College and Research Libraries HOWARD CLAYTON Femininity and Job Satisfaction Among Male Library Students at One Midwestern University Male library science students at one midwestern university were found to have mean scores on the femininity scale of the California Psycho- logical Inventory that were significantly greater than norms estab- lished by unselected samples of American men. Analysis of data also indicated that approximately one-third of the men participating in this investigation had been dissatisfied with a full-time fob, or occupa- tion, prior to entering library school. A statistically significant inverse correlation was found to exist between the amount of satisfaction these men experienced in such work and their score on the C.P.I. femininity scale. INTRODUCI'ION pSYCHOLOGISTS AND GUIDANCE WORKERS generally agree that various occupations attract certain personalities to their ranks. Indeed this circumstance is so common that even the most untrained observer comes to associate given char- acteristics with such groups as car sales- men, research scientists, airline ·hostesses, and female bookkeepers. This being the case, should not librarians as an occupa- tional class also manifest recognizable characteristics? Various studies have shown that the mean age of library science students ranges from the late twenties to the ear- ly thirties. 1 This would indicate that these people are older than the average age of students who have not yet gained experience in their first choice of occu- pation, a circumstance that probably oc- curs because most people who enter li- brarianship do so only after they have Dr. Clayton is Professor, School of Li- brary Science, University of Oklahoma. 388 I worked in some other field, usually teaching. Bryan, for example, found that two out of every five library stu- dents in her study had worked for at least one year in another area, and of this number, more than half had ex- perience in teaching, with business, writing, and various intellectually re- lated fields some distance behind. 2 A persistent question among investiga- tors is why these people abandon their first choice of occupation and, at a fair- ly advanced age, move to an entirely new field where they will have to make a substantial outlay in time and money just to acquire the necessary prepara- tion. The importance of this question is heightened by the fact that librarian- ship typically offers neither greater re- muneration nor higher status than the original occupation of these people. In such a context, this investigation at- tempted to determine whether distinc- tive personality characteristics-identi- fiable through statistical measurement- could be found among students of li- brary science who were enrolled at a rna- jor midwestern university during the summer session of 1967. METHOD Data for this study were gathered by means of the California Psychological Inventory and a specially designed ques- tionnaire. The participants were all 150 full-time library students enrolled at the University of Oklahoma during the 1967 summer session. Because the entire library school faculty made class time available for administering the C.P.I., each student was able to complete both the Inventory and the questionnaire with a minimum of personal inconve- nience. While a procedure of this kind may suggest a captive audience, any such counteraction was hopefully mitigated by specifically asking the respondents not to identify their answer sheets in any way. Upon completing both instru- ments, each student merely placed all materials in a sealed, unmarked enve- lope and anonymously handed in the packet. The C.P.I. is a standardized paper- and-pencil test that concentrates on con- structive achievement and positive as- pects of interpersonal behavior. Be- cause this investigation did not concern itself with weaknesses or defects in per- sonalities, and because the C.P.I. at- tempts to provide insight into the growth and spontaneity of the subjects examined, it was felt that this particu- lar inventory would be especially appro- priate for a survey of this kind. Obvi- ously, a number of limitations are ines- capable when using standardized tests and statistical measuring tools; more- over, it is recognized that these data are