MLO IV essay

During my academic tenure at California State University, Monterey Bay (CSUMB) I have practiced service learning and have completed original research in a field of my choice. I researched the occupational choice among social workers. In order to start my research, I had to practice using the sociological imagination. The social imagination was coined by sociologist C. Wright Mills and means how to explain daily life in sociological terms.

My research examined the social reasons why people become social workers. What I had determined is that when social worker students’ family of origin has a higher rate of dysfunction than that of their peers in other majors. Why I think this was important is that this population may be more aware of the trauma they they carry and this knowledge can increase selfcare and teach styles for social workers and social work students.

The main theories I used to interpret the meta data analysis was Social Learning Theory and Trait Theory. These were important to make sense of the quantitative data I collected. When I did a case study of various studies I found that applying these theories made the statistics tell a story about the participants of the case study rather than it being only about numbers.

My research used social and behavioral sciences to explain the outcome, sociology and psychology. While the university has since removed the behavioral science from the major with the creation of the psychology department I still used psychology in my study. I used sociology to explain how socialization affects people’s occupational choices (external influences) and how personality affects their choices as well (internal influences).

The take away which I have learned from MLO IV is how to combine practical applications of research and analysis with real world applications. Creating a legitimate research paper is not an abstract idea I had actually completed it and, I think have done it at a high level. That is not to say there is not room for improvement

SBS 402Senior Capstone Seminar

Lorenzo Covarrubias ______________________________________________________________________

Capstone

Occupational Choice of Social Workers: Testing Theoretical Models

By Dylan HarbertSocial and Behavioral Sciences, Sociology California State University Monterey Bay

AdvisorsGeorge Baldwin, PhD

Lorenzo Covarrubias, PhDJennifer Lucido, MA

May 1, 2018

Table of Contents

Abstract ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….3

Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….4

Literature Review……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………7

Theory………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..…………………………11

Methods………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..………………………15

Results………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………-…...……………………17

Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………21

Acknowledgments…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………24

Reference………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………25

Appendices……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………28

Abstract

In many occupations there is significant speculation as to why one will enter and eventually remain in a particular career path. Why and how one becomes a social worker is one of those paths. This research examines the current literature and findings on Master of Social work student's personal (childhood, young adult) lives and how it affected their career choice. Specifically, I looked at how childhood trauma's and experiences such as drug or alcohol abuse, physical abuse, and spousal abuse may have attributed a preference to the professional job of social work. I will be using two theories, Social Learning Theory and Trait Theory to describe why the students made the occupational choice they did. The literature shows that childhood trauma has an impact on career choice and outcome for social work students. In this Capstone I will describe and analyze a case study which look at Master of Social work students’ pasts to examine to what extent it influenced their choice to become a social worker. The conclusion of the study will show which theory best describes why social work students make the occupational choice they do.

Key terms: MSW, STUDENT, CHILDHOOD, CAREER, MASTER OF SOCIAL WORK, OCCUPATIONAL CHOICE

Introduction

The subject of occupational choice has been studied since the early 1930’s (Ginzberg et al,

1951). Since then there have been numerous sociologists, psychologists, career counselors and others

who have studied the subject. Psychologists when examining why people chose a vocation often look at

traits and personality. An instrument often used to find an individual’s personality is the Myers-Briggs

Personality test and Big Five Personality test. Based from the traits that the instrument finds, a career

counselor or program looks at occupations which individuals with the similar traits thrive and become

exceptional. This look at occupational choice contrasts with that of a more sociological approach, Social

Learning Theory. Social Learning Theory looks at how an individual was raised, the environment they

were raised in; to sum up, how and where the individual was socialized. An individual observing what is

around them determines what they want to do and what they can do. These theories will be explained

more in-depth in the theory section of the Capstone. This examination of occupational choice of social

workers will introduce the concept, go over the previously published literature, explain the theories

involved and describe how the theories affect social workers in their career choices.

