The primary purpose of this study was to examine the relationship of the selected developmental and situational factors to career aspirations and expectations of adult women It was proposed that the internal psychological barriers as well as situational factors related to the woman's prescribed sex-role may in part be responsible for low participation of women in high paying, prestigeous professions The selected psychological correlates of vocational success were Self-Esteem, Achievement Motivation, Dominance, Locus of Control, and Sex-role Orientation The selected situational variables were Age, marital status, socio-economic level, number of children, age of the youngest child, and time spent performing household tasks. The instruments employed in the study were Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg, 1965), Achievement Motive Scale (Mehrahian, 1969), Dominance-Submissiveness Scale (Mehrahian and Hines, 1978), Internal-External Control Scale (McDonald and Tseng, 1971), Belief About Equal Rights Scale (Anderson and Jacobson, 1976), and a questionnaire asking for demographical data. A group of 117 adult undergraduate women (age 25 and over) from the University of Connecticut, Stamford Branch, were invited to participate in the 'study The paper and pencil tests and the questionnaire were sent to the subjects during the Spring Semester 1978 A total of 96 (827o) responded comprising the final sample. Step-wise multiple regression analyses, oneway analyses of variance, t tests, and chi square analyses were employed to respond to the investigation's research questions and to test the study's four hypotheses. The results of the study indicated that among the selected variables sex-role orientation and age (negatively correlated) were the most efficient predictors of the level of occupational aspiration Therefore, the younger women with more liberal attitudes about the equality of the sexes demonstrated higher occupational aspirations Number of children (inversely related), dominance and achievement motivation were the most effective predictors of occupational expectation Therefore, women who had fewer children and scored high on Dominance and Achievement motivation scales also demonstrated a higher level of occupational expectations Other selected variables of the study were relatively ineffective in predicting the subjects' levels of occupational aspirations and expectations Further analysis of data indicated that the subjects showed a general lack of interest in highly prestigeous occupations. These findings have implications for 1) researchers interested in career development and motivation of women, and 2) counselors and administrators in their attempt to meet the vocational needs of adult women.