indicative of only one group of stu- dents in one summer session, and for this reason there is no intention to pro- ject these findings to a larger area or to claim that the results are valid for all students in all library schools. While eighteen personality variables Femininity and ] ob Satisfaction I 389 are measured by the C.P.I., scores for men and women are always computed separately and discussed as unrelated groups. Regrettably, space limitations preclude a consideration of both sexes here, and as a result this article must concern itself only with the 35 males who participated in the investigation. Because this may at first seem like quite a small sample, it should be pointed out that ( 1) the 115 women subjects gen- erated data that was quite similar to that of the men, and ( 2) persons who wish to examine the complete study can obtain a copy of the original report by writing to ERIC Document Reproduc- tion Service, N.C.R. Company, 4936 Fairmont Avenue, Bethesda, Maryland 20014. ANALYSIS OF DATA In general, biographical data concern- ing these 35 male library students paral- leled that of previous investigations. Information from the questionnaire, for example, revealed an average age of approximately thirty-two years, with 25 men already past the age of twenty-six. In addition, at least two-thirds of these students had been employed on a full- time basis before entering library school, none had worked in a library, and eleven of the 35 had teaching ex- perience prior to this study. Against this background, Figure 1, presents a profile depicting mean scores generated by the 35 male students on each of the C.P.I.'s eighteen personality scales. These mean scores are connected by dotted lines in such a way that by following the contour of the profile one can easily see how the overall elevation is below that of a composite profile which was derived by computing the means of fourteen adult occupational groups listed in the C.P.I. manual.3 The asterisks accompanying the actual scores (beneath the figure) indicate that thirteen of the librarians' eighteen means are so far below those of the FIGURE 1. Composite Profil es Generated from Mean Scores of 35 Male L ib rary Students and 14 Occup ational Groups as Presented in CPI Manual Do c. Sy Sp Sa w~ R• So Sc To Gi C"' Ac •• Py ,. I MALE NORMS I ii -i------ ----.:,,-- ----~ f.~----- ---- ~------ -~4-' ______ ; .. ~ _ __ I -;:.. I I -to -·· _,. 10 -lO ~ : ~w--- I -40 d .::so -so _, . -so ·•~ r- - ---- ----=':.='--;4' -----~- =----- =4, ~--=---- ~ -- :50 ·~~-~------=~ TO £ -40 -: - ~~ - - ' -- z' r.m_· .. ·· .. - -- -lO ~i - 3' - t - ,, - fu .:4~ - )0 1& -25 " - r- ;" - {$] - - - ' - ,, - - )0 -40 - __ -_ ·-~·"'.·.~ .. '.- : .: 40 = .~ - - 4' ~ -:-- - - - ~. - ill -35 = -;25 - 1- :--:--: I - - -20- 60 ...'30-· : ----~ ,' ~ ......... -40 ~t - -40 .:,5 - ' -:w""':;~.~~~........... ; , ---........... ~~ ,, '"'- 'i!{ - - -25 6 ~, , ._,. - m - ,.,_, --... •lO -u.'-35 -20\ ~..,. ............. : :..,...-:-!, : / !~ :,' -:'",-~.}·• ---,- , ·- - - "M-- ! .tlO-;i~-7"--=~ .... ! ! g----- - ... i 712-•ll -,- -•., ~ , • I - I 10 - -15 ~zo -:lO = ~" '- ~--~ -~25 ~~0-=~; ____ j ::__.~~-~" ~ : : ___ 40 - = ---15 - 15 _ h 25 )() - - - I - - , - -to -•• ~.. ~J ~ ~ ;•• -•• ~oo J :•• - - ~ ~ -oo • -i------..:..::;_ _ _ ___ -=-.::o. ~ •.. :···- --- -- it.·.· ... --- - -lO M-- -- 30 - ~t - 20 -; 25 - 15 - } - - 10 - w - 5 - '' -•o - IO ~ - : - s -20 ,, : : - I - - ~ .. ~-,- ~·: ~: ~~·· H~~::-r: -·: ~. n~~· tl ~. -· -· :· ---- ,_____ '--------t -0 10 - • - 0 ~ •• -to I ~ ~·_; .. ___:_~ -~~- -··l ~ . ~ 0 ~··~--------- 90 80 70 60 ... ! 0 .X ~ 50 0 .., II: ~ ~ 40 30 20 10 0 -)() -2' -25 90 50 0 Do Ca Sy Sp ~ Wb Re So Sc To Gi C"' Ac Ai le Py Manual D ata 30 21° 26° 37° 22 38° 32° 36° 30° 24° 19 26° 29° 21 4 1° 13° 10 Library St. 28 20 24 35 22 36 29 34 27 22 17 24 27 20 39 11 9 Male Norms w CD 0 --.......__ n c ~ ~ ~ G- ~ ~ c., ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~- ~ ~ "' ~ ;; ~ ~-::1 ~ 0.. 