Using Super`s Career Development Assessment and Counselling (C

Internat. Jnl. for Educational and Vocational Guidance 1: 131–139, 2001.
© 2001 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.
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Using Super’s Career Development Assessment and Counselling
(C-DAC) Model to Link Theory to Practice
SPENCER G. NILES
Counselor Education Program, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802,
USA (E-mail: [email protected])
Abstract. Super’s Career Development Assessment and Counselling Model (C-DAC)
represents an excellent translation of career development theory into practice. After decades
of developing the various segments of his theory (i.e., developmental stages and tasks,
life span, self-concept) to explain career development, Super focused on using these
theory segments to help individuals resolve their career concerns. This unique assessmentbased intervention model is the result of a multinational research effort directed toward
understanding the individual’s subjective and objective career development experience. This
paper provides a brief overview of the C-DAC model and then discusses how the C-DAC
model is useful for addressing career concerns in the post-modern era.
Résumé: Un modèle d’utilisation de l’évaluation et du conseil de développement
vocationnel (C-DAC) de Super pour lier la théorie à la pratique. Le Modèle de
l’Evaluation et du Conseil de Développement Vocationnel (Career Development Assessment
and Counselling Model – C-DAC) de Super représente un excellent transfert d’une théorie du
développement vocationnel dans le champ de la pratique. Après avoir pendant des dizaines
d’années développé les divers segments de sa théorie (c’est-à-dire les stades et les tâches
développementaux, l’empan de vie, le concept de soi) pour expliquer le développement
vocationnel, Super s’est centré sur le recours à ces segments théoriques pour aider les
individus à résoudre leurs problèmes vocationnels. Ce modèle unique d’intervention basé sur
l’évaluation est le résultat d’un effort de recherche international dirigé vers la compréhension
de l’expérience du développement vocationnel subjectif et objectif. Cet article propose une
brève revue du modèle C-DAC et discute ensuite en quoi ce modèle est utile pour aborder les
problèmes vocationnels dans l’ère post-moderne.
Zusammenfassung: Die Verbindung von Theorie und Praxis durch die Nutzung
von Supers Modell der Laufbahnbewertung und – beratung (C-DAC). Supers Modell der
Laufbahnbewertung und – beratung (Career Development Assessment and Counselling Model
– C-DAC) stellt eine hervorragende Übertragung der Theorie der Laufbahnentwicklung
in die Praxis dar. Nach jahrzehntelanger Entwicklung der einzelnen Segmente seiner
Theorie (z.B. Entwicklungsphasen und – ziele, Lebenszyklen, Selbstkonzept), die die
Laufbahnentwicklung erklären, konzentrierte sich Super auf die Verwendung dieser Elemente
seiner Theorie, um damit Individuen bei der Lösung ihrer beruflichen Probleme zu helfen.
Dieses einzigartige Handlungsmodell auf der Grundlage von Bewertungen ist das Ergebnis
eines multinationalen Forschungsbemühens, das sich darauf richtete, die individuelle
objektive und subjektive Erfahrung der Laufbahnentwicklung zu verstehen. Dieser Artikel
bietet eine kurze Zusammenfassung des C-DAC-Modells und diskutiert anschließend,
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SPENCER G. NILES
inwiefern dieses Modell zur Lösung von Berufslaufbahnproblemen in der postmodernen Ära
geeignet ist.
Resumen: Aplicación del modelo de Diagnóstico y Orientación del Desarrollo de
la Carrera (C-DAC) de Super para vincular teoría y práctica. El Modelo de Diagnóstico
y Orientación del Desarrollo de la Carrera (Career Development Assessment and Counselling
Model: C-DAC) de Super representa un excelente ejemplo de integración de la teoría y
la práctica del desarrollo de la carrera. Después de elaborar y formular, durante décadas,
varios de los elementos y conceptos básicos de su teoría (tareas y estadios evolutivos, ciclo
vital, auto-concepto, etc.) para explicar el desarrollo de la carrera, Super se centró en la
aplicación de estos elementos teóricos para ayudar a los individuos en el desarrollo de su
carrera. Este modelo de intervención basado en el diagnóstico previo es el fruto de una
investigación internacional dirigida a comprender cómo los individuos experimentan su
desarrollo profesional de forma subjetiva y objetiva. En este artículo se hace una breve
descripción de dicho modelo y después se presenta su utilidad en la orientación sobre temas
profesionales (de la carrera) en la era post-moderna.
