In the category of Career Development on the National Counselor Examination (NCE), the Counselor Preparation Comprehensive Examination (CPCE), or another counseling exam, you’ll most likely need to know about Trait and Factor Theory.
The Trait and Factor Approach (or theory) uses a person’s traits and tries to match them with a career based on the qualities of the workplaces. These workplace characteristics are referred to as “factors”, which is where the name comes from.
What is Trait & Factor Theory? The Trait and Factor approach to career counseling works to match a person (based on their traits) to the workplace or environment. The Trait and Factor approach may go by other names as well, such as Trait Factor, Actuarial, or Matching Approach.
What are Traits? Traits are the qualities that make each person unique. They may include a person’s interests, strengths, or their limitations to name a few. Overall, these would be traits that they may contribute to their workplace or that may impact their career.
What are Factors? Factors of work environments may include things such as the pay, tasks that will need to be performed, or the opportunity for advancement. These are aspects of the workplace that might be important to those who would work in this position.
What are the disadvantages of Trait and Factor Theory? Trait and Factor theory has some downsides. Perhaps most prominent is that it does not consider that a person’s career could change over time. In fact, the assumption seems to be the opposite, that one only needs to have a career match considered once in life.
Why career counseling moving away from Trait and Factor Theory? It seems important to mention that overall, counselors have moved away from the Trait and Factor approach. The primary reason for this is that the approach tried to oversimplify very complex topics—trying to choose a career and people!
Who is Frank Parsons? Trait and Factor theory originated with Frank Parsons in his 1909 book, Choosing a Vocation. Parson’s wanted people to understand the traits and qualities that they possess. Then he wanted people to understand what the factors are that exist in various workplaces. From there, he wanted people to compare their traits with the factors of the job, but to do so in a way that involved reason
Who is E.G. Williamson? Edmund Griffith (E.G.) Williamson was a significant person in Trait and Factor. Williamson had four diagnostic categories that he used to convey what may be unhelpful about a career choice and what would be a good choice for a client. That said, studies have shown these diagnoses are not very accurate—in fact, when others look at data collected from test sessions that were reviewed by other professionals, they agree with the diagnosis only about 50% of the time.
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In grad school, the Trait and Factor Theory was one that seemed to come up a lot in my career counseling course. And because of this, this is a theory that I would want people to have a good understanding of before they take their NCE, CPCE, or other counseling exam. Hopefully this video will be a good resource for you to help you learn more about the Trait and Factor Theory. My name is Keegan. I recently graduated with a master’s degree in counseling. I’m making videos like this to help you understand the topics that are included on the NCE, CPCE, and other counseling exams. The topic for today is the Trait and Factor approach to career counseling.
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This theory works by matching a person and their traits to the factors of the workplace or environment that they could have a job in. And keep in mind today I’m referring to it as the training factor approach. However, there are other names that you might hear this theory go by, such as simply Trait Factor or the Matching approach. The Trait and Factor approach attempts to match the traits of the person to the characteristics and requirements that a career may entail. Traits may include a person’s strengths, interests or limitations, to name a few. Factors for work environments may include things like pay,
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tasks that need to be performed, and opportunities for advancement. One important assumption of the Trait and Factor approach is that the traits and the factors of the person and the work environment can be measured. Therefore, it should be no surprise that the Trait and Factor approach is heavily influenced by the psychological testing movement. To best match a person to the occupation, Trait and Factor career counseling would involve testing to best understand the person and the traits that they would contribute to the workplace.
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Because of this, clients undergoing Trait and Factor career counseling would need to possess some level of self-knowledge to be able to progress in this process in the best way. Train factor theory originated by Frank Parsons in his 1909 book called Choosing a Vocation. Parsons wanted people to have a good understanding of the traits that they possess, as well as the factors that would show up in their workplace. Not only this, but he wanted people to be able to rationally understand and piece apart how their traits and the factors of the environment or occupation that they’re interested and working in would interact with one another.
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Before we get into another prominent figure in the trait and factor career counseling approach. If you’re enjoying this video and finding it helpful, please help me up by giving it a like and subscribing to the channel so you don’t miss any future videos. Trait and Factor theory did not involve only Parsons. Edmond Griffith Williamson — or E.G. Williamson — was another prominent figure in the Trait and Factor approach.
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Williamson developed diagnostic categories that would explain what wasn’t a good match about a person’s career that they were interested in, or what made it a good match for them. The problem was, as these diagnostic categories that he developed have been studied and as sessions have been reviewed, where one of his diagnoses were given. Other counselors agreed with the diagnosis, given by another professional doing the diagnosis as well only about 50% of the time.
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Therefore, because the agreement between professionals looking at the same sessions was only about 50% for the diagnoses that Williamson had developed. This has not been seen to be super reliable since that’s at the same level as chance. Not only that, but Trait and Factor theory has some other downsides as well. Most prominently being that the Trait and Factor approach does not seem to recognize that people’s interests or what they’re looking for in an occupation could change over time. in fact, Trait and Factor career counseling promotes quite the opposite, saying that this process would only need to be done once in a person’s lifetime.
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With these things being said, it’s important to note that counselors have largely moved away from the Trait and Factor approach to career counseling, the primary reason for moving away from this approach is that counselors feel that Trait and Factor theory tried to oversimplify some very complex things. Specifically, the process of choosing a career and a person’s interest in possible careers. As a review, the Trait and Factor approach originated with Frank Parsons.
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Traits refer to the qualities that we possess as people, and factors are workplace characteristics. E.G. Williamson was another prominent figure in the Trait and Factor approach, but overall the Trait and Factor approach has largely faded away as counselors have moved toward more modern and accurate methods of career counseling. I hope this video gave you a good understanding of the Trait and Factor approach that can be a prominent topic in career counseling. If you enjoyed this video, make sure you check out my channel to see other videos that can help you with your NCE or other counseling exam topics. Thank you so much for watching.