0 c., A. X' ~ 0 c g, c ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 1--1 co d composite that such differences probably did not happen by chance. On the basis of this information, therefore, it would appear that these 35 male library stu- dents are not only lower than the com- posite on the first six scales (poise, as- cendancy, and self-assurance), but also on the second set (socialization, maturi- ty, and responsibility), and on the third set of scales as well (general orienta- tion toward achievement and intellec- tual efficiency). Accordingly, it is only on the final scale (femininity) of the last set (interest modes) that these 35 li- brary students score above the compos- ite. While such comparisons always make for lively conversation, one must be careful about reading too much into findings of this nature. In the first place, the author of the C .P.I., Dr. Har- rison Gough, University of California, advises that composites which are gen- erated from scores in the Inventory's manual can not be considered a national sample and should therefore not be re- garded as norms. In addition, the means for these 35 library students, while con- sistently below the composite, still may not indicate serious deficiencies in any of the variables measured, for in no case do these group scores go as low as the first standard deviation below the mean-a point indicated on the profile sheet by a standard score of 40 and by the first horizontal line below the mid- point of 50. Yet despite such precau- tions in interpretation, a number of stat- isticians would contend it is significant that these library students did score be- low the composite on seventeen out of eighteen scales, for such an event could rarely happen by chance. Thus it would appear that as a group these library stu- dents are somewhat deficient, but not abnormally so, on seventeen of the eighteen characteristics which the C.P.I. is able to measure. Another way of studying the person- ality structure of these 35 students is to Femininity and Job Sat·isfaction I 391 determine how they differ from the way most persons answer each question in the Inventory. This can be done through an item analysis of all 480 questions in the C.P.I., a technique that will tell which items were answered true by library students more often than is normally expected, and which points were ' answered false more often than usual. In analyzing test questions in such a manner, one must first know the percentage of "true" responses which can be expected on each item from unselected samples. After this, it is necessary to select a cutoff point so that all items which exceed this point can then be separated for study. The author of the Inventory has established such percentages, and for this investiga- tion a cutoff point of 25 percent above these norms was arbitrarily established. Therefore, if established norms indicat- ed that 40 percent of all unselected sam- ples answered a given question true, that Inventory item had to be answered by at least 65 percent of the library stu- dents before it could be used in this in- vestigation. On the basis of such a de- termination, the points listed in Table 1 were identified. For clarity, the actual percentage of librarians answering true, plus the percentage of expected affirma- tive answers, are included in the brack- ets. Equally pertinent are those questions that 25 percent fewer library students answered true. In the same manner as before, Table 2 shows the question number as it appeared in the Inventory, the percentage of male students who marked it true, and the percentage of true answers that should be expected on the basis of established norms. FEMININITY AMONG MALE LIBRARIANS Using such information as back- ground for understanding the entire sample, attention should now be direct- ed to those data which resulted in the 392/ College & Research Libraries • November 1970 Question TABLE 1 CPI QuESTIONS THAT WERE ANSWERED AFFIRMATIVELY BY MALE LIBRARY STUDENTS MORE FREQUENTLY THAN BY UNSELECTED SAMPLES Number Text of the Question 122 I like poetry. 124 I am likely not to speak to people until they speak to me. 140 I enjoy hearing lectures on world affairs. 204 I like to plan a home study schedule and then follow it. 207 Sometimes at elections I vote for men about whom I know very little. 217 I think I would like the work of a librarian. 222 I would like to belong to a discussion and study club. 246 I like to plan out my activities in advance. 268 At times I have been very anxious to get away from my family. 