An analysis of social work students shows that early life experiences affect their reasoning to

join the profession (Rompf & Royse, 1994). Psychologists, sociologists and career counselors often look

at why an individual decides to join a specific career. This Capstone aims to reveal whether Trait Theory

or Social Learning Theory models best describes why a social work student choses social work as an

occupational choice. The literature states that’s social work students may want to become social

workers because of altruistic reasons (trait), for others it may be because of faith, personal or family

reasons (Biggerstaff, 2000; Rompf & Royse, 1994). Inside of the field of professional social work there

are many different career paths. As a MSW graduate one can work with: children, geriatrics, alcohol and

drug user and many populations. Besides the counseling and therapist (micro) jobs a MSW graduate can

do there are also policy careers available (macro) (Zerden, Sheely, & Despard, 2016), people with BSW’s

have access to many similar jobs as well. With so many career options available it is no wonder that

there will be a huge demand of social workers soon. The Bureau of Labor Statistics views that there will

be a change of employment of 19% from 2012 through 2022 (Bureau of Labor Statistics).

To see how socialization may influence the occupational choice of social workers I analyzed four

quantitative studies which inquired about the family life of the student. The surveys showed that the

instances of childhood problems for social work students are significantly higher than that of their peers

(Sellers, Hunter 2005; Rompf and David Royse, 1994; Russel, Gill, Coyne and Woody, 1993). Extracting

from Social Learning Theory one can argue that the reason why social worker students chose career of

social work is because their personal family experience. The childhood interaction of someone who grew

up in a family with problems may have increased the interactions with social workers. The positive

environment and interactions with social workers may have socialized the child to see the profession as

a positive career to do. The Social work Influence Questionnaire showed that a high number of students

who took the questionnaire chose social work as a career because of personal family experiences

(Biggerstaff, 2000). This theory of socialization ignores the theory of traits.

When looking at the three same studies about the family life of the student one can also use

Trait Theory to explain why the students went the occupational choice they did. The literature indicates

that an overwhelming majority of social worker students are women (Biggerstaff, 2000). This can be

explained by the Big Five personality test. Women as a population score higher in openness and

agreeableness (Weisberg et al, 2011); this is not to say all women score higher than men, or that all men

score low on openness and agreeableness. Social work is a ocupation which demands high amount of

empathy and compassion and as a profession does not compensate as high as other professions, with a

median of $46,890 compared to the national income median of $56,516 (Bureau of Labor Statistics &

Proctor et al, 2015).

Literature Review

Many scholarly articles have been published on theories of occupational choice. Theories such

as Trait Theory and Social learning theory have often been used by career counselors to help decide

what vocational choice one should make (Brown, 2002). However, the specific goal of explaining why

social workers choose the ocupation they did is lacking. I have read many articles and reports on social

workers, Bachelor of Social work (BSW) students and Master of Social work (MSW) students describing,

statistically their victimization to violence as children and exposure to drug abuse. In the literature most

agree that a majority of social worker have had family dysfunction, though there is disagreement

whether the traumatic past affected their decision to become social workers (Biggerstaff, 2000). It is

important to note that in these studies, “families of origin” was not operationalized, so I believe they are

working under the nuclear family mode. The terms dysfunctional and problems are very broad and are

not defined as well in these surveys, we can assume that those terms mean that the participants of the

surveys met any one of the surveys’ items. These included but not limited to abuse, violence in the

home, drug and alcohol use and abuse, mental health issues (sex addition, eating disorders,

schizophrenia, depression).

Scholars have written how compassion careers have different family histories compared to

those of non-helping careers, social workers especially. A study by Robin Russel, Phyllis Gill, Ann Coyne

and Jane Woody (1993) showed that MSW students were significantly more likely to be a victim of

violence compared to MBA students 19.3% versus 3.9%. A different study by Rompf and Royce (1994)

found that Social work students had significantly higher likelihood of experiencing child abuse or neglect

compared to English students, 17% vs 8% (p=.003). A third study found the comparable results, looking

at 126 MSW students 19% of them were victims of violence.

