Nontraditional occupational choices were examined within the context of aspirations, or ideal choices, and expectations, or realistic choices. As background for the study, the literature on occupational stereotyping was reviewed. A major purpose of the study was to determine if altering subjects' perceptions of base rates, or the proportions of males and females in a given occupation, would affect subjects' reactions to that occupation. The relationship between nontraditional occupational choices and several subject and parental characteristics was also explored. Subjects consisted of 107 female and 82 male seventh grade students, who were each given a description of one occupation. Control subjects were told that the base rate of that occupation would remain stable. Experimental subjects were told that the percentage of the non-dominant sex would increase to 50% in the future. Subjects rated the occupation as both an ideal and a realistic choice for them. Measures of subjects' open-ended occupational choices, sex role attribution, and parents' occupation and education were also obtained. Contrary to expectations, the experimental manipulation did not affect subjects' ratings of the occupations. On the open-ended responses, significant sex differences were found, with males making job selections which were more traditional than the choices made by females. The majority of females named a nontraditional job for both their ideal and realistic choices. Weak relationships were obtained between background variables and subjects' job choices, with father's education emerging as the best predictor of a male-dominated occupation. Androgynous individuals were no more likely than other types to choose a nontraditional occupation. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 47-07, Section: B, page: 3118. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1986.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_75894 |
| Contributors | MILES, WENDY E., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 93 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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