Development of indigenous basic interest scales: Re-structuring the Icelandic interest space

The present investigation used an emic approach to develop a set of Icelandic indigenous basic interest scales. An indigenous item pool that is representative of the Icelandic labor market was administered to three samples (N = 1043, 1368, and 2218) of upper secondary and higher education students in two studies. A series of item level cluster and factor analyses combined with scale construction techniques was used to develop unidimensional basic interest scales. These analyses yielded 28 basic interests scales in the upper secondary education samples and 35 basic interest scales in the university sample. The 35 indigenous interest scales or I-BIS are close to a complete description of the vocational interest domain in Iceland. About one-fourth of the 35 I-BISs were culturally specific to Iceland with the majority of Icelandic scales similar to the US Strong Interest Inventory Basic Interest scales (Donnay, Morris, Schaubhut, & Thompson, 2005) and Basic Interest Markers (Liao, Armstrong, & Rounds, 2008). Several interest categories found in the US inventories did not emerge in the Icelandic data: religious, military, and family activities. Multidimensional scaling (MDS) and cluster analysis were applied to the intercorrelation of the 35 I-BIS in the university student sample. The results from the MDS yielded four dimensions that were not interpretable. The cluster results indicate that a hierarchical model of eight general interest clusters and facets measured by the 35 I-BIS best describes the vocational interest landscape in Iceland. The hierarchical model is a comprehensive representation of interests in Icelandic culture and can be used as benchmark in future research of commonalities and differences across cultures. This study has implications for emic and etic approaches in vocational interest research and can a serve as a prototype for the development of indigenous measures and models for use in career counseling.

► An indigenous item pool representative of the Icelandic labor market was developed.
► Thirty five indigenous interest scales were developed in Iceland.
► One-third of the I-BIS are culture specific but majority are similar to known US scales.
► Eight general interest factors best describe the interest structure in Iceland.