285 I refuse to play some games because I am not good at them. 396 I sometimes wanted to run away from home. TABLE 2 CPI QUESTIONS THAT WERE ANSWERED AFFIRMATIVELY BY MALE LIBRARY STUDENTS LESS FREQUENTLY THAN BY UNSELECTED SAMPLES Librarian Norm P ercent Percent 80 41 34 6 91 60 68 34 80 52 97 13 77 42 88 22 80 55 68 33 68 44 Question Librarian Norm Number Text of the Question Percent Percent 18 A person who doesn't vote is not a good citizen. 37 66 19 I think I would like the work of a building contractor. 14 44 41 For most questions there is just one right answer, once a person is able to get all the facts. 26 56 82 I think I would like the work of a garage mechanic. 11 37 155 A person should adapt his ideas and his behavior to the group that happens to be with him at the time. 37 62 189 In school my marks in deportment were quite regularly bad. 6 34 241 The man who provides temptation by leaving valuable property un- protected is about as much to blame for its theft as the one who steals it. 34 59 249 I like mechanics magazines. 34 72 255 Only a fool would try to change our American way of life. 28 64 263 Lawbreakers are almost always caught and punished. 37 63 367 My home life was always very pleasant. 37 62 382 Success is a matter of will power. 40 66 416 I don't think I'm quite as happy as others seem to be. 17 42 . femininity score shown above in Figure 1. In discussing this scale, one must be careful to differentiate between the pop- ular connotation of the word "femi- ninity" and its meaning in the C.P.I. The underlying purpose of the entire scale is to act as a continuum which runs from low scores that signify such traits as initiative, capacity for making decisions, and assertiveness, to high scores which characterize persons of a conserving, maintaining, and restoring nature. In other words, one end of the femininity continuum is indicative of action and change while the opposite end symbolizes stability and nurturance. Perhaps the most important point inso- far as the layman is concerned is that sexual normality is ordinarily expected of the subject under study, regardless of his score on this particular scale. With this introduction, attention should be directed to Table 3. In this tabulation, data from 6,419 American males is presented which, in showing norms for the femininity scale, indi- cates the mean is approximately 16.26, with a standard deviation of 3.63. In contrast to these data is the fact that li- brary students have a mean of 18.17, and a standard deviation of 2.95. When put to a "t" test, such a difference proves to be statistically significant at the .01 level of probability, all of which indi- cates that in comparison to the norm, this group of library students tends to- ward that end of the scale which is known for gentleness and appreciative- ness, rather than ambition, activity, and innovation. Such tendencies become even more pronounced when one observes that in Table 3 only two library students have raw scores (viz., 12 and 13) that would be plotted near the first negative stan- dard deviation in Figure 1. As pointed out earlier, standard deviations are breaking points where fairly clear indi- cations of a characteristic become ap- parent. Therefore, of the 35 library students in this study, only one would seem to be a candidate for such adjec- tives as manipulative, opportunistic, hardheaded, impatient, and oriented to- ward action and change; only one other student is even close to the point where he could be described in similar terms. On the other hand, there are at least twelve male library students in Table 3 who are one standard deviation or more above the mean of the profile chart in Figure 1. Such a circumstance is of ut- most importance for it means that these scores would form a rather elevated dis- tribution if plotted on a profile sheet similar to that found in Figure 1. If this distribution were normally scattered around a standard score of 50, as are the American male norms, there would be 23.8 scores within the first standard de- viation, and 5.6 scores both above and below the first standard deviation. With p < 01, a goodness of fit test confirmed that there are indeed too many scores Femininity and I ob Satisfaction I 393 above the first standard deviation, or in that range where characteristics