Assessment has had an important place in the history of career counseling.

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Assessment has had an important place in the history of career counseling.

      The trait-and-factor approach relied heavily on matching the requirements of an occupation with the individual’s characteristics.

    The Minnesota group among others developed many tests to help simplify the process, such as the Minnesota spatial relation test, Minnesota clerical test and the Minnesota rate of manipulation test. The creation of many tests was stimulated by the career counseling movement.

    Group intelligence tests became widely used in the schools, business and industry because of the success of Army Alpher and Army Beta examination during world war I. World war II stimulated the used of multiaptitide tests. It was then tests was reevaluated and issues such as cultural and gender bias and the validity of test for the situation they were used.

   At present assessment has ventured into new directions, one is in the used of the computer. There are many computer-assisted and computer-adaptive tests that have been developed. Test interpretation has become much easier and more elaborate with computer generated test reports. Informal assessment procedures are used in many of the career guidance systems rather than formal standardized test instruments. More emphasis is placed in some systems of assessments on description rather than predication.

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    Nevertheless, assessment instruments are still widely used in career counseling contexts. They have also become increasingly relied on for other purposes, such as licensure and certification. Assessment information has helped to document the success of these programs.

   The task force of the American Association for counseling and development (1980,1989) identified  four major use of testing for placement and selection purposes, predicting behaviour and performance in many different situation, describing individuals and providing a picture of growth.

   In education, business and industry tests are used for placement and selection purposes. More emphasis is being placed on the ...

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