Vocational Interest Inventory

Introduction
General Instructions
Registration
Start the Test
Score Sheet/Report

CONTENTS

Overview - Introductory Video on Vocational Interest Inventory
Introduction
Information about Vocational Interest Inventory for Students
Terms to know
Information about Vocational Interest Inventory for Teachers, Counsellors and Parents
Construction of Items
General Instructions for Students
Registration Form
Start the Test
Score Sheet/Report
Understanding the Meaning of Score

General Instructions

Please read the general instructions carefully

This assessment will measure your interest and personality traits. Your results will be displayed after you submit all the test items. The list of sectors that matches your interests will be displayed thereafter.

Read the instructions carefully: Before you start attempting the test items read them carefully. You are not being tested, therefore, do not think that you might be right or wrong. Your answers will give a picture of your likes or dislikes.
Number of Items that you have to attempt: There are a total of 78 items to be attempted. You have to answer all the items by clicking on either like or dislike. For example, there is an item which says, “Planting and growing crops”. Now if you like planting and growing crops, you click on the option “like” but if you do not like planting and growing crops, then you click on “dislike”. There is another item, which says, “Arranging stocks in shelves” and if you like this, then you click on the option “like” but if you do not, then you click on “dislike”.
Do not guess: Just respond honestly. Do not guess the answer, as it will lead to wrong interpretation. If you rush through the questions, you are likely to make mistakes.

Registration Form

Please fill the form carefully

AADHAAR No. *

School Type *

Govt.

Private

Govt. Aided

Grade (Class) *

8

Select Gender *

Male

Female

Transgender

Select State *

District : *

Tehsil :

Select School Location *

Guardian Name: *

Contact No/Whatsapp No/Mobile No.

Email ID.

Select Category *

Warning! All Fields are Mandatory

Warning! Only Numbers Are Allowed !

Warning! AADHAAR Number must be exactly 12 characters !

Warning! All Fields are Mandatory

The Vocational Interest Inventory instrument has been developed by a group of experts to help students identify their interests and the fields that match them.The Inventory is based on Holland's RIASEC (Realistic, Investigative, Artistic, Social, Enterprising, Conventional) Model. It is an inventory which will be used to help students identify their interests and personality and match them with the various disciplines or fields. The inventory comprises of items to be answered by the students of Grade 8, which will help them to know their vocational interests and to choose a vocational subject or a vocation as a career.The items are based on the six basic types of personality (RIASEC) with the aim to facilitate making choice to work in an environment similar to the interest of the people,as people are more likely to be successfull and satisfied when they work in an environment similar to their personality type. It provides information related to the occupational interests of the students and should be taken up voluntarily by students. Another factor that influences the choice of career is the "personality". Personality tests measure aspects of an individual's personality that are relevant to job performance, including interaction style and behavioural tendencies. However, the correlations of interests with personality characteristics are not very strong, and an individual's personality gives only a rough guide as to his or her pattern of vocational interests.

According to John L Holland (1997), personality in most persons can be categorized as one of the following six types:

Realistic (R) : People with this type of personality like working with hands, learning new things, dealing with facts and figures. For example; Building and Construction, Private Security are some sectors these people have an interest in.
Investigative (I) : People with this type of personality prefer to work with "data". They generally like to think and observe, rather than act, organize and understand information. For example; Banking, Financial Services and Insurance, IT-ITES (Information Technology Enabled Services) are some sectors these people have an interest in.
Artistic (A) : People with this type of personality prefer to work with "ideas" and are more creative in their approach. They tend to be more open, original, perceptive, sensitive, independent and emotional. They generally oppose structures and rules but enjoy involving people with physical skills. For example; Media and Entertainment, Beauty and Wellness are some sectors these people have an interest in.
Social (S) : People with this type of personality prefer to work with "people". They would generally like to seek close relationships with other people. For example; Health care, Tourism and Hospitality are some sectors these people have an interest in.
Enterprising (E) : People with this type of personality prefer to work with people and data. They use their speaking skill in leading or persuading others. They value reputation, power, money and status. For example, Organized Retail, Tourism and Hospitality are some sectors these people have an interest in.
Conventional (C) :: People with this type of personality prefer to work with data and they like rules and regulations, structure and order. They also place value on reputation, power, or status. For example, Logistics, Telecom, Banking, Financial Services and Insurance are some sectors these people have an interest in.

The details about the use of inventory, dimensions measured in the inventory, administration and scoring are available online. The outcome of the inventory should not be utilized for imposing the decision on the students regarding the choice of vocational courses or other subjects.

The Vocational Interest Inventory Instrument requires the respondent to indicate his or her probable liking for various kinds of occupations and work activities. Responses to these items are then used to predict which occupations and work activities would be best suited to the respondent.

Teachers and Counsellors can utilize the outcomes of the inventory to guide the students.

100 (50 males and 50 females) school students drawn from rural and urban areas of Bhopal were selected for the survey. The age of students ranged from 13 to 15 years, with a mean age of 13.5 years. The main objective of the pilot survey was to know:

Whether the items elicit desired responses
Whether the items elicit varied responses
Whether the terminology and language are understood by the students taking the test.