What is curious about reported amount of household violence is when compared to a self-

reported victimization survey of children the national percent of the sample showed that family assault

on children is 8.6% (Finkelhor & Dziuba-Leatherman, 1994) This shows that Social work students are

more likely to have experienced violence than the general public. The dysfunction of a family’s past

includes more than violence. Social workers also have more histories with a family member with drug

and alcohol addiction.

With a higher chance of violence there is no surprise that there is a high rate of drug and

alcohol abuse in the families of Social work students. Looking at the same studies regarding drug

addiction and alcohol abuse it is found that families of Social workers have an average of one in five

chances of having an alcoholic family member, business students had a one in ten chances. Concerning

drug abuse in family histories, social workers had twice as many drug addiction instances compared to

the business majors (Russel et al, 1993; Rompf & Royce 1994).

There is overwhelming evidence that social work students experience a higher rate of

dysfunction in their families compared to their peers. This dysfunctional family upbringing is debated as

to how important it is when it came to the career choice for the students. Sellers and Hunter in their

study showed that 57% of their participants in their survey said that their past expeinces affected their

career choice (Sellers & Hunter, 2005). Another study explained that only 39% of students decided that

their past experiences affected their career choice; however, it did show that 24% of the group

explained that the reason they wanted to become a social worker was because their role model was a

social worker in their young life. The key difference is that rather being affected by those events that

transpired they were affected by those who helped them though the events. It is important to note that

as Rompf and Royce stated “[The] study should not be misconstrued as evidence that social work

students are drawn to the profession because of their own mental health problems” (Rompf & Royse,

1994, p. 169) as it would not be fair to judge.

My examination of the literature has found some weaknesses in the studies. Specifically, what I

find missing is that, with all of the families who have a dysfunction or problem, I want to know what

sociodemographic information these students reside in. In one study which related to the influence of

problems in the family, the demographics were shown. The mean age of the social work students

surveyed was 27.8, 87% of the respondents of the survey were women and 72% were [white] and the

next closet was African American at 11% (Sellers& Hunter, 2005). When looking at a childhood self-

reported victimization survey, the most victimized youth gender is boy at 57.6% and girls at 44.8%

(Finkelhor & Dziuba-Leatherma, 1994, 417). A theory that links the occupational choice of social work

with one’s past is best stated by Lackie, “one's choice of social work as a career may be an attempt to

deal with an earlier imbalance of parentication/infantilization” (Lackie, 1983, p. 315). A snag on this

theory is that if this was true there could be more male social worker, as it currently stands, its

dominated by women (Women’s Bureau, 2015).

An alternative to the socialization of children which guide them to the career of Social work, is

based off personality. A blog posted by University of Southern California’s Suzanne Dworak-Peck School

of Social work has a list of skills which every Social worker needs. Mentioned are: empathy, self-

awareness and cooperation. The skills mentioned can be attributed to the Big Five psychological trait

agreeableness (Song, & Shi, 2017; Weisberg et al, 2011).

Empathy is the touchstone of being a Social worker. The Social Work Dictionary defines empathy

as "the act of perceiving, understanding, experiencing, and responding to the emotional state and ideas

of another person” (Barker, 2003, p. 141). This definition come from a combination of psychoanalyst,

therapists, psychologists and developmental psychologists (Gerdes & Segal 2011). In the article

Importance of Empathy for Social Work Practice: Integrating New Science, it was noted that two main

components are used when measuring: empathy, emotional empathy and cognitive empathy.

The National Association of Social workers, which is one of largest professional organizations for

social workers, states that a social worker’s mission is to: serve the community, promote social justice,

uphold the dignity of people, integrity, competence, and promote the importance of human

relationships. The key point in this mission restates the important of empathy and altruism.