associ- ated with high scores on femininity be- gin to be pronounced. SATISFACTION ScALE As noted earlier, the literature con- sistently shows that a high percentage of library students have typically worked at some other occupation before entering the field of librarianship. Be- cause most people do not wait until they are well into their adult years before en- tering a profession which requires a TABLE 3 DisTRIBUTION oF ScoREs oN FEMININITY ScALE COMPARING MALE LIBRARY STUDENTS TO AN UNSELECTED SAMPLE OF AMERICAN MEN Male Library Students American Male Nonns N:35 N = 6,419 Femininity Number Femininity Number Score of Men Score of Men 33 1 29 3 28 6 27 12 26 21 25 1 25 45 23 1 24 65 22 2 23 104 22 184 21 3 21 304 20 5 20 437 19 6 19 544 18 4 .. .. X 18 672 17 3 17 657 16 2 X . ... 16 694 15 3 15 667 14 3 14 574 13 1 13 450 12 353 12 1 11 245 10 183 9 108 8 59 7 18 6 6 5 7 X=18.171 S.D. = 2.95 Median = 18.5 Mode= 19 X= 16.265 S.D.= 3.63 Median= 16 Mode= 16 394 I College & Research Libraries • November 1970 substantial outlay of time and money just to acquire minimum credentials, important factors must be at work which cause a person to desire training in library science. An interesting specu- lation might be made on the amount of satisfaction a person realized from his previous work, for surely most people stay with the same general kind of work if it is giving them substantial satisfac- tion. In an attempt to determine wheth- er past job satisfaction is in any way as- sociated with scores which these library students generated on various C.P.I. scales, each participant was asked to rate the amount of satisfaction he derived from whatever type of work he was do- ing before entering library school. In making these self-ratings, the student mining job satisfaction, for it is a mat- ter of interpretation as to how much satisfaction and dissatisfaction an em- ployee is reflecting when he rates him- self at any given number. But if it is assumed that such use of the standard deviation is a valid device for determining occupational satisfac- tion, some thought-provoking findings will quickly come to light. Figure 2, for example, presents mean profiles for the two groups of men who occupy these high and low satisfaction categories, and from this graph it is clear that dis- satisfied students have lower elevations on all C.P.I. scales except femininity. By the use of "t" tests, significant dif- ferences between these scores are appar- ent on at least seven of the Inventory's TABLE 4 DISTRIBUTION OF SELF-RANKINGS INDICATIVE OF SATISFACTION WHICH 35 MALE STUDENTS REALIZED FROM FuLL-TIME WoRK PRIOR TO ENTERING LIBRARY ScHooL Unsatisfying 2 3 Number of Students 1 4 merely placed a check mark on a 10- point rating scale that represented a continuum running from unsatisfying to highly satisfying. Table 4 shows how these 35 library students checked this Satisfaction rating scale. The mean score on these ratings was 6.74, with a standard deviation of 2.29; accordingly, only "9" and "10" on the scale would mathematically show a high level of satisfaction, and ratings "1" through "4" would be considered unsatisfying. On this basis, Table 4 in- dicates that only ten of the 35 men could be considered as truly happy with their former work, while six students would have to be characterized as occu- pationally dissatisfied. Quite obviously this is a questionable method of deter- 4 5 6 1 5 3 7 8 6 5 Hi ghly Satisfying 9 10 7 3 eighteen scales. Moreover, as was the case in Figure 1, the direction of these differences is also important, for in terms of statistical probability they could hardly have occurred on seven- teen out of eighteen scales simply by chance. But perhaps the most important finding pertaining to these six men is that they accumulated a mean score of 20.3 on the femininity scale, a score that places the entire group slightly above the first standard deviation. In light of this circumstance, the five men who rated themselves at "5" on the Satisfac- tion scale were added to this subsam- ple, and upon completing the necessary computations it was seen that this new group of eleven students generated a femininity score of 20.1, or still beyond the profile's first standard deviation. ! 0 JC "! 