The impact of personality and social climate variables on career choice and job satisfaction

Statement of the problem. The purpose of this study was to explore the relationships between social climate in family of origin and work environments from a multidimensional perspective. Primary goals of this research were to investigate the relevance of family of origin dynamics in career counseling and to clarify the relationships between personality variables, family and work environments, and job satisfaction.;Method. The sample for this study consisted of 133 adults all of whom were involved in outplacement or career transition counseling. The participants completed two inventories which were used to evaluate their perceptions of the social climate in their families of origin and most recent jobs. They also completed Holland's Self-Directed Search and a global measure of job satisfaction. Correlational analysis was used to describe the relationships between social climate variables in family of origin and in work environments, as well as relationships between job satisfaction, personality, and social climate variables. Multiple analyses of variance were used to evaluate the relationships between personality, family environment, and work environment. Finally, a step-wise multiple regression analysis was calculated to investigate differential contributions of the study variables in predicting job satisfaction.;Results. Cohesion and organization in family of origin environment were found to be significantly correlated with clarity in the work environment. Significant correlations were found between job satisfaction and six of the eight social climate variables under study. However, multiple regression analysis indicated that the Enterprising vocational personality type, autonomy in the work environment, and cohesion in the family of origin are most predictive of job satisfaction.;Conclusions. Clearly, job satisfaction is related to the social climate an individual experiences on the job as well as the social role that one experiences in the family of origin. This study also found that there is some correspondence between an individual's family of origin and the organization in which he or she works. However, this relationship is less clear and may be complicated by the competing factors of role replication and individuation from one's family.