Enhancing job satisfaction perspectives: Combining Holland themes and basic interests

Investigations addressing the match between vocational interests and satisfaction have emphasized higher-order dimensions (e.g., Holland themes) and specific occupational scales. Although support exists at these levels of analysis for the hypothesis that congruence between interests and work environments yields satisfaction, limitations of these perspectives frequently result in small effect sizes or inconclusive results. This study examined the capacity of content scales of the 2005 Strong Interest Inventory, including the General Occupational Themes (GOTs) and Basic Interest Scales (BISs), in predicting job satisfaction across 22 samples comprising 9647 working adults. Hypothesized multivariate sets of content scales, and predicted individual GOTs and BISs demonstrated significant group differences. Sequential discriminant function analyses demonstrated that sets of hypothesized BISs significantly distinguished between satisfied and dissatisfied workers beyond the six Holland themes in 17 of the 22 occupational samples. The authors discuss practical implications of interpreting BISs to augment Holland themes related to job satisfaction.