0 ., c .! vt FIGURE 2. Composite Profiles Generated from Mean Scores of Male Library Students with High and Low Self-Ratings on Satisfaction Scale 90 80 70 10 50 40 30 20 10 0 Do Cs Sy Sp ~ Wb Re So Sc To Gi Cm Ac Ai le P F F ~----=-----=-----~ MALE NORMS 1 r_!_---~---~ .. ~ ~~-= ---- - ,_;_\<.~ I - -k-~· = = ~=- fj ::40 I. J -2o - 20 - - 40 - 30 ~ ----::. 30---! ••. \ - ~ .. ~.. ~.. ;---~30 = I -~~- - 3~ 4~ - 2~ [ :;;-: - - : •• ~30 I L :-- ~,.b--~ -1 5-=~ - 25 • - : •5 : - 30 - I - -25 - I -15 -~~ ~ Tr. ~/=, ~·· ~~.. ~·· ~:: L. ~.. - ~-~~/I>?i ~/:= ~·~ .. - - -~ -35 -20" d - - e - b 7 - -~ 1 - _ • _ ._ • - =r-~-20 ... - ~~.~ - - - - • - w. _:--. 30 - - ~~ - - - 0 , *' -- ,_, I _,.,.,__ - v. ,_, - -W efti - - 15 ·~- - - - ,' " - J - --~. - - - :)1 - -·- ¥·· - ...... - - J#_ - " - 35 ft - • - -20 w -25 ...... •-- - {~ - -- - ···ao·••"X> - ' - t1 - ,--.., -= 25 - ., 15 W .... -15 -35 f - ----- ~ 5 - ---- ~~~%;"- - --- •• -,- -,-- --w~- --~----m_·----~ 5 -2o - ' +• - S~ - 30 - • • • - ' , W - M ~- ·fr ! = -= 20 - : '•' I - I - - 2 5 '!1 - - 15 - 10 ;y -20 w - -t----------l-=-5 ______ ---:.....:3:..::o'-~'l~2o ; 2~--~ ~ ~ : - ~-~~o--:30 r- 5------t- - IS -1 0 - - f;} - - - 5 -20 ' - - - a - ; 20 : 10 = ~-~~ : : -= ~0 - 10 I ~ ~ 5 = : rJl ~ -0 -, ---- __ -_ lo'---- ----- - "-- -- - 2o - - @r- - --- --- s -~'"· - 10 : - ~25 ~ : 15 : ~ 5 .: 0 ' : 5 : 2 1: - ~ - 15 - ~ - I : .: I~ :: 5 il - - - I - -- 5-- - __ __;:_____ - 11~.: ;o- : -= 0 - I : 10 : - -.:; J'-----"0 _ _ ___ --...o.-- ... - 10 - 20 \< - : ~~ 0 ~~ - i'll. - - 15 . N _______ -_lr_: __ ~--- _ - o ' _ 5 _I, ________ ~,. Wb Re So Sc To Gi Cm Ac Ai le Py Fx Fe - 4 5 .J ______ _ - 0 Sy Cs -10 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 ~ 20 10 0 Rank 9-10 Do 29 25 21 17 25 20 Sp 37~ 30 23~ 38~ 31 ~ 36 27 24~ 16 25~ 28 23~ 41 11 10 11 9 18 20 N =10 Rank 2- 4 19 32 24 33 23 17 15 22 24 16 37 N =6 Male Norms II' a ~ A. Q a. ~ II' n 0 ~ i ~. ~ ~. ~ ~. ~ ~ ~ ~ P.. ._ 0 ~ (/.) ~ ~ ~ ("') ~ ~. 0 ~ .......... VJ co c.n 396 I College & Research Libraries • November 1970 The satisfaction scale also proved use- ful when a correlation test was taken to discover if any association existed be- tween the self-ratings of the entire sam- ple and scores on the femininity scale. In this case, there was an inverse corre- lation, r = - .387, p < .05, between the ratings of all 35 students and their fem- ininity scores; while correlation does not mean cause and effect, such a finding does indicate that low self-raters on this satisfaction scale were more likely to be high scorers on femininity. At the same time femininity was found to be inversely associated with satisfaction, positive correlations were found between these self-ratings and the sociability, social presence, self-ac- ceptance, and responsibility scales. The exact coefficients on each of these tests were as follows: Sociability +.317 Social Presence +.287 Self-Acceptance +.316 Responsibility +.286 Femininity -.387 Although the entire contour of a pro- file must be analyzed if one is to appre- ciate the personality being studied, these five scales in combination do present a certain constellation of characteristics. In general, high scores on sociability, so- cial presence, self-acceptance, and re- sponsibility, when coupled to a low score on femininity, indicate a person who is enthusiastic, resourceful, outgo- ing in a self-confident yet dependable way, progressive in a planned manner, but impatient with those who are too re- flective. Conversely, low scores on the first four of these scales, together with a high score on femininity, indicate a person who is moderate, respectful, con- servative, who behaves in a conscien- tious way, but who is somewhat awk- ward and narrow in his interests. At this point it is well to remember from Table 3 that twelve of the 35 stu- dents, or virtually one in three, have femininity raw scores which-when plotted on a profile sheet-are above the first standard deviation. Interestingly enough, these twelve men have a mean self-rating on the satisfaction scale of 5.6, with a standard deviation of 2.59. In contrast, the twenty-two men of Ta- ble 3 who are inside the first standard deviation have a mean satisfaction rat- ing of 7.3, with a standard deviation of 1.82. In a «t" test for significance, this mean of 7.3 proved to be