Date of Graduation

1995

Document Type

Dissertation/Thesis

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate career and volunteer fire fighters using the vocational concepts of John Holland. The sample consisted of 100 career fire fighters and 100 volunteer fire fighters from a four state region. The instruments that were used in this study were the Vocational Preference Inventory (VPI), the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire (MSQ), and a Demographic Information Form (DIF). The VPI was used to assess the three-letter Holland codes for the subjects; the MSQ was used to assess job satisfaction; the DIF was used to obtain demographic information, self-perceived competence, occupational daydream, career satisfaction, and for volunteer fire fighters, their interest in career fire fighting as a professional occupation. The results showed that the group of volunteer and career fire fighters had significant differences from the norm group of the VPI on all six scales of the Holland typology. The most frequent code of the fire fighters was RIC. The group was higher on the realistic scale and significantly lower on the other five scales. The career fire fighters rated themselves significantly higher in self-perceived competence. The volunteer fire fighters had greater satisfaction in fire fighting than the career fire fighters; the job satisfaction for the volunteer fire fighters' career occupation was significantly lower than their satisfaction with fire fighting. In the investigation of Holland's theory of careers, support was found for Holland's typology. This study found that congruence was the best predictor of job satisfaction compared to consistency and differentiation. The study supported volunteer fire fighter experience as a screening tool for a career as a paid fire fighter. People who are volunteer fire fighters can make an assessment of their potential job satisfaction as a career fire fighter based on their level of satisfaction as a volunteer fire fighter.

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