Based on the findings of the pilot testing some changes were made in the general instructions and language of the items.

Realistic : Items under this dimension are designed to check the realistic nature of the students.
Investigative :Items under this dimension are designed to check the investigative nature of the students.
Artistic : - Items under this dimension are designed to check the artistic nature of the students.
Social : Items under this dimension are designed to check the social nature of the students.
Enterprising : Items under this dimension are designed to check the enterprising nature of the students.
Conventional :Items under this dimension are designed to check the conventional nature of the students.

The principles that were followed in the construction of items are as follows:

Items were to be developed for all the six dimensions i.e. RIASEC.

Item Analysis

Item analysis: This method is called total-item correlation in order to ascertain the reliability of each item. The retained items, which have significant correlation coefficient with the total score, are called reliable items. For each respondent, the total of all the items (answer) is calculated. This total is the sum of answers of all the items of an inventory for each respondent. In other words, this total contains the contribution of all items of each respondent. This statement generates total of 90 items for each respondent. Now there are one hundred twenty-one variables – 1 to 90 is the statements and the last (91st) is the total. Calculated correlation coefficients of total with each item. The non-significant correlation coefficients of the items were identified by manual checking. It was reveals that these items do not contribute significantly to the total. In other words, these items are not reliable and deleted from the inventory. Finally, out of total 90 items only 78 items were retain and remaining 12 items were deleted.

Scoring

The inventory is scored with the help of a vocational interest inventory manual. In the present inventory only two alternative responses have been given to each statement i.e. "Like" and "Dislike".

The vocational interest inventory has 78 items. Every item is to be responded to in "Like" and "Dislike". There is no other alternative. Every "Like" response is assigned 1 mark and every "Dislike" is assigned 0 marks. The sum of marks is obtained for the entire inventory. In the present study vocational interest is indicated by the total score obtained by the students on the vocational interest inventory.

The scores for each area are collected separately and the overall total is taken as the vocational interest score of the student. The student with high scores in this inventory is considered to have a high level of vocational interest and vice versa. The maximum vocational interest score of the vocational interest inventory was 13 and the minimum score was one. The Median value was calculated to put a demarcation line between highly interested and poorly interested students The vocational interest classification of students based on their respective scores are given below:

Scores 1 – 3 below Average Scores 4 - 7 Average Scores 8 – 11 above Average Scores 12 – 13 High

Reliability of the Vocational Interest Inventory

After deleting the item (s) with the help of frequency distribution and the total-item correlation method, the remaining items are subjected to check the reliability of the scale as a whole.

Split Half Reliability

This method checks the reliability of the inventory as a whole. A total of two halves are computed. In the first half, the total of all the odd items is calculated for each respondent, and in the second half, the total of the even item is calculated.

The correlation coefficient of these two variables, ODD TOTAL and EVEN TOTAL is calculated with the help of the Pearson correlation method. The value of the correlation coefficient comes more than .70, the inventory is called reliable, otherwise, the inventory is less reliable, and the inventory does not indicate the true picture of the measurement. The higher the value of the correlation coefficient, the more will be the reliability of the inventory.

The split-half reliability of the Vocational Interest Inventory was calculated for both the male and female students. The reliability of inventory was computed by applying the 'odd and even' procedure. The scores of 39 odds and 39 even items for the entire vocational interest inventory were correlated by using the product-moment method. The obtained reliability coefficient is given in the following table:

Test/Retest Reliability

According to this method the inventory is administered at two points of times to the respondents. These two points means test the inventory and again retest it on the same respondents. The results of measurement were almost the same at two points of time. It was concluded that inventory is reliable.

There are seventy-eight items of the inventory (Q1 TO Q 78) and data were collected for the test from 100 respondents. Then the data were again collected with the same inventory from the same respondents at retest time (after five weeks’ gap). The data were entered into the computer in Excel. The seventy-eight questions have been labelled as Q 1 to Q 78 at a test and the names of the questions have been given as QR 1 to QR 78. The test-retest reliability of the inventory was determined by the 'test re-test reliability method' after a lapse of five weeks. The obtained reliability quotient was .74.

Validity of the Vocational Interest Inventory

Content Validity:

The contents of items of each area were balanced representations. This means each area of the inventory has almost a similar number of items or questions. The contents of the inventory were related to the objectives of the inventory. This means all the items measure a common element. The content validity has moderate to high levels of internal consistency. All the items have a high level of correlation among themselves. The degree of content validity is mainly a criterion that all the items are complete and representative. The inventory developers observed that all items of an area are logically related.

Expert Validity:

Expert Validity: The copy of the prepared inventory were sent to the seven Professional Experts (psychologists, counselors, educationists, psychometricians) along with the objectives of the inventory with a request to check the validity of the inventory. Out of total seven professional experts, five exp3rts express consensus, hence validity is confirmed. Majority of professional experts give some suggestions. In the light of their suggestions the same was incorporated in the inventory and modified accordingly. The inventory sends to the professional experts for seeking their final opinion on the validity.

Face validity:

Face validity is the logical link between the items and the objectives of the inventory. It means each question of the inventory is related to the objectives of the inventory. The inventory developers assessed the face validity of the present inventory.