Sexual Harassment and Dual‐Career Issues: The Case of Megan

In this article, the ecological model of career development (E. P. Cook, M. J. Heppner, & K. M. O'Brien, 2002) is applied to a case example. The individual described in the case example faces issues of sexual harassment in the workplace as well as challenges related to being part of a dual‐career marriage. The author suggests career counseling strategies and discusses potential barriers to effective counseling.     

More Than a Job Club,Sister: Career Intervention for Women Following Incarceration

Following incarceration, women face unique challenges in returning to their communities and seeking employment. This qualitative study used interpretative phenomenological analysis to explore the lived experiences of previously incarcerated women as they participated in It's More Than a Job Club, Sister, a spiritually integrated career intervention, and subsequently sought employment. The following 4 superordinate themes emerged describing this experience: (a) It was more than a job club; (b) God gave me a second chance: the impact of faith on recovery and employment; (c) barriers to employment; and (d) looking ahead. The findings indicate the need for a strengths‐based approach to career intervention that builds upon existing skills and emphasizes identity exploration, uncovering core beliefs and vocational values, bridging the gap between goals and barriers, and leveraging interpersonal skills. The findings also indicate that career counseling with female returning citizens is enhanced by incorporating attention to the role of substance abuse/recovery and by attending to the intersection of calling and vocation.     

Predictors of Student and Career Decision‐Making Self‐Efficacy Among Nontraditional College Women

A study of 354 nontraditional college women found robust levels of confidence in their ability to manage the student role and pursue career‐related tasks. Findings indicated that perceived career barriers and social support accounted for variance in student and career decision‐making self‐efficacy for nontraditional college women with and without children. Social support added to the prediction of self‐efficacy over and above the contribution of perceived barriers. The discussion focuses on recommendations for career counseling interventions to facilitate educational and vocational success among nontraditional college women.     

Strength‐Based Narrative Résumé Counseling: Constructing Positive Career Identities From Difficult Employment Histories

The résumé is a fixture within employment counseling, often viewed as a necessary product for securing employment. Résumés can also be a powerful vehicle for facilitating the development of positive career identities. The complex interplay of negative societal narratives with personal narratives can make the development of a positive identity, and the execution of an employment search, difficult for clients who have work histories complicated by personal and economic challenges (e.g., homelessness, intimate partner violence, histories of incarceration). The authors present résumé counseling as an opportunity for clients to develop stories of strength, reveal stories of difficulty, solidify a positive career identity, and rewrite positive future narratives. This article describes the strength‐based narrative approach to résumé and employment counseling, illustrates its application with a hypothetical case, and offers practice recommendations.     

Integrating Existentialism and Super's Life‐Span,Life‐Space Approach

As workers face a changing and ever‐complex employment landscape, traditional career theories and approaches may not be sufficient in meeting career challenges. Calls for integrated career theories have emerged as more people seek meaning and purpose in their lives and careers. This article proposes a career counseling option that integrates existentialism and Super's (1990) life‐span, life‐space approach to establish a foundation for a broader approach to career development that views clients holistically by exploring life and career meaning and purpose from a developmental perspective. A case example and interventions are provided to demonstrate practical application and a contextual framework, along with implications for counselors.     

Academic Self‐Efficacy Within a Culture of Modern Racism: The Case of Benita

The author presents a case study that depicts an African American student's experience in her graduate program, as described to a career counselor. The ecological model of career development (E. P. Cook, M. J. Heppner, & K. M. O'Brien, 2002), which addresses both the microsystems and macrosystems levels of analyses, is applied to the case. The author presents proposed interventions for use with the client and discusses potential barriers to effective multicultural career counseling.     

Self‐Help Career Services: A Case Report

Self‐help career services represent an important form of career intervention rarely described in the literature. Using a case‐report approach, the author describes this type of career intervention, which was guided by cognitive information processing theory and Holland's ( 1997 ) typological theory. The report offers an example of appropriately identifying client readiness to engage in career counseling using a 3‐tier model for service delivery composed of direct, brief, and self‐help interventions. It also demonstrates an effective method for translating theory to practice, a particularly critical need in the career development field. The outcome of the intervention supports a differentiated model of career services that increases client accessibility to those services.     

Career Interventions for At-Risk Populations: Incorporating Social Cognitive Influences

This article discusses the career development and the career counseling needs of populations who have limited access to educational and occupational opportunities. The article reviews some of the limitations of current theories and interventions and offers recommendations for applying social cognitive career theory (SCCT; Lent, Brown, & Hackett, 1994) to populations that are at risk for experiencing employment and career barriers. To illustrate one application of SCCT, a career intervention program for adult female offenders is presented.     

Cultural Context of Career Choice: Meta‐Analysis of Race/Ethnicity Differences

The authors focus on career counseling from a cultural perspective, using the proxy construct of race/ethnicity. They briefly describe traditional career counseling and critique the degree to which the myriad cultural contexts that shape clients' career development are incorporated into vocational theories and practice. They conducted a meta‐analysis of research that has investigated the relationship between culture and vocational choice variables and concluded (a) that race/ethnicity differences do not greatly affect career aspirations but (b) that there are differences among racial/ethnic groups in perceptions of career‐related opportunities and barriers.     

