The Changing Role of Pharmacists as Evidenced by the Strong Vocational Interest Blank

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1 Claemont Colleges Claemont CGU Faculty Publications and Reseach CGU Faculty Scholaship The Changing Role of Phamacists as Evidenced by the Stong Vocational nteest Blank C. Andeson Johnson Claemont Gaduate Univesity Timothy R. Chuch Univesity of Minnesota Albet. Wetheime Temple Univesity Clayton R. Rowland Pfize Recommended Citation Chuch, T.R., Johnson, C.A., Wetheime, A.., & Rowland, C.B. The changing ole of phamacists as evidenced by the stong vocational inteest blank. Am J Pham Educ, 43(2), 94-97, This Aticle is bought to you fo fee and open access by the CGU Faculty Scholaship at Claemont. t has been accepted fo inclusion in CGU Faculty Publications and Reseach by an authoized administato of Claemont. Fo moe infomation, please contact scholaship@cuc.claemont.edu.

2 The Changing Role of Phamacists as Evidenced by the Stong Vocational nteest Blank Timothy R. Chuch, C. Andeson Johnson, Albet. Wetheime and Clayton R. Rowland Depatment of Gaduate Studies in Social and Administative Phamacy, College of Phamacy, Univesity of Minnesota, Minneapolis M N The Stong Vocational nteest Blank/Stong Campbell nteest nventoy-meged Fom, o simply Stong Vocational nteest Blank (SVB), is widely used to detemine the suitability of a student's inteests to a paticula field. n the pocess of noming the instument, data concening the satisfaction of pactitiones of a field and thei esponses on the instument ae gatheed. Such data lend themselves to analysis of tends in the chaacteistics of those pactitiones both ove time and ove the satisfaction spectum. Hence changes in the field and chaacteistics lending themselves to satisfaction can be ascetained. One field is phamacy, accoding to the liteatue. Twentyfive yeas ago and, in fact, even 10 yeas ago, it would have been appopiate to think of the phamacist as the come duggist in his shop, selling, displaying, window timming, dusting and pehaps pefoming some pofessional efeal and healthcae sevices. He ecommended poducts in the times befoe eveyone knew about them fom television viewing; he emoved paticles fom eyes, changed bandages, tended insect bites, seved as an active membe of the school boad and the chuch. Eveyone knew "Doc" and he knew them all individually by name. 1 ~hamacy education was (and, some might ague, still emams) a naow technical educational tack. Thee is little oom in the cuiculum fo electives in the social sciences whee exposue ~o hypotheses about such "unothodox" topic~ as human elations, communication skills, altenative life ~tyles,.etc.,.~ight be faced by the phamacy student. The 1mmed1ate m1heu may be all the phamacist knows. A ecent epot investigated the appopiate fom and content that phamacy education should adopt in the coming yeas( ). Seveal changes wee noted in the pactice of phamacy. ov~ the past 20 yeas. The emphasis on the dispensing fu.nction.m phamacy has deceased while the need to inteact w1th patients moe. effect.ively has inceased temendously. ~et~mly, the eve-mceasmg mpotance of clinical phamacy s ev1dence of this. tend. This means that phamacy education mu~t change also m ode to povide the best taining possible fo 1ts gaduates. t also means that the type of student being ac~cpted to phamacy school might also have to have diffeent sk1lls. t seems easonable to assume that as the natue and scope of ~he pham?~y pofession changes that those social and behav Oal quaht1es needed by the successful phamacist would change. n fac.t, the degee of job satisfaction depends upon the degee t? which both the taining and pedisposition of the phamacst have pepaed him/he fo the job. To this end, it is 94 impotant to identify those qualities that best coincide with the ole of the phamacist and those that will best pedict good job satisfaction and good pefomance. Howeve, the esults pesented hee suggest a social compo- nent to the phamacist's wok which has been taditionally ovelooked, and has only ecently been consideed as a possible subject of didactic instuction fo phamacists(2). At the ( Univesity of Minnesota College of Phamacy, a adical expeiment in phamacy education is attempting to poduce measuable impovement in patient-oiented behavio by instucting students in communication skills and by giving them altenative ole models. NSTRUMENT: THE STRONG VOCATONAL NTEREST BLANK (SVB) People do not ente a field o pofession by accident. Much of the decision making is affected by seconday school guidance o caee counselos based upon thei peception of the wok, equiements and the othe chaacteistics of a pofession o occupation. Those impessions ae long-fomed, based upon thei pesonal expeiences with people in that calling as well as with the esults of standad tests and the liteatue concening them. The Stong Vocational nteest Blank (SVB) is an instument widely used by vocational guidance counselos to detemine the inteest and aptitude of students fo a paticula occupation. The SVB is scoed in such a way as to geneate six Geneal Occupational Theme (GOT) scales, 23 Basic nteest (B) scales, and 124 Occupational scales(3). Fo the pupose of this pape, only the GOT and B scales ae elevant. These ae listed by name in Tables V and V. Table V lists the six GOT scales and Table V lists the 23 Bl scales. Since the chaacteistics of a pofession such as phamacy change ove time, it is necessay to peiodically "ecalibate" o "enom" the occupational scales on a cuently pacticing goup. THE STUDY: RENORMNG THE SVB The enoming of the SVB instument fo phamacists ~as undetaken by D. Jo-da Hanson of the Univesity of Mmne~ota in 1976 in coopeation with the College of Phamacy. "? s enoming is the fist since 1968 fo male phamacists and smce 1971 fo females. The study assessed the satisfaction of phamacists as it elates to the SVB. SVB, job satisfaction 1 Fo a good example of the duggist's ole in the 1950s, see Chapte 5 of Koos, E.L., The Health of Regionvi/Le, Hafne Publishing Company, New Yok NY (1954).

