What would I do if I couldn't do what I wanted to do? investigating career compromise strategies

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Abstract
Although the process of compromise is crucial to career decision making, it has received little attention. This paper reports an attempt to explore people's attitudes and beliefs about how they would behave if they were forced to make career compromises. Specifically, subjects were asked to indicate what they would do if they were faced with a number of hypothetical career compromise situations where there were limited alternatives. Each alternative represented a different strategy and was varied according to the dimensions outlined in Gottfredson's (1981) circumscription/compromise theory of occupational aspirations. The results are discussed in terms of the circumscription/compromise theory and the practice of vocational counselling. Typically, subjects opted to sacrifice prestige level and maintain vocational interests and occupational sex type. This finding did not confirm Gottfredson's theory, nor was it consistent with previous research concerning how individuals state they would behave if faced with a career compromise situation.