students from 19 predominantly black 4-year colleges and 1,956 blacks and 75,820 white students in 200 predominantly white 4-year colleges. Their findings showed that black males selected teaching and social service occupations more often than white males. This study compares the inventoried vocational interests of black male freshmen with those of white male freshmen. Specifically, it is hypothesized that blacks, more than whites, will show interest in the social service occupations on the Strong Vocational Interest Blank (SVIB). lReprints may be obtained by writing the senior author, Counseling and Testing Center, Berea College, Berea, Ky. 40403. 153

154

HAGER AND ELTON

METHOD

Criterion analysis was used to test the hypothesis. The logic of criterion analysis is fully developed and described by Eysenck (1950). Briefly it consists of the following steps. Each test score in a battery is correlated with a criterion, i.e., white-black dichotomy, by the method of point-biserial correlation. Next, the table of intercorrelations for only the white students is subjected to factor analysis. In this study, the principal components method of analysis was employed. Then the first unrotated factor is rotated into a position of maximum correlation with the point-biserial correlations. This procedure is analogous to the development of any rotated factor structure from an unrotated factor structure, e.g., varimax rotation. The correlation between the resulting rotated factor and the criterion data indicate the degreeto which the hypothesis is supported. As Eysenck (1950) states, if the hypothesis being tested is not supported by the data, no amount of rotation would result in anything but a chance correlation between criterion and rotated factor. A further extension of the procedure reported by Eysenck (1950) is to

test the significance of the mean differences in the rotated factor scores derived for the white and black students. The sample of students consisted of 150 white freshman males and 40 black freshman males who completed the SVIB during their freshman testing program at Berea College in Berea, Kentucky. The 54 occupational scale scoresof the revised SVIB constituted the test battery used (Campbell, 1969). RESULTS The first two columns in Table 1 present two unrotated principal components factors. Column three (h*) presents the communalities. The fourth column in Table 1 contains point-biserial correlation coef@ients between white and black males. The values in the fifth column (0) represent the loadings on the rotated factor. The last column @I,) in Table 1 shows the values of the rotated factor resealedso that the vector length of the rotated factor is equal to the vector length of the first unrotated factor. Inspection of the D, column in Table 1 shows a bipolar factor with high positive loadings on all of the scalesin Group II occupations (Physical Sciences) and high negative loadings on all scalesin Group V occupations (Social Service). Theseloadings suggestthat this factor, accounting for 33% of the variance, is a dimension representinginterest in scienceat its positive pole and interest in people at its negative pole. A negative sign in the criterion column indicates that black males scored higher on that particular occupational scale; therefore, the negative loadings on the extended rotated factor would insure that white males would earn a

VOCATIONALINTERESTS OF BLACKMALES

155

higher score and black males would earn a lower score on the factor dimension Science versus Social Service. The mean factor score for the whites was 51.24; that for the blacks was 45.35 ( t = -3.96, p < .OOl, one-tailed test). This procedure of developing factor scores and testing the significance of their mean difference extends Eysenck’s methodology. Additional support for the hypothesized difference between blacks and whites is given by the correlation of .86 between the criterion column and the rotated factor column. DISCUSSION Black students have been found to differ from white students on a variety of psychological measures(Dreger & Miller, 1968). Little researchhas been reported on differences between black and white males in inventoried interests. That such differences exist was the hypothesis tested in this study. This hypothesis was supported by the finding that white males differ from black males on a bipolar factor of interest in scienceversusinterest in service to people. The median family income for the whites was $4000 and that for the blacks was $3400 suggesting that differences in the socioeconomic backgrounds of these two groups might also be related to the present findings. While this interpretation is a possibility, it is lesslikely for the following two reasons. First, 80% of the students at Berea College are recruited from the Appalachian South with the remaining 20% coming primarily from areasadjacent to the region or from foreign countries. Second, a comparison of median family incomes obscuresthe number of personsin a family depending on that income. The mean per capita income provides this data, which was $1000 for the whites and $900 for the blacks. Thus it appearsthat the socioeconomic backgrounds of the whites and blacks are more similar than dissimilar. Other reports of studies indicate that blacks perform less well than whites on intelligence or achievement tests even when socioeconomic factors are held constant (Deutsch, 1960). Test results on the SCAT for the two groups in the present study support the Deutsch finding. The mean total raw scoresand standard deviations for the two groups on the SCAT were: Blacks, z = 41.65, SD = 11.10; Whites, x = 60.14, SD = 13.85. The proportion of black males dropping from school was, however, no greater than that of the whites despite the obvious differences in measuredacademicability. Hager (1968), using the College Student Questionnaires-Part I (Peterson, 1965), compared a randomly selected sample of 128 Berea College freshmen (which contained six black students) with a national stratified sample of 1500 students from 48 institutions. He found that a significantly greater proportion of the Berea group than of the national group planned majors in the physical sciencesand mathematics and fewer planned to major