3 .lel. Mean P<;cent of time spent in activhies by sex of the phamac1sta ( l Activity Administation nfomation Dug distibution Non-health items Compounding Packaging Labeling Sales pomotion Reseach Education Puchasing nventoy contol Picing Cleical Pickup and delivey Mean pecent Female Male 2l.l Date of fist licensue a These epesent the figues given by espondents unadjusted fo total of 100 pecent. and job activities measues wee collected via a questionnaie mailed in 1976 to 2,400 phamacists, epesenting a 5 pecent systematic sampling of the cuent mailing list of Business Mailes nc. That mailing list was compiled, in tum, fom the egistation olls of the National Association of Boads ~f Phamacy's constituent state licensing bodies and the Amencan Phamaceutical Association. RESULTS Usable esponses wee obtained fom 693 espondents. The Stong Vocational nteest Blank was scoed and analyzed by the Univesity of Minnesota Cente fo nteest Measuement Reseach to detemine new noms fo phamacists and to pepae individual pofiles. Males and females wee teated sepaately, since SVB scales ae nomed sepaately. The diffeences between sample scale means fo the old (males 1968, females 1971) nom goups and the new (1976) nom goups wee tested using the!-test pogam in SPSS (4). Analyses of the questionnaie data wee pefomed using the Univesity of Minnesota Compute Cente's CDC CYBER 74 compute. Table displays the aveage pecent of time spent in each of seveal phamacy activities by male and female phamacists, and the aveage yea of fist licensue. Both sexes spent the bulk of thei time in "distibution of dugs and othe healthcae items," followed by "poviding infomation" fo women and "administation" fo men- an indication of taditional sex oles wheein men ae moe likely to be found engaged in Table. Fequency of diffeent occupations among noming goups fo male and female phamacists Male Female N Pecent N Pecent ndependent etail owne ndependent etail staff Chain phamacy manage Chai~ phamacy staff Hospital phamacy chief Hospital phamacy staff Othe Phamacist ole Othe pofession --...: Total No esponse Table ll. Self-epoted satisfaction of male and female phamacists Male Female N Pecent N Pecent "Couldn't be moe satisfied" " like it" "Uncetain," "dislike it," "indiffeent" administation activities and women in sevice activities. The men have, on the aveage, been pacticing two yeas longe. Table pesents the numbes and pecentages of males and females in the vaious occupations listed in the questionnaie. Nealy a thid of the male phamacists wee ownes of independent phamacies. Only nine pecent of the female phamacists wee ownes; ove a thid of them wee staff phamacists fo independent etail stoes. n Table, the esponses of the male and female phamacists to the question ''How do you feel about you pesent wok?" ae tabulated. Most indicated that they "like(d) it," both among males and females, with fewe numbes saying that they "couldn't be moe satisfied," o that they wee "uncetain," "indiffeent" o "dislike( d)" it. These last two goups wee about equal fo both males and females. Fom Table V, it is appaent that male phamacists 2 seem to have deceased in investigativeness, social oientation, entepise, and conventionality elative to thei countepats in On the Social, Entepising and Conventional scales, the change was fom "modeately high" to "aveage." The change in the nvestigative scale was within the "aveage" ange (3). Scoes on the ntovesion-extovesion scale showed a positive incease. Wheeas the 1968 sample was slightly extoveted, the new sample seems to be sl!ghtly intoveted. Academic Oientation showed no change smce the last nonning. A positive change was shown fo females between and 1976, on the atistic scale. Both scoes wee, howeve, m the "modeately low" categoy elative to the efeence sample. Deceases elative to the 1971 sample wee shown by the 1976 sample on the Realistic and the n~est! ative sc~les. Bo~ anges wee fom the "modeately htgh to the aveage. categoy elative to the efeence sample. The Ac~demtc Oientation emained high and unchanged, as dtd the ntovesion-extovesion scoe. Table V displays the six Geneal Occupation Theme (GOT) scales thei estimated means and standad deviations, and the obse~ed diffeences between those who indicated th~t they "could not be moe satisfied" o "lik~d i,t:'}bo~t thet W?~ (N = 554), and those who felt "uncetam, mdtffee~t to tt o "disliked it" (N = 107). Diffeences wee detemmed by contasts in one-way analysis of vaiance using ~P~S (4).. on.ly diffeences with ap < ae consideed stat.stical~y sgm~icant; the othes ae meely suggestive o infon:tattve. Thts Type eo ate was aive~ at. as a compo~use between calling too many diffeences stgmficant and havmg no powe to detect diffeences(5).. A glance at Table V eveals that only the soc.al ~cale de~onstates a significant diffeence by the above c~te.no~. Sattsfied phamacists scoed high.e on this s~a~e, mdtcati~g. tha~ they "ae sociable, esponsible, humamsttc, and ehgtous, 2 A subset of the entie sample was used fo n?ming the scales. Selection citeia had to do with length of time on the JOb, type of w~k, and age. a Data on the Bl scales wee not available fo the last enommg. 9~

