This study examines the fit between students’ interests and their academic choices at different stages of their college careers. Using image theory (Beach, 1990) as an integrated theory of person-vocation fit, this investigation focuses on the stability of academic fit during college and the relationship between fit with academic choice and fit with occupational choice. Participants, 257 students in their final year at Rice University, responded to questions about their interests as well as factors that may influence their career choices, such as parental support, work centrality, career efficacy, and employment potential. Results showed that students tend to improve their fit with their academic major during their first four semesters. And, students tend to maintain or improve their fit when they select their first occupation after college. Of the factors considered to influence career choices, work centrality, or the importance one places on work, moderated the relationship between academic and occupational fit.

Postsecondary curricula are often the first opportunity where students can and are compelled to make choices regarding their adult professional life and the first opportunity students have to engage in serious and focused exploration of the various career options that might be available to them. While the general impact of a postsecondary education on career experience, including job satisfaction and success, is well documented, the factors influencing postsecondary students' career choice and how those factors impact college outcomes, including motivation towards, satisfaction with, and achievement in their chosen major field, appear to be more obscure and uneven. Self-determination theory (SDT) is a well-established motivational construct in the educational psychology field and the goal of this study is to explore the role that SDT may play in the relationship between determinants influencing a student's choice of major and their satisfaction and achievement outcomes. Using self-reported survey data from students across five disciplines at a large public four-year university, a cluster analysis was performed to determine if students could be grouped meaningfully based on their self-determination and the determinants that influenced their choice of major. Meaningfulness was assessed based primarily on the differences across the clusters on the satisfaction and achievement measures. Students were found to be too similar across the clusters on the achievement measure for meaningful interpretation on that outcome, but there did appear to be an important relationship between the influence of future outcomes and personal experiences in choosing a major and the students' satisfaction with their major. Multiple regression analysis was also employed to assess the degree to which achievement could be predicted by students' satisfaction, self-determined motivation, and determinants influencing choice of major. Self-determined autonomy was an important mediator and moderator of the effects that the determinants influencing choice of major had on satisfaction and achievement. Future directions in the research program, as well as the practical implications of the results, are discussed. / text

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