When BSW and MSW students were scored on the importance of choosing social work as a

career the mean scores which where the highest were under the altruistic category, the other options

where professional concerns and exploratory factors (Csikai & Rozensky, 1997). The most important

reason to choose Social work as a career in Csikai and Rozensky’s evaluation specifically was, “I had a

desire to help people” (p. 534). In the same study it was noted that age and gender significant affected

the answers of altruism, specifically women and younger students scored higher on those scales.

In Trait theory, as measured by the Big Five, the category of empathy and other aspects which

result in altruism lie under the factor of agreeableness (Weisberg, DeYoung, Hirsh, 2011). These factors,

according to research, have a relation with career choices (Hussain et al, 2011). According to Hussain et

al, the reason why people stay in a career field for a long time is because they matched their personality

type with their job, conversely job dissatisfaction is related to ignorance on their personality type (2011).

This idea of job satisfaction based upon ignorance of personality type is contested (Lin & Watkins &

Yuen, 2009). Lin et al argue that instead of personality type which keeps people in their occupation the

reason is a combination of personality types which create success in all occupations.

Theory

Theories are a lens to examine phenomena and explain why and how the outcome came about.

In this examination of social workers and why they made their occupational choice is no different. For

the purposed of this Capstone two theories are being used as lenses for the phenomena Social Learning

Theory and Trait Theory.

Social Learning Theory was a beginning of a change on studying why people act and react to the

things they do. Before Social Learning Theory, an individual was thought only to be based off,

“personality theories [that] proposed diverse lists of motivators, some containing a few all-purpose

drives, others embracing a varied assortment of specific drives” (Bandura, 1977, 1). The argument was

that the theories at the time ignored how complex social humans are and that an internal motivator

could account for the full gambit of responses a human has. Social Learning came about to combat the

internal driven factor. However, Learning Theory was criticized because proponents of the Personality

and Trait Theories saw it making humanity becoming reactionary in nature. Social Learning Theory is

differing from the more intense variations of behaviorism. This is shown in extreme behaviorism models

the cognitive nature is ignored, humans are just a reactionary force. With a Learning Theory model, the

mind takes place and learns from socialization, how and what to do when faced with a situation.

Bandura states. “social learning theory [is outlined by placing] special emphasis -on the important roles

played by vicarious, symbolic, and self-regulatory processes" (Bandrua, 1977, p. 2). This symbolic

representation allowed an individual to react in a familiar way to an unfamiliar situation. Within the

Social Learning Theory model there are several ways one can learn.

Learning though direct experience is one of the first ways on learns as described in Social

Learning Theory. It represents the reward and punishment pathway. People meet obstacles every day.

On this journey they choose a path, the path which has a positive outcome is the reward, the negative

outcome is the punishment. Because humans are thinking creatures they take advantage of this system

and have more control over the situations they are in compared to that of a less intelligent creature.

This cognitive ability while having more control over the choices driven by preference sculpts and limits

the choice the individual wants to take. This leads into the next type of learning, information function of

reinforcement.

Direct learning can be very strong to reinforce behavior; however, people do not perform every

task and learn from their own mistakes. We as people, can learn from others mistakes vicariously. By

watching others succeed or fail people have the ability create hypothesizes on outcomes for their own

lives and emulate behaviors which create the most success, ignoring the choices which are ineffective or

negative in benefits. The benefits positive outcomes and the consequences of negative choices are part

of the motivational function of reinforcement.

Humans are anticipatory in nature, because we notice patterns and react accordingly we act

according to what we have been told by others experiences and by our own. This motivational function

of reinforcement allows most people to understand the value of something without having to use it or

experience it. For instance, when someone from San Diego decides to visit snowy mountains they

understand that it will be cold instead of being unprepared to snow and cold weather, the person brings

appropriate clothing. These cognitive abilities allow and drives individual to be insightful and thoughtful

(Bandura, 1977).

