PERSONALITY-CORRELATES OF CAREER CHOICE IN THE KIBBUTZ - A COMPARISONBETWEEN CAREER AND NONCAREER WOMEN

The study compared Kibbutz career women (who studied beyond high schoo l and worked in their profession) to Kibbutz noncareer women (who did not study beyond high school and worked in various nonprofessional job s such as the laundry, the kitchen, and child care) on several persona lity characteristics. All subjects were nonorthodox Jewish women who w ere born and raised in the Kibbutz. The two groups completed a variety of self-report inventories, including the Bem Sex-Role Orientation In ventory, need for achievement inventory, two self-esteem scales that m easured both the global self-esteem and various dimensions of self-est eem (academic, social, physical appearance, physical abilities, and se lf-regard) and Cattell's Clinical Analysis Questionnaire (CAQ), which is a short version of Cattell's 16 Personality Factors Test. The resul ts showed that Kibbutz career women differed significantly from noncar eer women on several personality characteristics. These women attribut ed to themselves more instrumental characteristics, were found to be m ore independent and emotionally stable, and had a higher need for achi evement and a higher academic and social self-esteem. In addition, the division of household work was more egalitarian in the case of career women. The results are discussed in view of the fact that all of the career women were actually holding traditionally ''feminine'' position s such as teachers and social workers.