bigger than 5.6 with p < .025. Such a finding sup- lies further evidence that it is from this disproportionately large number of high scores on femininity that one is most likely to locate those who were dis- satisfied with what they were doing be- fore entering library school. SuMMARY AND CoNCLUSIONS In comparing a sample of 35 male li- brary students to a composite profile generated from data in the C.P.I. man- · ual, it was found that the students had lower mean scores on all of the Inven- tory's eighteen scales except femininity. Upon further investigation, it became clear that the students' higher score on femininity was also greater than the scale's established norm; moreover, ad- ditional inspection showed that only one library student was as much as a single standard deviation below this norm, while twelve students were at least one standard deviation above such a point. Equally important were the data gen- erated from a 10-point satisfaction scale. In this case, the entire sample of 35 male library students gave themselves a mean rating of 6. 7 4 on a scale in which «1" was considered unsatisfying and cc10" was denoted as highly satisfy- ing. Testing revealed that the six most dissatisfied students not only had a low- er group C.P.I. profile than the highly satisfied raters, but it also showed that on the femininity scale these six dissat- isfied students had a mean score that was above the first standard deviation on the profile sheet. Then, as a matter of inter- est, those five students who rated them- selves on the satisfaction scale at "5" were added to the six males who rated themselves no higher than "4." When this was done, the new total of eleven students produced a mean femininity score of 20.1, a score that was still above the first standard deviation on the pro- file sheet. The twelve students who were above the profile's first standard deviation on femininity were found to have a mean satisfaction rating of 5.6. Conversely, those 22 students who were inside the first standard deviation had a mean self- rating of 7.3. By means of a ''t', test, this difference proved to be statistically significant with p < .025. Finally, a sta- tistically significant inverse correlation was found between all 35 satisfaction ratings and separate scores on the fem- ininity scale, while a positive correlation was found between the satisfaction rat- ings and the sociability, social presence, self-acceptance, and responsibility scales. Briefly stated, then, there were twelve students-or one out of every three in this investigation-who were above av- erage on femininity and who together had a mean satisfaction rating of 5.6. By the same token, there were six stu- dents who were mathematically below average on satisfaction and five more students who, on a 10-point scale, rated themselves no higher than "5." Togeth- er, these eleven men had a femininity score of 20.1, a score that placed them above the first standard deviation on the C.P.I. profile sheet. From this it seems clear that those highest on femininity were the ones who were most dissatis- fied with former work. In conclusion, a correlation test indicated that an as- sociation did exist between high scores on femininity and low ratings on satis- faction. As is the case with all statistical stud- ies in the behavioral sciences, results such as those reported here often raise Femininity and ]ob Satisfaction I 391 more questions than they answer. No one knows, for example, whether high scorers on the C.P.I.,s femininity scale make good, bad, or average librarians. Moreover, no one knows whether adult men who were dissatisfied with former work will be satisfied or more dissatis- fied as librarians. Nor does anyone know whether the number of dissatisfied men found in this study is out of propor- tion to either the population as a whole or to what one would find in any inves- tigation of various occupations. In fact, this entire field is such an unexplored area that no one even knows what type of personality makes the best librarian. What these findings do indicate is that this sample of library students has a higher mean score on the C.P.I.,s fem- ininity scale than American men as a whole. Related to such a finding is the fact that high scorers on the C.P.I.,s femininity