Chapter 6: The Impact of Parent-Adolescent Relationships on Adult Career Choices

It has become increasingly clearer over the past 50 years that the environment plays a large role in career development (Holland, 1992; Mitchell & Krumboltz, 1996). One salient component of an individual’s environment is his/her family. Researchers and practitioners in a variety of fields such as counseling psychology, secondary education, and higher education have wondered about the interface between various family and career variables since Roe theorized that parental styles had a significant influence on individuals’ career direction in 1956. Interest in this topic increased in the 1980s when family systems theorists proposed that career decision-making is affected by the family system (Bratcher, 1982). According to family systems theory, the family operates as a system or unit, where patterns of interactions evolve and relational aspects of the system have a significant influence on individuals’ behavior (Carr, 2000). The proposed impact of the family system on individuals’ career development was extended by Zingaro (1983), who theorized that clients may have difficulty making career decisions due to a low level of differentiation from the nuclear family and that these clients may not be able to differentiate their own career expectations from their parents’ expectations. Family systems theory continues to impact career development theory and practice, as many studies have been conducted in an attempt to illuminate the precise ways in which the family of origin influences career-related issues. The results tend to support the idea that family variables and career variables are related (Whiston & Keller, 2004).