Career‐Ready Students: A Goal of Comprehensive School Counseling Programs

This article opens with a rationale for and a definition of student career readiness. Next is a presentation of the qualities and attributes of career‐ready students. Then discussion follows about what students need to become career ready. Following this is a presentation of how comprehensive school counseling programs help students become career ready, including discussion of the delivery system for school counseling programs that provide the activities and services that contribute to student career readiness. The article closes with the critical point that helping all students become career ready requires a whole school–community approach.     

Self‐Efficacy,Perceptions of Barriers,Vocational Identity,and the Career Exploration Behavior of Latino/a High School Students

This study explored the potential relationship between the social cognitive variables of career decision‐making self‐efficacy and perceptions of barriers and the outcome variables of vocational identity and career exploration behaviors in a sample of 128 urban Latino/a high school students. The results indicated that higher levels of career decision‐making self‐efficacy were related to both a more differentiated vocational identity and a greater engagement with career exploration tasks. Perception of fewer barriers was also found to be related to a more integrated vocational identity. Implications for career counseling and future research are discussed.     

Influence of Temporal Distance on the Perceived Importance of Career‐Related Self‐Efficacy and Outcome Expectations

Because all career choices are about future actions, time is an important contextual variable in social cognitive career choice ( Hesketh, 2000 ). However, there is a dearth of research examining the effect of time. The authors examined how temporal distance to career entry influences the perceived importance of self‐efficacy and outcome expectations concerning a career pursuit. They also examined the moderating effects of perceived support and barriers, as well as country. The participants were college students in the United States (n= 180) and in South Korea (n= 215). The results of hierarchical regression analyses did not show main effects of time, but a 3‐way interaction indicated the complex interplay of time and other contextual variables. Implications for career counseling and future research are discussed.     

Career Counseling Is Personal Counseling

Despite many changes that have occurred in the field of career counseling, counselors continue to rely on models of counseling that emphasize the rational, informational aspects of career decision making. The author argues that career counselors need to pay more attention to the affective, psychological issues confronting clients with career problems. The impact of significant psychological variables that influence career decision making are discussed: developmental stages and tasks, identity formation and status, self-concept, psychological needs, and internal barriers.     

The Career‐O‐Gram: A Postmodern Career Intervention

The authors examine the usefulness of postmodernism in career counseling. Specifically, a case is made for broadening career counseling theories and techniques to feature the contextual influences inherent in each individual's unique career history. A career intervention, titled the Career‐O‐Gram, is introduced as a tool for exploring contextual influences on career development. A case study is presented to demonstrate the application of the Career‐O‐Gram.     

Occupational sociology as career and employment counseling: Patterns and possibilities

This article contends that career and employment counseling should be viewed as an aspect of the clinical practice of occupational sociology. First, the actual development of career and employment counseling is briefly traced. Then, against this backdrop, past and present linkages between occupational sociology and career/employment counseling knowledge are identified. Finally, sociology training and internship possibilities for the counseling component are suggested.     

Divorced Mothers and Higher Education in Utah

Drawing on human capital theory and role strain theory, we analyzed survey responses from 133 divorced mothers in Utah and in-depth interviews with a subsample of mothers to examine investment in higher education. In models predictive of postdivorce college degree attainment, having a college educated parent was the strongest predictor of receiving a college degree. Computer skills and student loans were also associated with completing college. In modeling the relationship between college degree (associate or bachelor) and employment income, only completion of a 4-year degree was predictive of increased future income. Drawing from both survey data and in-depth interviews, we found that increased income, personal improvement, and career advancement were the primary reasons given for pursuing higher education. In contrast, the role strain from fulfilling multiple roles as a single parent and the need for career counseling were the primary barriers to investing in higher education.     

Attitudes Regarding Career Counseling: Perceptions and Experiences of Counselors‐in‐Training

The authors explored attitudes regarding career counseling. Interview data were analyzed and conceptualized using grounded theory methods. Peers, faculty, and programs influenced participants' attitudes. Participants' observations regarding instruction and developed understanding of their own career development figured into favorable attitudes regarding career counseling. Data revealed that students did not perceive that they were competent or confident conducting career counseling. Implications for counselor education are discussed.     

Difficult Cases in Career Counseling: IV— Floundering and Occupational Moratorium

This paper is the fourth in a series of articles dealing with difficult counseling problems encountered by career counselors. Clinicians need to understand the underlying causes of floundering behavior and the reasons that propel some people to retreat to a career and psychological moratorium. This article focuses on young adults in career transition and underscores their needs for greater self-understanding. Resources for career counseling suggestions are noted within the context of a traditional five-stage career counseling model.     

Effective Techniques: The Career‐in‐Culture Interview: A Semi‐Structured Protocol for the Cross‐Cultural Intake Interview

The authors introduce the Career‐in‐Culture Interview (CiCI), a flexible, semistructured interview protocol designed for the career counseling intake session. The contents of the CiCI are based on recent theoretical advances in multicultural counseling and on the social cognitive model of career development. The authors describe a pilot evaluation of the interview and present guidelines for using the CiCI in practice.     

Career Counseling With Clients Who Have a Severe Mental Illness

Individuals who are diagnosed with a serious mental illness encounter a variety of barriers that can impede their career development. In this article, the career barriers of clients who have a severe mental illness are reviewed, and a developmental approach to career counseling with this population is described. A case example is provided to illustrate the complex process of developmental career counseling with people who are seriously impaired by a psychiatric illness.