The cognitive mediation of reinforcement effect is characterized by the preference of rewarded

choices. This ability to learn what is rewarding is ever evolving. In an experiment, if a participant was

rewarded for a specific behavior with no verbal cues they would start to trend in that particular

behavior. If the preference changed to different behavior and stopped rewarding for the old behavior

and started rewarding for a new behavior, the participant would start showing preference and doing the

new behavior. This is because the individual will change behaviors based off the reward, they even will

do this unknowingly. In contrast, if the participant knowingly doing a task for reward the reward can

negatively or positively affect their performance based off the reward.

Social Learning Theory is used in this examination to help describe the phenomenon of

occupational choice among social workers. By breaking it down into its atomistic properties we can

better see how the theory applies contrasted to looking at the theory holistically. Social Learning Theory

can be applied to nearly any learning experience that people find themselves in. The reward systems

that are coded into the human brain allows one, for the instance of this Capstone, to feel positive to join

an ocupation which helped them. This theory is in conflict with the other theory used in this Capstone,

Trait Theory.

Trait Theory, also called Dispositional Theory, has its origins in psychology. There various

theories on the trait approach such as: Cattell’s Theory, which uses 16 different factors which can be

over complicated; Eyseneck’s Theory, which looks at the different dimensions of personality in a three-

factor way and went against the idea which traits arise from going against biology and socialization; the

main focus for this Capstone when referring to Trait Theory will be the Five-Factor Model (Big Five) from

McCrae and Costa (Schultz & Schultz, 2016).

The Big Five used a model which breaks down an individual’s traits/personalities into five

distinct categories. These categories are neuroticism, extraversion, openness to experience,

agreeableness, and conscientiousness. The Big Five will be used for the purposes to represent Trait

Theory. According to researcher’s Tupes and Christal, after having conducted a battery of different

personality tests, they found five factors reoccurring in the samples (McCrae & John, 1992, 176). This

repetition of results exhibited the validity of the instrument. Each factor has one name but represents

many personality characteristics.

Neuroticism (sensitive vs secure) is the factor which represents how prone someone is to

psychological stress, when faced with perceived threat and punishment. A person who scores high in

neuroticism lacks emotional stability. An example of this factor would be described as worrying, anxious

and self-pitying.

The extraversion (sociable vs solitary) factor reflects how social one is and corelates with

positive emotion. This is not the opposite of neuroticism. Extraversion corelates with warmth,

gregariousness (Weisberg, DeYoung, Hirsh, 2011). An example of extraversion is talkative, enthusiastic

and outgoing.

Openness (curious vs cautious) to experience is notably correlated with intellectual curiosity.

Openness is expressed by creativity and the appreciation of new experiences. A person who is an

example of openness has a preference for variety of experience rather than a structured routine, they

would be described as artistic, imaginative and introspective (McCrae & John, 1992).

Agreeableness (compassionate vs detached) is the factor which hold traits related to altruism

for instance, empathy and kindness. Agreeableness measures one’s ability to be trusting and have a

mild-temperament. Examples of agreeableness are modest, kind, generous and compassionate toward

others (Weisberg, DeYoung, Hirsh, 2011).

The conscientiousness (organization vs carelessness) factor holds traits like self-discipline,

organization and reliability. Conscientiousness measures competence, productivity and goal motivation.

An example of this factor would have a high asperation level, behave ethically and is able to delay

gratification (McCrae & John, 1992).

The two theories previously described will be used to describe how social workers occupational

choice was decided. One can look at the socialization of a child and using Social Learning Theory to

examine how often the family history of social workers may have made an impact on them as children.

How potentially being raised in a house with family dysfunction may have had a counselor or a social

worker involved in their life may have socialized them to see the career as a positive thing driving them

to become social workers, this choice may be conscious or not. Trait Theory would use the Big Five and

examine how social workers score on the five factors with an emphasis on agreeableness, the factor

which attributes toward altruism.

