Career exploration and occupational knowledge in Italian children

We explored the perception and actual occupational knowledge of jobs on career exploration across Holland’s categories in 60 elementary and 60 middle school students. Results showed a closer relationship between career exploration and actual knowledge than children’s perception of knowledge. We found higher levels of actual knowledge and perception of occupational knowledge for social jobs and lower levels for conventional jobs. There was no increase with age for career exploration and actual occupational knowledge. A decrease emerged in the perception of occupational knowledge in Social and Investigative categories. Gender differences emerged in perception but not in actual occupational knowledge.