4 , tt n t', m:tmtt,, '-t::'w w nn n ~ th G neal occupational Theme scales fo male and female phamacists. Table V. Changes ove t1me m e e - Male, means Female, means, Refeence Refeence Change Change c 45.5 Realistic c c 48.5 nvestigative c 53.2 Atistic C Social c Entepising c Conventional Academic oientation ntovesion/extovesion c Sam le sizes: Males: 1968 = 205, 1976 = 285; females: , b Tec:nical note: Fo the puposes of statistical tests, estimates of vaiance wee obtamed fom the new sample and pojected to the old. c Statistically significant (P < 0.05)... have vebal and intepesonal skills;... peceive themselves as undestanding, esponsible, idealistic, and helpful"(3), moe so than those that ae not explicitly satisfield o happy with thei wok. Table V also suggests they might be highe on the Realistic and Entepising scales - the fome eflecting pagmatic, concete oientation, the latte eflecting entepeneuial oientation, with aggessiveness and selfconfidence as pedominant and valued taits. Table V pesents data analogous to that in Table V fo the B scales. The Bl scales eflect an oientation towad the nominal subjects. Satisfied phamacists diffe fom those who wee not on thee scales: Medical Science, Religious Activities, and Sales, These esults indicate that the moe satisfied phamacists show a geate inteest in medical science, eligion and sales. The data also suggest that satisfied phamacists ae disinteested in agicultue, that social sevice is a positive goal and that mechandising is of inteest. The last finding is consistent with the sales oientation of satisfied phamacists, and the tendency towads social sevice is consistent with the Social GOT scale. Howeve, it is cuious that the Medical Sevices scale does not demonstate a diffeence. t is possible that some o all of the diffeences between the moe and less satisfied goups may have been mediated by sex and maital status. n ode to investigate this possibility, a thee-way coss-classification multivaiate analysis of vaiance(6) was pefomed with satisfaction, maital status, and sex as the coss-classifications, With the GOT scales as dependent vaiables none of the inteaction tems was significant. Hence, diffee~ces between satisfied and unsatisfied phamacists on the six GOT scales wee not dependent on maital status o sex. Satisfaction emained a significant facto in the Social and Entepising ~cales, but not in the Realistic scale (P < 0.005) a~te contolhng f~ sex. and maital status. Satisfied phamac~sts sc?ed 6.2 pomts highe on the Social scale and 4.4 points htghe m the Entepising scale. Thee was a main effect fo sex (P < 0.001) on two GOT Table. V. Diffeences between satisfied and unsatisfied phamacists on Geneal Occupational Theme scales Scale name Realistic nvestigative Atistic Social Entepising Conventional p < Mean+ SD 52.5 ± ± ± ± ± ± 9.28 bp < Diffeence b scales: males wee 5.0 points highe on the Realistic scale and females wee 4.8 points highe on the Atistic scale. Maital status was not a facto in any of the scales. When the same multivaiate analysis was applied to the Basic nteests scales (B), the main effects fo satisfaction and sex wee significant (P < 0.001, fo both), but not fo maiage. No significant inteactions wee obseved, again suppoting an additive model. Significantly highe (P < 0.05) scoes fo satisfied phamacists wee found on the Medical Science (3.5), Social Sevice (4.4), Religious Activities (3.9), and Mechandising (3.9) scales- but not Sales. This coesponds closely to what was found in the one-way analysis of vaiance, with the exceptions that Agicultue and Sales did not emege as significant when contolled fo sex and maiage. Males and females diffeed on Adventue (males 6.8 points highe), Militay (males 5.2 points highe), Medical Sevice (males 13.8 points highe), Music/Dama (females 5.0 points highe), At (females 7.0 points highe), Witing (females 5.9 points highe), Athletics (males 5.7 points highe), Domestic Ats (females 11.4 points highe), Public Speaking (males 4.1 points highe), Sales (males 4.9 points highe), and Business Management (males 4.0 points highe). Table V. Diffeences between satisfied and unsatis fied phamacists on the Basic nteest scales Scale name Mean± SD Diffeence Agicultue Natue Adventue Militay activities Mechanical activities Science Mathematics Medical science Medical sevices Music/damatics At Witing Teaching Social sevice Athletics Domestic ats Religious activities Public speaking Law/politics Mechandising Sales 51.2 ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± ± 9.09 Business management 50.6 ± 9.52 Office pactice a p <0.05; b p <0.01; c p <0.005; d p < a d b c b 2.8 c

5 SON. ~~~:: scwe '"'ults imply that.ati,fied phannaci'ts ae entepising and gegaious p~ople. The B scales show them to be mecantile, but also ehgwus and sevice-oiented, with a bent fo medical science. Although thee might have been some esponse bias in that the willingness to coopeate could be elated to the Social and Social Sevice scales, these biases would be in the opposite diection of the changes ove time seen in the sample. That is, the population would be less social- and sevice-oiented than ou sample, hence less than the efeence sample fo both male and female phamacists in Of couse, if a simila bias is found in both satisfied and dissatisfied espondents, such a bias would not affect the conclusions about the diffeences. Suely, a desie to help people motivates some people to go into phamacy and this may be thought of as equiing a oneto-one elationship. The phamacist has to like people and be gegaious to have a successful pactice. n the past, we may have seen a self-selection pocess of socially oiented, gegaious pesons of a consevative bent going into the field of community phamacy pactice. One could have his own stoe with a minimum of investment and be an entepeneu. Community pactice phamacies aely failed so vey little elative isk was peceived. Today, meeting the educational equiements of the pofession demands that as the socially inteactive aspects of phamacy become moe emphasized, so the cuiculum must evolve to encompass these skills. n this way, phamacists may hold thei position as pactitiones of the healing at, as much as they ae now entepising, community-minded mechants. Bodie, et al. (7), see five oles fo phamacists: (i) as a manage of esouces, (ii) as an educato, (iii) as a consultant, (iv) in a health maintenance ole fo the chonically ill, and (v) in a pimay-cae ole. This last has become moe fomalized than in the past, and the last thee especially demand a clinical- o patient -oientation(?). That the pacti"tiones of phamacy with taits which suppol these last thee oles ae moe satisfied as a goup has been shown by the pesent study. t has also shown that in the past phamacists wee moe eady to assume these oles than the population at lage, although this is no longe tue. Theefoe, t may be necessay to moe stongly emphasize them when enc~uaging young people to go into the pofession.. Fmally, the implication that the selection citeia fo admission to phamacy schools ought to include consideation of the applicant's ability to elate to and communicate with fellow health pofessionals, patients, and othe clients is dea. Such sceening might be eithe by administation of questionnaies o by pesonal inteview. n light of the slight changes necessay m pesent admissions pocedues the inclusion of patient-oiented factos in admissions po~edues seems waanted. Hopefully, this will evese the tend towad less socially-oiented phamacists. Am. 1. Pham. Educ., 43, 94-97(1979); eceived 1/9/79, accepted 4/13/79. Refeences () Phamacists fo the Futue: A Repot of the Study Commission on Phamacy, Health Administation Pess, Ann Abo M (1975). ~ (2) Rowland, C.R. and Wetheime, A.., A Patient-Oiented Phamacy Cuiculum: An Expeiment in Education, Univesity of Minnesota Minneapolis MN (1975). ' (3) Campbell, D.P., Stong Vocational nteest Blank: Manual fo the Stong-Campbell nteest nventoy, Stanfod Univesity Pess, Stanfod CA (1974). (4) Nie, N.H., Hull, C.H., Jenkins, J.G., Steinbenne, K. and Bent, D.H., Statistical Package fo the Social Sciences, 2nd ed., McGaw Hill, New Yok NY (1977). (5) Games, P.A.,Am. Educ. Res. J., 8, 531(1971). (6) Moison, D.P., Multivaiate Statistical Methods, 2nd ed., McGaw Hill, New Yok NY (1976). (7) Bodie, D.C., Knoben, J.E. and Wetheime, A.l., Am. J. Pham. Educ., 37, 107(1973). 97