In the latter part of his career, Donald Super turned more exclusively toward
focusing on the application of his career development theory (Super et al.,
1996). Specifically, Super and his colleagues developed assessment instruments to measure readiness for career decision-making (Career Development
Inventory; Super et al., 1979), concern for career development tasks (Adult
Career Concerns Inventory; Super et al., 1988), life role salience (Salience
Inventory; Super et al., 1986a), and values (Values Scale; Super & Nevill,
1986b). These assessment instruments comprise the core of what Super
labelled as the Career Development Assessment and Counselling (C-DAC)
model (Super et al., 1992). Most of these assessment instruments have been
adapted for use in international research efforts to describe the relationship
among important career development variables such as role salience, career
concerns, and vocational identity. Thus, the C-DAC model is influential
internationally in informing career development theory and practice.
The C-DAC model also reflects Super’s foresight that career counselling
in the post-modern era would not be a simple process of matching people
to jobs. For example, work-bound youth are confronted with the daunting
task of developing life-role readiness at an accelerated pace (Gysbers &
Moore, 1975; Herr, 1995). Clarity concerning life-role self-concepts is an
immediate requirement rather than a distant goal for these people (Super,
1990). Thus, work-bound youth need to know which life roles are important
to them, what they seek to achieve in each life role, and what will be required
of them to achieve their goals. Although approaches to career assessment
emphasising career choice content provide useful information in this regard
(often by focusing on ability and interest assessment), these approaches fail
to address whether individuals have developed readiness for career decision-
CAREER DEVELOPMENT ASSESSMENT AND COUNSELLING (C-DAC) MODEL
133
making (Super, 1983). Super realised that approaches to career assessment
must attend to both content and process variables in order to adequately
address people’s career development needs.
To this end, Super et al. (1992) articulated a model of career assessment and counselling that addresses both content and process variables. The
initial presentation of the C-DAC model was later expanded and applied to
secondary school students, college students, and adults (Osborne et al., 1997).
The C-DAC model supplements ability and interest assessment activities by
addressing a full range of traditional and innovative dimensions in career
assessment. Specifically, the C-DAC model treats interests and abilities as
basic status data to be viewed in light of the individual’s career adaptability,
life-role salience, and values- which are seen as moderator variables (Super
et al., 1992). The C-DAC model also assumes that to be ready to effectively
choose, and adapt to, an occupation it is important for people to “see themselves as coping with certain developmental tasks, at a stage in life at which
they are expected, and to some degree may expect themselves, to make certain
decisions and acquire certain competencies” (Super, 1983, p. 559). Additionally, people need to “understand how they see work and other life-career
roles and how society and their families and peers see them” (Super, 1983,
p. 559).
From this perspective, the C-DAC model focuses on the development of
career adaptability as a necessary precursor to the effective use of ability
and interest assessment data. Super’s (1974) description of career adaptability involves five dimensions: (a) having a planful attitude toward coping
with career stages and tasks, (b) gathering information about educational and
vocational opportunities, (c) exploring the world of work, (d) knowing how to
make good career decisions, and (e) being able to make realistic judgements
about one’s self and suitable occupations.
These dimensions of career adaptability are important because if someone
knows little about the world of work, then interest inventories that use occupational titles or activities may produce misleading scores and poor choices
may be made (Super et al., 1996). Likewise, when people do not engage in
sufficient career planning, they often encounter career tasks for which they are
not prepared (Herr, 1996). Thus, the C-DAC model addresses the individual’s
resources for choosing, and adapting to, an occupation. Addressing these
resources requires conducting appraisals of career choice content (e.g., abilities, interests, values) and process (e.g., life-role salience, career maturity)
variables. Because the most innovative dimensions of the C-DAC model
relate to the variables that moderate career choice (i.e., life-role salience,
career adaptability, and values), it is useful to focus on the inclusion of these
variables in the career assessment and counselling process. It is also important
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to note that these moderator variables have been the focus of much of the
international research efforts using Super’s theory.
Using the C-DAC model to assess career choice process variables
Life-role salience
Traditional assessment approaches often assume that all individuals place a
high value on work and that all individuals view work as the prime means
of values realisation. However, different patterns of life-role salience exist
and they must be considered in career decision-making (Niles & Goodnough,
1996). When salience for the work role is high, individuals view work as
providing meaningful opportunities for self-expression. In such cases, people
are motivated to engage in the behaviours necessary (e.g., to be planful,
to explore opportunities, to gather information) for making good career
decisions. When work-role salience is low, however, individuals often lack
motivation and career adaptability. In the latter instances, counsellors need
to begin the career counselling process by arousing the individual’s sense
of importance for the worker role (Super, 1990). Disputing irrational beliefs,
exposing people to effective role models, and providing mentors are examples
of activities that foster career arousal.