156

HAGER AND ELTON TABLE 1 Dichotomous Correlations, Unrotated and Rotated Factor Weights for SVIP Scale#

Group I

II

III

IV

V

VI

VII VIII

Occupation Biological science Dentist Osteopath Veterinarian Physician Psychiatrist Psychologist Biologist Physical science Architect Mathematician Physicist Chemist Engineer Technical supervision Production Army officer Air Force officer Technical and Skilled Trades Carpenter Forest service man Farmer Math-science teacher Printer Policeman Social service Personnel director Public administrator Rehabilitation couns. YMCA staff worker Social worker Social sci. teacher School superinten. Minister Aesthetic-cultural Librarian Artist Musician performer Music teacher CPA Owner Business and accounting Senior CPA Accountant Office worker

Fl

F2

h2

-.902

-.013 .144 -502 .439 .734 .770 .531

.814 .217 525 .666 .538 .689 .831

-.774 -.908 -.890 -.869

.184 .388 .140 .082 -.213

-.277 .os 1 -.038

c,,

b

D-,

.252 .221 .301 .178 .120 .092 ,174

.220 .096 S69 .130 -.057 .Oll .136

.870 .371 .668 51.5 -.226 .044 .535

.772 .750 .844 .799 .829

.161 .077 .143 .166 .196

.193 .156 .209 .210 .234

.764 .614 .825 .827 .925

-.821 -.548 -.491

.726 .303 .242

.049

.197 .074

.124 .034 .050

.133 .199

-.623 -.308 -.723 - .266 -.353 .079

-.640 -.622 -529 -.354 -.512 -.690

.797 .481 .802 .195 .396 .482

.160 .396 .313 .060 .098 .I13

.205 .127 .220 .094 .130 .039

.810 .502 269 .373 .512 .153

.823 ,772 .833 .a54 .798 .858 .735 .521

-.050 -.017 .301 .llO .492 .045 .395 .690

.679 .596 .784 .741 .878 .738 .695 .747

-.247 -.I86 -.214 -.I09 -.205 -.186 -.197 -.170

-.196 -.186 -.228 -.217 -.235 -.212 -.212 -.185

-.773 -.735 -.899 -.856 -.929 -.838 -.836 -.729

.I91 -.757 -.151 .508 .194

.825 .398 .721 .635 .268

,716 .732 542 .661 .109

-.208 .I35 -.082 -.237 -.252

-.I16 .I51 -.024 -.177 -.070

-.457 .595 -.094 -.698 -.275

.046 .293 .563

- .644 -.636 -.543

.416 .490 ,610

.013 -.195 -.230

.043 -.018 -.091

.169 -.070 -.360

-.443 -523 -.688 -.018 -.312 -.741 -.859

.490

157

VOCATIONAL INTERESTS OF BLACK MALES Table 1 (Can’t) Group

Occupation

Business and accounting con? Purchasing agent Banker Pharmacist. Funeral director IX Sales Sales manager Real estate salesman Life ins. salesman X Verbal-linguistic Advertising man Lawyer Author-journalist XI President-manufacturing Supplementary occupational scales Credit manager Chamber of corn. exec. Physical therapist Computer programmer Business ed. teacher Community rec. admin.