Methods

For this study on the occupational choice of social workers, I chose to do secondary research.

This was because for me, as an undergraduate researcher, to get the primary data needed to conduct

the study would be beyond my means at this time. Secondary research is using data and information

collected by others as well as using books and journals. An advantage of secondary research is that is

quick way to find information especially since the age of the internet (Stewart & Kamins, 1993). A

reason why secondary research is a superior research method is because one can use many different

vast data sets to examine and explain phenomena (Stewart & Kamins, 1993). So when it came time to

find the scholarly journal articles about the topic I decided to leverage the internet and I primarily used

Google Scholar, the journal data base Jstor and the California State University system’s library. To find

raw statistical data the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and US Census data base were used.

To find articles relating to the research topic, because it is niche, I looked at articles as far back

as 1992 in an attempt to have contemporary research. This date while is earlier than what is normally

used by researchers was needed to gain a fair amount of literature. Especially since the breadth of

research on this topic was done in the 1980’s. The key terms used to search for the articles included:

MSW PAST DYSFUNCTION, SOCIAL WORKER INFLUENCE, SOCIAL WORKER CAREER INFLUENCE, BSW. To

include the articles in literature the reviewed articles needed to be related to my topic and must have

been peer reviewed scholarly articles. I specifically searched for quantitative data relating to the topic.

With the various articles and case studies collected I used two different theories to the situation,

Social Learning Theory (socialization) and Trait Theory (personality). Using a sociological perspective, I

applied these theories to why social workers may have chosen the ocupation based on their past family

history.

Using a case study style, I compared Trait Theory to Social Learning Theory. I did this by

examining the body of literature published that I collected using the technique previously mentioned.

Looking at the research done on empathy and social workers and how personality traits affect

occupational choice, I compared the theories was using a case study type approach.

A case study is a study of a specific situation as opposed to a statistical survey (Shuttleworth,

2018). Case studies are good for testing theoretical models by applying them in non-experimental

situations. A reason why a case study style of research would be best to examine the phenomenon of

social worker ocupation choice is because of how multifaceted the style is. Bromley (1990) states that a

case study is a “systematic inquiry into an event or a set of related events which aims to describe and

explain the phenomenon of interest” (p. 302). What is studied in a case study can vary from something

as small as a single individual to a population of a city. Data from a case study can come from many

different sources such as: documentation, observations, artifacts and archival records (Zucker, 2009).

There are several types of case studies, factual, interpretive and evaluative; the key point is that a case

study is scientific and evidence based (Zucker, 2009).

Results

The results of this research will be drawn from applying Social Learning Theory and Trait Theory

to the situations the Social workers have found themselves in as well as the psychological traits that are

expressed by the demographic. For Social Learning Theory I looked at data collected by: Sellers &

Hunters (2005); Russel, Gill, Coyne and Woody (1993); Rompf & Royse (1994); Biggerstaff (2004) and

noted how many students grew up in a home with family dysfunction. To apply Trait theory to social

workers used research from government agency surveys and academic surveys which link trait data to

populations, extrapolating that data and applying it to that of social workers.

Using data about students’ own experience of abuse from Russel et al (1993) I compared the

instances of abuse amongst the different majors (Figure 1). What can be seen in this data set is that

MSW are often victims of abuse so much so that 73.1% of the major has been abused in some way (not

shown on table). This dysfunction is not significantly different when compared to the total of the

counseling major at 68.2%, however when compared to education and business the difference is more

apparent at 44.9% and 36.9% (Russel et al, 1993, 126).