scale typically manifest characteristics that can be described as patient, sympathetic, and appreciative. In the absence of evidence, of course, one might easily make a case that these are the very traits which people most want to find in library workers; certain- ly it is doubtful if many persons want to be greeted in a library by profession- al personnel who manifest the antithe- ses of such characteristics. But even if this is granted, there is still room for concern about the num- ber of low profiles that seems to be as- sociated with lack of job satisfaction. Because these men as a group were simi- lar in several respects to samples report- ed in earlier studies, the temptation is to generalize on the bases of these dis- crete pieces of information and say that available evidence indicates that librari- ans tend to be refugees from certain identifiable occupations, usually profes- sions which are strongly competitive (e.g., music, literary, and artistic) or which are known to have considerable stress and tension (e.g., teaching). How- ever, in searching for a new occupation, 398 I College & Research Libraries • November 1970 it seems that these people still want to be in a line of work that is basically in- tellectual and education-oriented. The present study is intended only as a pilot project which needs to be repli- cated in many different settings. If this could be done, the results might provide background for a nationwide survey which could determine whether person- ality factors have anything to do with a person becoming dissatisfied in one line of work and subsequently turning to librarianship. In addition, separate studies could be undertaken to deter- mine what type of person makes a suc- cessful librarian, what type is actually entering the ranks of librarianship, and what, if anything, is needed to entice certain personalities into librarianship. At this point, some find it difficult to see how librarianship can ever become a well-established profession if a substan- tial proportion of its members do enter the field only after they become dissatis- fied with their first choice of occupa- tion. Many persons in higher education feel the academic library of today has a special need for imaginative people with innovative ideas. If there is any validity to the long -cherished sentiment that a library is central to education, then it seems self-evident that librarians must be as enterprising and ambitious as others who participate in the teach- ing-learning process. When considered in this context, the academic library of tomorrow will probably have to be staffed by personnel who manifest more aggressiveness and less nurturance than is exhibited by students in this investi- gation. A willingness to serve is impor- tant, and a kindly spirit is always appre- ciated, but conviction in what one is do- ing could be even more important; when matched to enthusiasm and re- sourcefulness, the result may be what academic librarianship is most in need of, namely, positive-minded persons who are goal-oriented and anxious for improvement. REFERENCES 1. Anita R. Schiller, Characteristics of Professional Personnel in College and Uni- versity Libraries, with the assistance of James W. Grimm and Margo C. Trumpeter, Research Series No. 16 (Washington, D.C.: Bureau of Research, U.S. Office of Educa- tion, 1969), p. 23. J. M. Whittock, "Study the Interests of the Female Students En- rolled in the School of Library Science,, Drexel Institute of Technology, as Measured by the Strong Vocational Interest Blank and the Kuder Preference Record" (Unpub- lished M.L.S. thesis, Drexel Institute of Technology, 1952). R. R. Douglas, "Per- sonality of the Librarian" (Unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Chicago, 1957), p. 56. 2. Alice Isabel Bryan, The Public Li- brarian; A Report of the Public Library In- quiry (New York: Columbia University Press, 1952) . 3. Occupational groups included in the composite profile are: salesmen, bank man- agers, business executives, correctional of- ficers, school superintendents, machine op- erators, psychiatric residents, practicing den- tists, architects, research scientists, psychol- ogy graduate students, medical school ap- plicants, social work graduate students, and military officers.