Colleges and Majors

In my former role as the director of a college career center, this particular question was VERY popular. That is, “What Can I do with a Major in…business, or in psychology, or in biology, or whatever it was that the student in front of me happened to have chosen as a college major. It was as if students viewed career decision making as a straight forward step by step process and that the choice of a college major (step A) would lead to the choice of a career (step B). This is a common assumption and, to be honest, I must confess that it was one I held back when I was a college student.

For eighteen years I served as the Director of a college career center. I now work with teens and young adults through my career counseling practice, OPTIONS for Career & Life Planning. As you might imagine, I have worked with countless students over the years as they weighed countless academic possibilities. When considering college major decision making styles from a personality type perspective, I use a popular personality type tool in my work known as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (or the MBTI for short). Since working with this tool, I’ve witnessed some interesting patterns in college major decision making styles. According to the book, Introduction to Type in College by John K. Ditiberio and Allen L. Hammer, there are four preferred styles for exploring college courses and majors.