In the C-DAC model, the Salience Inventory (SI; Super & Nevill, 1986a)
provides the starting point for assessing the importance of work in the lives
of work-bound youth. Specifically, the SI measures the relative importance
of five primary life roles (student, worker, citizen, homemaker, and leisurite)
on three dimensions, one behavioural and two affective. The behavioural
component, Participation, assesses what the respondent does or has done
recently in each of the life roles. The first affective component, Commitment,
requires the inventory-taker to indicate how he or she feels about each of the
five life roles. The second affective component, Values Expectations, requires
the respondent to indicate the degree to which there will be opportunities now
or in the future to express important values in each of the life roles.
Because people are heterogeneous in their characteristics, it is important
to establish the functional and conceptual equivalence of SI items (Fouad,
1993). Therefore, prior to administering the SI, counsellors should discuss
the vocabulary of the inventory items, the instructions for completing the
inventory, and any possible confusion or uneasiness the inventory-taker feels
about specific items (e.g., items that may reflect culture-specific activities
that serve as a means for life-role participation). One of the strengths of the
SI is the fact that researchers have attempted to increase the functional and
conceptual equivalence of SI items by developing country-specific versions
CAREER DEVELOPMENT ASSESSMENT AND COUNSELLING (C-DAC) MODEL
135
of the instrument rather than relying on the version developed by Super and
Nevill in the United States. In fact, substantial research using country-specific
versions of the SI has been conducted in Canada (e.g., Macnab et al., 1987),
Portugal (e.g. Ferreira-Marques, 1983) and Australia (e.g., Lokan, 1992).
Also to set the stage for using the SI, clients can be encouraged to discuss
the following questions: (a) How do I spend my time during the course of
a typical week? (b) What changes would I like to make in how I spend my
time? (c) How important is each life role to me? (d) How important is each
life role to my family? (e) What do I like about participating in each life role?
(f) What do I hope to accomplish in each life role? (g) What does my family
expect me to accomplish in each life role, (h) What life roles do I think will
be important to me in the future? and (i) What must I do to become more
prepared for the life roles that will be important to me in the future?
Discussing these questions helps people clarify and articulate their liferole self-concepts. Specifically, by discussing these questions people become
clearer as to the values they seek to express in each life role. This information
is vital not only for guiding people in the selection and pursuit of appropriate occupational options, but also in developing appropriate expectations
for values satisfaction within the respective life roles.
These discussion questions also provide opportunities for exploring the
individual’s level of acculturation, cultural identity, and worldview. For
example, people can discuss family expectations and other cultural factors
influencing their life-role participation. Finally, discussing these questions
helps counsellors become aware of potential barriers, as well as potential
sources of support, for clients as they negotiate their career transitions. In
essence, these discussion questions provide useful information that supplements (and extends) SI assessment data.
Thus, information provided by the SI helps people identify those roles
in which they spend most of their time, those which they are emotionally committed to, and those which they expect to be important to them in
the future. By clarifying information concerning life-role salience (and the
cultural factors influencing role salience) people establish the foundation for
making accurate self-evaluations and developing career adaptability.
Concern with career stages and tasks
Planfulness is an important ingredient in developing readiness for career
decision-making (Super, 1974). People must plan for the career stages and
tasks that they will encounter as they enter and progress in their work. The
Adult Career Concerns Inventory (ACCI: Super et al., 1988) assesses the
planning attitudes and planfulness of older adolescents and adults. Specifically, the ACCI measures developmental task concern for the career stages
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of adulthood (i.e., Exploration, Establishment, Maintenance, and Disengagement).
Counsellors can use information from the ACCI to devise career interventions directed toward facilitating the individual’s coping with high concern
tasks. To this end, counsellors can use ACCI items to identify the resources
people may find useful in coping with their developmental task concerns. For
example, if a university student is concerned with the task of implementing,
then items from the ACCI-Implementation scale serve as guides for identifying exploratory resources that facilitate the implementation process (e.g.,
‘Deciding how to qualify for the work I want to do’, ‘Meeting people who
can help me get started’, and ‘Making specific plans to achieve my current
career goals’).