Severe physical abuse Often insulted or swore at Often subjected to spitful behavior

Sexualy molested0

5

10

15

20

25

30

Students Own Experience of Abuse In Precentages (Figure 1)

Social Work (n=145) Counseling and Guidance (n=78)Education (n=78) Business (n=65)

The personal and family dysfunction is impactful on individuals, these childhood experiences

and life experiences, overcoming and going though social problems can provide funds of knowledge to

help others who were in a comparable situation as oneself was in the past. By living though an

experience one knows how to get though the situation. The survivors of these situations often are lead

into helping professions such as Social workers or therapists either consciously or subconsciously field

(Rompf & Royce, 1994). In psychiatry, those who have received psychiatric/psychological treatments are

favored as future practitioners of the (Covarrubias, 2018). Rompf and Royce (1994) compared Social

work students to English students and the item which was drastically different was that their

experiences affect their career choice (graph in appendix a). These dysfunctional family situations lead

to interacting and socializing with social workers, counselors, or therapists.

Socializations with Social workers, counselors, or therapists create an influence on the person

interacting with them, creating a role model. Rompf and Royce described in their study that 24% of the

students surveyed, “who was the person most influential in your choice of career”, chose a social

worker. An additional 14% added other mental health professions (1994). These close interactions with

the profession create positive feelings, and role models which drive individuals to become Social

workers.

With so many social workers and social work students having grown up with dysfunctional

families the interactions with helping professions is higher than that of other majors and professions

(Russel et al, 1993). The socialization with the professionals create a lasting impression.

The preference for the Social work ocupation is based on Bandura’s Social Learning Analysis of

Observational Learning (1971). The individual starts paying attention to the person of interest and for

this situation it would be a social worker. Because the social worker is working on behalf of the

individual a greater attention is given to them. Observing the behaviors of the Social worker and being in

contact with them for a period leaves an impression on the individual, leading to retention of the

behaviors.

Retention of the behavior is needed in order to model the observed behavior. This impression

on the individual needs to be so strong that the memory becomes symbolic. For instance, when one

thinks of a social worker, the individual remembers the model specifically helping them. In this way

“social worker” becomes coded with the action of helping and of that specific person doing it.

Motoric Reproduction Process is the third step of the observational process which is where the

individual attempts reproduction of the behaviors and actions of the model and integrates the skills that

the model exhibited. This would be when the individual started formally or informally training for the

profession of social work. Since the action of physical reproduction of the behavior cannot be done, the

individual attempts a symbolic reproduction of what the model did. For purposed of this study this

would be doing humanitarian work, or volunteering in a social work setting. During this process the

individual would be self-reflecting and adapting to best reflect the model.

The reinforcement and motivational process as Bandura states, “[this is where a] person can

acquire, retain, and possess the capabilities for skillful execution of modeled behavior, but the learning

may rarely be activated into overt performance if it is negatively sanctioned or otherwise unfavorably

received.” (Bandura, 1971, 8). What this means conversely is that when positive actions are executed

and rewarded the action is more likely to be repeated. Motivation such as this could be grades in school.

The previously described steps are how an individual would observe and be imprinted by a

model. They would then explore and emulate the behaviors and eventually start to express the

behaviors as their own. The Social Learning Theory model differs greatly than the Trait Theory

explanation of why people become social workers.

To explain why people become social workers using Trait Theory, I will use the Five Factor

Model to help break down the reasons. According to the literature, empathy is very important in the

field of social work (Gerdes and Segal, 2011). Empathy is related to the agreeableness factor.

When we look at the demographics of social workers we see that most them are white and

women (Biggerstaff, 2000; Sellers & Hunter, 2005; Csikai & Rozensky, 1997). For the scope of this

research I did not entertain the idea on how or if race affects personality, however gender does affect

personality (Weisberg et al, 2011). The literature shows that personality affects career choice (Hussain

et al, 2011).

When asked the motivations for choosing social work students on a 14-item survey, students

were given the choices of professional reasons or empathetic reasons. On a 5-point Likert scale the

mean of altruistic reasoning was 3.98 and for professional reasons the mean was 3.69 (Csikai &

Rozensky, 1997). Being a 5.8% difference, it does not give sufficient evidence that social workers chose

the ocupation to help people, a trait driven by their personality.

