The authors investigated the level of career maturity of nonadjudicated high school students without disabilities and 3 groups of adjudicated high school students: those without disabilities, those with learning disabilities, and those with emotional disturbance. Also investigated was the relationship between career maturity and behavioral functioning, using the Behavior Assessment System for Children-Self-Report of Personality (BASC-SRP; C, R. Reynolds & R. W. Kamphaus, 1992). No significant differences existed between nonadjudicated and adjudicated students without disabilities, Adjudicated students with emotional disabilities and learning disabilities scored significantly lower than nonadjudicated high school students without disabilities on the overall measure of career maturity. Career maturity was found to be significantly but only moderately related to 8 behavioral domains on the BASC-SRP.
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There has been a significant increase in adolescent crime in the United States over the past two decades (Panel on High-Risk Youth, 1995). Moreover, there is a strong tendency for juveniles who are released from correctional facilities to become reinvolved with the legal system (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 1993). Juvenile correctional facilities report that as many as 50% of the adolescents released from their facilities tend to be reincarcerated. A study conducted in a correctional facility in Alaska, for example, indicated that 52% of the juveniles released from that facility were eventually placed back into a correctional setting (Henjum, 1990). The high failure rate of rehabilitating these juveniles seems to be because there is a subgroup of these adolescents, whose criminal misconduct begins at an early age and who can be classified as falling into one of the following categories: learning disabled, emotionally disturbed/mentally disordered, developmentally delayed, drug and alcohol dependent, neurologically impaired, and juvenile sex offender (Altschuler & Armstrong, 1990). The present study focused on adjudicated adolescents in two of these disability categories: learning disabled and emotionally disturbed/mentally disordered.
The term learning disability has been defined as a disorder in one or more of the basic psychological processes involved in understanding or in using language, spoken or written, that may manifest itself in an imperfect ability to listen, think, speak, read, write, spell, or do mathematical calculations. The Individuals With Disabilities Education Act of 1990, Public Law 101-476, defined Emotional Disturbance as "a condition exhibiting one or more of the following characteristics over a long period of time and to a marked degree that adversely affects educational performance": (a) an inability to learn which cannot be explained by intellectual, sensory, or health factors; (b) an inability to build or maintain satisfactory interpersonal relationships with peers and teachers; (c) inappropriate types of behavior or feelings under normal circumstances; (d) a generally pervasive mood of unhappiness or depression; or (e) a tendency to develop physical symptoms or fears associated with personal or school problems.
Research has shown that more than 50% of juvenile offenders have learning disabilities, which is more than 5 times the rate that occurs in the normal adolescent population (Keilitz & Miller, 1980). Due to the high rates of reincarceration characteristic of this high-risk subgroup of adjudicated adolescents, it is essential that career interventions be developed that enable these adjudicated adolescents to make a successful transition back into the community. Yet, there has been little research that has addressed the career development needs of this population. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether differences exist in career maturity between various subpopulations of adjudicated adolescents with and without disabilities and how these compare with nonadjudicated adolescents.
CAREER MATURITY OF ADJUDICATED YOUTH WITH DISABILITIES
Career maturity is defined as the degree of development the individual reaches on a continuum of vocational development from exploration to decline. It involves the extent to which an individual possesses the skills and knowledge necessary to make realistic and informed vocational choices (Levinson, 1993). According to Super (1957), vocational maturity is characterized by the extent to which (a) one is concerned with and seeking out a career choice; (b) one is investigating and planning for an occupation; (c) one's occupational preference is stable over time; (d) one displays realistic attitudes toward work; and (e) one's work habits, interests, and abilities match one's occupational preference.
A thorough computer-assisted review of the literature identified very few studies that focused on the career maturity of adjudicated adolescents. The research that has been conducted, however, implies that these adolescents are at greater risk for lower levels of career maturity than are adolescents in the general population (Wilson, 1978). The presence of a learning disability in such students, which is a relatively common occurrence, would seemingly exacerbate this situation. The incidence rate of learning disabilities in adjudicated adolescents has been found to range between 40% and 50% (Moran, 1979). Adolescents with learning disabilities display characteristics, such as learned helplessness, low self-esteem, and a passive learning style, that are likely to negatively affect career maturity (Alley, Deshler, Clark, Schumaker, & Warner, 1983; I. Rosenthal, 1989). Thus, adjudicated youths with learning disabilities seem to be at especially high risk for low levels of career maturity.
PURPOSE OF THE STUDY
Using the Career Development Inventory (Super, Thompson, Lindeman, Jordaan, & Meyers, 1981), we investigated whether there were differences in the career maturity of nonadjudicated high school students without disabilities and three groups of adjudicated high school students: those without disabilities, those with learning disabilities, and those with emotional disturbance. We also investigated the relationship between career maturity and self-report of behavioral functioning on the Behavior Assessment System for Children-Self-Report of Personality (BASC-SRP; Reynolds & Kamphaus, 1992). We hypothesized the following:
1. The career maturity of nonadjudicated students without disabilities would be higher than that of adjudicated students without disabilities.
2. The career maturity of nonadjudicated students without disabilities would be higher than that of adjudicated students with learning disabilities.
3. The career maturity of nonadjudicated students without disabilities would be higher than that of adjudicated students who were certified as emotionally disturbed.
Because research on career maturity …
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