Week 4 Post

I found that Savickas’ (1995) article titled “Constructivist Counseling for Career Indecision” provided a thorough representation and description of constructivist counseling as well as how it can be applied in an actual case. The history of career counseling for career indecision was extremely helpful in recognizing and understanding the complexity of career indecision. It was fascinating to see how an initial emphasis on an objective approach to career indecision progressed from a dichotomy to multidimensional concept. It was interesting that initially the dichotomy of decided versus undecided was originally viewed as a good versus bad decision. In my experience in college, I had never viewed fellow members of my class as bad because they were not set on a major. Earlier this semester, it became clear in class discussions that not many, if any, students utilized career development services available in high school; therefore, I do not think it’s unreasonable or extreme for students to enter college without having declared a major. According the constructive approach, indecision is viewed as a transformation in progress (Savickas, 1995). It allows the individual an opportunity to pause and explore options before moving forward with a concrete decision about their future career decisions. The constructivist view of indecision as a transformation reminded me of Marcia’s moratorium stage of identity development during which an individual is provided the opportunity to explore alternative options. I found that this article attempted to view indecision as a moment of growth for the individual which is something I really appreciated about the constructivist approach.  

Additionally, I enjoyed the subjective approach that the constructive counseling approach for career indecision as it truly took into account the experiences of the individual within his or her specific context. I found this to be extremely important when providing career recommendations as it allows the counselor the opportunity to listen to an individual’s experiences before discussing and determining life themes; however, this heavy reliance on a subjective approach presents several concerns. Because the constructivist approach relies on subjective experience, it is prone to subjective interpretation by the counselor which inadvertently affects the themes and recommendations provided by the counselor. Additionally, it may take an individual a significantly longer amount of time to self-disclose personal experiences that would reveal life themes and build rapport with the counselor than the time length utilized by the constructivist approach. Counselors may potentially end up misinterpreting the life themes of the individual because of the lack of time allowed to share experiences, thus, inaccurate career recommendations may end up being made to individuals.

References

Savickas, M. L. (1995). Constructivist counseling for career indecision. The Career Development Quarterly, 43, 363-373.