According to Roberts and Robins, personality and career goal are interrelated (as cited by

Hussain et al, 2011, p. 2257). These career goals could be a position in a company or could be an

occupational choice. For the occupation of social worker, the field is dominated by women. This may be

explained by a study done by Weisberg, DeYoung and Hirsh (2011). First, before describing why

Weisberg et al’s research is relevant to the topic is it

very important to understand the data provided does

not capture a populations data nor can it explain

anyone at the individual level.

In Weisberg et al’s (2011) study they compared

the Big Five factors between men and women. They

got the volunteers from a Canadian metropolitan

Figure 2 (Weisberg et al, 2011, 7)

Weisberg et al’

area and measured the personality using the Big Five aspect scales. There were 2643 participants (892

male, 1751 female) with age ranging from 17-85. The results of the study had interesting results; there

were noticeable differences between men and women with the factor of agreeableness Figure 2 shows

the distribution of the amount of agreeableness men and women have. What the figure shows is that

women score higher on agreeableness than men. Note not all women score higher than men.

The two previous studies help explain the demographic of social workers, significantly

dominated by women. The fact that women score higher in agreeableness may be why they are drawn

to a helping ocupation such as Social work. Individuals who score high in agreeableness would gain

satisfaction from helping others, therefor chose an ocupation such as Social work.

Conclusion

After the research into the topic of whether Social Learning Theory or Trait Theory best explains

the occupational choice of social workers, I have concluded Social Learning Theory best explains the

reason why. The reason why is because how much interaction there is between social work students in

their youth with a social worker or another helping profession. This interaction and socialization creates

role models on young impressionable people. A secondary reason is because of the emotional and

physical trauma they received in their youth; the individual wants to help others who have experienced

similar traumas. While some research may show that an individual’s past did not affect their choice on

choosing social work as a career, the preference and decision making, may be happening on the

subconscious level. Applying Trait Theory to the individuals explains an interest and possibly success in

social work is lacking the ability to explain a drive to the ocupation.

Looking at the Five Factor personality tests alone when it comes to occupational choice,

personality does not have great correlation with the choices some individuals make; personality may

only slightly influence the choice someone will make. This happens because personality is difficult to

demonstrate how it affects one’s choices for it is complex. Stating that one should do a specific

ocupation because of personality removes the life experience of the individual to make their choices of

what they think they well be successful in. A reason why this method does not explain occupational

choice in a satisfying way is too much focus is on personality, simply put it overly simplifies a complex

matter. Social Learning Theory/socialization is the best reason to explain occupational choice. Because

of the proximity of an individual to an ocupation it is normalized. Looking how an individual was raised

and where they were raised determines what they will want to do as well as what they can do.

Doing this research has led me to see a gap in the literature concerning personality. I was

wanting to find data which examined social workers personalities using the Five Factor model. There has

not been a study done. This research could help prevent burn out in social workers, which is common in

helping professions. While personality as expressed by this Capstone doesn’t affect occupational choice

to a huge degree, it can help identify occupational success. By viewing long practicing and successful

social workers we could see which factors help or hinder the profession.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Dr. Arias, Dr. Baldwin, Dr. Covarrubias, and Prof. Lucido. Dr. Arias for

helping direct my orginal ideas towards a more managable goal, with out him I would have been very

much lost. Dr. Baldwin for his ensuring that I had the best articles available and for allowing me to

bounce ideas and theories off of him as well as allowing me to keep my brain cells and “missing” many

round house kicks to my head in Self Defence class. Dr. Covarrubias for encouraging me to create a final

product that I would be proud of, and for the many hours of going over my Capstone and proof reading

it, I am so sorry for spelling that word wrong 74 times. Last and certainly not least I would like to thank

Prof. Lucido, my expeince at CSUMB would not have been as enjoyable with out her, she has been a

instumental in my success as a student, as well as being an a great example of what an Otter alum can

become.

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