Interest Profile Elevation, Big Five Personality Traits, and Secondary Constructs on the Self-Directed Search

Abstract

The study used the Self-Directed Search (SDS) and the NEO-FFI to explore profile elevation, four secondary constructs, and the Big Five personality factors in a sample of college students in a career course. Regression model results showed that openness, conscientiousness, differentiation high-low, differentiation Iachan, and consistency accounted for significant variance in profile elevation. A significant correlation was found between profile elevation and extroversion. A unique relationship between the two measures of differentiation and profile elevation was found. A multi-variate analysis of variance and orthogonal contrasts, using the five personality factors as dependent variables and profile elevation as the independent variable, was conducted as a partial replication of an earlier study. The findings provide potential interpretive ideas for a therapist using the SDS and suggest that profile elevation explains some aspects of a client's results not accounted for by the other secondary constructs.