The ACCI also helps people become aware of the developmental sequence
of expectations or tasks they must cope with to successfully manage their
career development. By reviewing the career stages and tasks within the
ACCI, career counsellors can teach people about the general process of career
development. Using ACCI items, people can identify those career development tasks they are likely to encounter in the near future. Strategies for coping
with current and near future career development tasks can be identified. In this
way, the individual’s understanding of time perspective or ‘planfulness’ can
be enhanced (Savickas et al., 1984).
Readiness for career decision-making
The Career Development Inventory (CDI; Super et al., 1979) assesses career
planning, career exploration, information about work and occupations, and
knowledge of career decision-making. Scores from the CDI help counsellors determine the career choice readiness and deficits of their clients. For
example, low scores on the Career Planning scale indicate that there has been
little involvement in career planning activities and that the work role is not
important (Super et al., 1992). In such instances, career interventions should
be directed toward arousing concern about the future and increasing awareness of imminent developmental and decisional tasks (Savickas & Hartung,
1996). Additional CDI score interpretations with corresponding recommendations for interventions are provided by Jepsen (1992), Niles and Usher
(1993), Savickas and Hartung (1996), Super (1983, 1990), and Super et
al. (1996). When individuals obtain high CDI scale scores, they are ready
to benefit from assessment results focusing on content of choice variables
(e.g., abilities, interests, and values). Assessment results focusing on abilities, interests, and values are used for further in-depth exploration of specific
occupations.
CAREER DEVELOPMENT ASSESSMENT AND COUNSELLING (C-DAC) MODEL
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Using the C-DAC model to assess career choice content variables
Interests, abilities, and values
As noted previously, the range of career assessment possibilities that can be
used systematically with clients is broad. To measure interests, counsellors
using the C-DAC model typically rely on instruments that provide information related to the individual’s Holland types such as the Self-Directed Search
(Holland, 1985) and the Career Assessment Inventory (Johansson, 1986).
Ability measures include the Differential Aptitude Test (Bennett et al., 1974)
and assessments of functional skills from school transcripts or educational
and career planning portfolios.
In addition to assessing interests and abilities, the C-DAC model highlights the importance of clarifying values in the career decision-making
process. Clarifying values is important because values are indications of the
qualities people desire and seek in “the activities in which they engage, in the
situations in which they live, and in the objects which they make or acquire”
(Super, 1970, p. 4). Because values reflect the individual’s goals, they provide
a sense of purpose and direction in the career planning process (Savickas et
al., 1996). However, while many agree that clarifying values is critical to
choosing an occupation, relatively few put forth the effort to examine their
values in a systematic way (Harrington, 1996).
The C-DAC model relies on the Values Scale (VS; Super & Nevill,
1986b) for assessing an individual’s values. The United States version of
the VS measures 21 intrinsic and extrinsic values. These values are: Ability
Utilization, Achievement, Advancement, Aesthetics, Altruism, Authority,
Autonomy, Creativity, Economic Rewards, Economic Security, Lifestyle,
Personal Development, Physical Activity, Physical Prowess, Prestige, Risk,
Social Interaction, Social Relations, Variety, Working Conditions, and
Cultural Identity. Counsellors use VS results to help clients clarify their
highest and lowest values. The former serves as a guide for in-depth occupational exploration and is used in considering whether specific occupational
alternatives will satisfy high values and avoid low ones. When used with SI
results, counsellors can help clients further clarify which values they seek
to express in which life-roles. For example, if Ability Utilization, Prestige,
Economic Rewards, and Altruism are highly valued, the counsellor can
help clients clarify the life roles in which they expect to express each of
these values. Interest inventory results are also used to identify work-related
activities that provide opportunities for values expression.
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Summary
Counsellors use the C-DAC model to address the content and process variables of career choice. In the C-DAC model, life-role salience, career adaptability, and values are viewed as variables that moderate the use of ability
and interest assessment data. Identifying the life roles that are important to
people, the values sought in each life role, and the individual’s readiness for
career choice, allows counsellors to identify the resources their clients need to
develop to use ability and interest assessment data in career decision-making
and to successfully negotiate their career transitions. Toward this end, the
C-DAC model blends career assessment and career counselling to provide
opportunities for people to clarify, articulate, and implement their life-role
self-concepts. Moreover, the C-DAC model benefits from Super’s international influence to inform career development theory and practice globally.
It is hoped that Super’s legacy will continue through ongoing collaborative
international research investigating important topics related to career choice
content and process variables.
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