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About The Strong Interest Inventory ®

The Strong Interest Inventory® was introduced in 1927 by E.K. Strong, a researcher at Stanford University. Since that time the Strong has been revised and improved, including the addition of Holland's RIASEC theory, which added general occupational themes to improve the quality of the Strong.

Because the instrument is constantly updated, the scores received by an individual today compare that person's interests with those of people who have responded to the inventory recently and who may be in occupations that did not exist in Dr. Strong's day. The Strong Interest Inventory gives you information about yourself and your relationship to the working world; information that will lead to greater  self-understanding and to better decisions about the course of your life. It also provides others who must make decisions about you (e.g., counselors, teachers, administrators and supervisors) with information and strategies so that the advice and counseling of these people has a high degree of consistency and personal applicability.

The Strong Interest Inventory® is a carefully constructed questionnaire that inquires about your level of interest in a wide range of familiar items (i.e. words or short phrases describing occupations, occupational activities, hobbies, leisure activities, school subjects, and types of people). For each of the 317 items, you are asked to indicate your preferences among three response categories on an answer sheet. The answers are then analyzed by computer to derive scores on measures of interest type, called scales. The results are then printed on a report called a profile, which presents the scale scores in an organized format and offers interpretive information.

The Strong gives the respondent five main types of information: first, scores on six General Occupational Themes, which reflect your overall orientation to work; second, scores on 25 Basic Interest Scales, which report consistency of interests or aversions in 25 specific areas; third, scores on 211 Occupational Scales representing 109 different occupations, which indicate degree of similarity between your interests and the characteristic interests of men and women working in those occupations; fourth, scores on four Personal; Style Scales, which measure aspects of the style with which you like to learn, work, assume leadership, and take risks; and fifth, three types of Administrative Indexes, which help to identify invalid or unusual profiles for special attention.

The power of the Strong thus rests on two assumptions: (1) that the day-to-day activities typical of a specific occupation are reflected in the interests of the people who are employed in it and (2) that those who have similar patterns of interests will be satisfied in that occupation if they have compatible values and the necessary knowledge and abilities.

The validity and reliability of the Strong exceeds that of any other interest inventory:

Sample size: 13 times larger than that of other career or interest inventories Sample base represents a wide range of educational, ethnic, and socioeconomic levels 14 growth occupations and contemporary careers have been added 72 Occupational Scales from the 1985 version have been renormed