q

F2

h2

Cn

-.025

-.820 -.671 -.624 -.451

.495 .389

-.095

.423

-.088

l5

61

.075

.296 .039

VIII

% Total variance

.193 -.Oll .469 .507

.409 .594

-.375 -.320

.019

.179

.458

.056 -.262 .002

.500

.840

.634 -.354 -.408

.931

.096

.236 -.372 .830 .863

-.076 -.130 -.345 .074

.332

.232

.673

.OlO -.066

.OlO ,057 -.076

.223 -.301 -.362 -.287 -.576

.397

-.122

- .092

.210 .353

-.Oll -.107

-.073 -.146

.241 .253 .470 .125

-.121 .076 .014 -.134

-.082 -.056

.872 .876 .061 .154 .808 .750

-.237 -.202 -.046 -.018 -.218

-.170

-.671

-.234

-.925

-.051 .lOl -.173 -.216

-.201 ,400 -.682 -.853

-.lOO

.OlO .029

-.324

-.219 .041 .115

.332

OFI and F2 = 1st and 2nd unrotated factors from analysis of intercorrelations of white students only. h2 = Communality. C, = Crit+on column, i.e., point-biserial correlation of each sca$ with black-white dichotomy. D = Fl rotated into maximum correlation with Cm D I= D rescaied so that vector length = F1 rDCn= .855.

in education. The two groups were not found to differ in the proportion of students planning majors in social service or social science occupations. Both Baird (1967) and Bereiter and Freedman (1962) however, reported that students from low socioeconomicfamilies-are more likely to choose social service occupations than do college students in general. The results indicate support for the earlier finding by Hager (1968) that white Berea students, in general, show interest in scientific occupations. On the other hand, black males at Berea College appear to more nearly fit the pattern of vocational choice for low income groups reported by Baird (1967) and Bereiter and Freedman (1962). The implication of this finding is that becausea student is from a family with low income it cannot be assumedthat his inventoried interests are in areasof teaching and social service.Race is one factor which appearsto be more important than level of family income in its relationship to inventoried interests.

158

HAGER AND ELTON REFERENCES

Baird, L. L. Family income and the characteristics of college-bound students. ACT Research Reports No. 17, Iowa City: American College Testing Program, 1967. Bayer, A. E., & Boruch, R. F. Black and white freshmen entering four-year colleges. Educational Record, 1969, 50, 371-386. Bereiter, C., & Freedman, M. B. Fields of study and the people in them. In N. Sanford (Ed.), The american college. New York: Wiley, 1962. Campbell, D. P. Strong Vocational Interest Blank manual, 1969 supplement. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford Univer. Press, 1969. Cramer, M. R., Campbell, E. Q., & Bowerman, C. E. So&l factors in educational achievement and aspirations’ among Negro adolescents, Vol. 2. Chapel Hill: Univer. of North Carolina, 1966. Deutsch, M. Minority group and class status as related to social and personality factors in scholastic achievement. Society for Applied Anthropology, 1960, No. 2. Dreger, R. M., & Miller, K. S. Comparative psychological studies of Negroes and whites in the United States: 1959-1965. Psychological Bulletin, 1968, 70, (3, Pt. 2). Eysenck, H. J. Criterion analysis: an application of the hypothetical-deductive method to factor analysis. Psychological Review, 1950, 57, 38-65. Hager, P. C. Differences between college students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and the American college student population. Unpublished manuscript, Berea College, 1968. Johnson, C. S. Growing up in the Black Belt: Negro youth in the rural South. Washington, D. C.: American Council on Education, 1941. Lott, A. J., & Lott, B. E. Negro and white youth: A psychological study in a border state community. New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1963. Peterson, R. E. Technical manual: College Student Questionnaires. Princeton, N. J.: Educational Testing Service, 1965. Received: July 10, 1970