05/01/2013

Roots of the National Career Development Association #4

By Rich Feller

The Association Journal: A Century of Publication

The National Career Development Association (NCDA) currently is celebrating its centennial year, having been founded in 1913 as the National Vocational Guidance Association (NVGA). As a part of our centennial celebration we are examining our roots. [See Roots #1 and #2 and #3,  previously published here.] This month, we consider the Association’s journal, which has been published for 100 years.

The first issue of the professional periodical that has become the Career Development Quarterly was published in 1911 by the Boston Vocational Bureau. Frederick J. Allen edited the four-page publication titled the Vocational Guidance News-Letter. By 1915, it was called the Vocational Guidance Bulletin. NVGA published the journal until 1952 when it was purchased by the newly-founded American Personnel and Guidance Association (now American Counseling Association). They made it their official journal and renamed it the Personnel and Guidance Journal (now the Journal of Counseling and Development). NCDA, wanting to maintain a journal of its own, began publishing the Vocational Guidance Quarterly (now Career Development Quarterly) in 1952.

To mark its centennial, NCDA has produced a “virtual special issue” of the Career Development Quarterly. The articles in this virtual issue, listed by rank according to available records, are the eight most cited articles published by the Career Development Quarterly and its predecessors including The Vocational Guidance Quarterly and Occupations. These articles, listed below, provide a sample of the contributions made by NCDA members to the profession of career counseling and the science of vocational psychology. To view the table of contents for the special issue and to find links to each of the eight articles go to the Online Library.

Job Satisfaction (1940)
Robert Hoppock and Charles L. Odom

Career Adaptability: An Integrative Construct for Life-Span, Life-Space Theory (1997)
Mark L. Savickas

Efficacy and Outcome Expectations Influence Career Exploration and Decidedness (1997)
Nancy E. Betz and Karla Klein Voyten

Vocational Adjustment: Implementing a Self-Concept (1988)
Donald E. Super

Social Cognitive Theory and the Career Development of African American Women (1996)
Gail Hackett and Angela M. Byars

A Social Cognitive Framework for Career Choice Counseling (1996)
Steven D. Brown and Robert W. Lent

Toward a Theory of Occupational Choice: A Restatement (1972)
Eli Ginzberg

A Context-Rich Perspective of Career Exploration Across the Life Roles (1997)
David L. Blustein

Rich Feller, Ph.D., is Professor of Counseling and Career Development and University Distinguished Teaching Scholar at Colorado State University, and a Nationally Certified Counselor. A Fellow and President (2012-2013) of the National Career Development Association, he received NCDA’s Eminent Career Award in 2009. He can be reached at Rich.Feller@ColoState.EDU