The Theory of Work Adjustment (TWA) was developed in the 1960s and 1970s to help individuals successfully adjust to work environments. TWA uses assessments of individuals' abilities, values, and personalities and matches them to the requirements and reinforcers of occupations. Instruments like the General Aptitude Test Battery and Minnesota Importance Questionnaire are used to assess individuals, while the Minnesota Job Description Questionnaire assesses occupations. Counselors can then help clients find suitable career matches. TWA can benefit those choosing careers, experiencing work issues, or retiring individuals seeking part-time work. It provides a framework for counselors to understand their own strengths and better assist diverse client needs and thinking styles.

1. Theory of Work
Adjustment
Jenny Dominguez
University of Saint Thomas
EDUC 5359

2. Development
 The Theory of Work Adjustment (TWA)
developed in two phases during the
1960s and 1970s.
 During the 1960s, Lloyd H. Lofquist and
Rene V. Dawis, University of Minnesota
psychologists, formulated a trait-and-
factor matching model and in
collaboration with David J. Weiss
developed instruments to measure the
major constructs introduced by the
theory (Eggerth & Tinsley, 2008).

3.  During the 1970s, the authors first
bridged the theoretical gap between
vocational needs and work values.
Integration of the structural and dynamic
aspects of the theory during the 1970s
transformed the TWA from a static trait-
and-factor model to a developmentally
oriented model that better describes the
ongoing interaction between individuals
and their work environments.

4.  Originally designed to meet the needs of
vocational rehabilitation clients, by
providing improved rehabilitation
services to vocationally challenged
clients (Sharf, 2010).
 TWA is a specific example of general
trait and factor theory in that it makes
use of clearly defined concepts and
follows an articulated theoretical
concept (Sharf, 2010).

5. Unlike many of the current career
theories, the theory of work adjustment
(TWA) relates to working a job
successfully once and occupation is
chosen. Work involves physical, social,
and psychological needs and helping
workers meet these needs as
successfully is as important as choosing
a career. TWA is instrumental to
employment counselors for helping
clients meet these needs (Renfro-
Mitchel, Burlew & Robert, 2009).

6. Theory of Work Adjustment
(TWA)
Dawis and Lofquist (1984) defined work
adjustment as a “continuous and
dynamic process by which a worker
seeks to achieve and maintain
correspondence with a work
environment” (p.237). This
correspondence is the reciprocal
process between the worker’s
satisfaction and the employer’s
satisfactoriness (Eggert, 2008).

7. Two major components to the prediction
of work adjustment:
 Satisfaction: being satisfied with the
work one does.
 Satisfactoriness: employer’s satisfaction
with the individual’s performance.
“Satisfaction is a key indicator of work
adjustment” state Lofquist and Dawis
(1984, p. 217).

8. Step 1: Assessing Abilities,
Values, Personality, and
Interests.
To assess abilities, Dawis and Lofquist
(1984) make use of the General Aptitude
Test Battery (GATB), developed by the
U.S. Department of Labor in 1982. It is
the most practical because of the
information it provides for counselors to
use in matching jobs with an individual’s
abilities and values (Sharf, 2010).

9. General Aptitude Test Battery
(GATB).
The GATB scales measure nine specific
abilities, it is widely used by employment
counseling agencies:
G – General learning ability
V – Verbal ability
N – Numerical ability
S – Spatial ability
P – Form perception
Q – Clerical ability
K – Eye/hand coordination
F – Finger dexterity
M – Manual dexterity

10. Minnesota Importance
Questionnaire (MIQ)
The MIQ (Rounds, Henley, Dawis,
Lofquist & Weiss, 1981) is a measure of
needs. The 20 need scales it
encompasses characterize work-related
concepts.
Using the Statistical technique of factor
analysis, Dawis and Lofquist (1984)
derived 6 values from the 20 needs.

11. MIQ: values and need scales
Values (6) Need Scale (20)
Achievement Ability utilization Achievement
Comfort Activity Independence
Variety Compensation
Security Working conditions
Status Advancement Recognition
Authority Social Status
Altruism Coworkers Moral values
Social service
Safety Company policies and practices
Human relations
Technical
Autonomy Creativity
Responsibility

12. Step 2: Measuring the
requirements and conditions of
occupations
 In addition to measuring individuals’
values and abilities, there are methods to
measure abilities and values needed for
many occupations.
 Work environments differ in the degree to
which they meet the needs and values of
an individual. To assess how much an
occupation reinforces the values of
individuals the Minnesota Job Description
Questionnaire (MJDQ) was developed
(MJDQ; Borgen, Weiss, Tinsley, Dawis &
Lofquist, 1968a).

13. MJDQ Need Scales:
 The MJDQ uses the same 20 needs
as the Minnesota Importance
Questionnaire. Thus the needs of an
individual are matched with reinforcers
provided by the job.
 Using information about value patterns
helps counselors to see how the
values of their clients match the
values that are met or reinforced by a
large number of occupations (Sharf,
2010).

14. Step 3: Matching Abilities, Values
and Reinforcers.
When matching values and abilities,
counselors have three tools available:
Minnesota Importance Questionnaire
(MIQ),
GATB mannual (US Dept. of Labor,
1982)
Minnesota Occupational Classification
System (MOCS).
All helpful in identifying occupations for
clients to explore further (Sharf, 2010).

15. Instruments Used In TWA
Assessment of Individuals Assessment of Occupations
Abilities Ability Patterns
General Aptitude Test Battery Occupational Ability Patterns
(GABT)
Values Value Patterns
Minnesota Importance Minnesota Job Description
Questionnaire (MIQ) Questionnaire (MJDQ)
Personality Styles Personality Styles
Matching Assessment of Individual Occupation
and
Minnesota Occupational System (MOCS)
Classification
Adjustment Styles (Instruments are Not yet developed)

16. Who could benefit by the use of
this theory?

17. Job Adjustment Counseling.
Theory of Work Adjustment is
applicable to adults:
 In the process of making career
choices.
 Those experiencing work adjustment
problems.
 Retirees who want to continue working
but need to explore career choices.

18. Retirement
Although retirement is
traditionally defined as the end
of a career and withdrawal
from the workforce, a
significant percentage of
retirees want or need to
continue working after
retirement (Harper & Shoffner,
2004).
In a survey by the American
Association of Retired Persons
(AARP) one third of the
retirees who responded
indicated that they would prefer
to work (AARP, 1993).

19. In addition to being
challenged by changing
capacities, some retirees
recognize that their career
development options
might be limited by social
attitudes toward aging.
(Harper & Shoffner,
2004).

20. TWA in Retirement
Counseling
 Dawis and Lofquist (1984) stated that a
primary objective in retirement counseling
is for the retiree to achieve a level of
individual-environment correspondence
during retirement that is similar to what the
retiree experienced before retirement.
 The counselor using TWA with a client who
is planning for retirement attempts to help
the client compare skills and abilities with
the requirements of the environment,
needs and values with reinforcers of the
environment and personal style with the
work environment style (Harper &
Shoffner, 2004).

21. Application to Women and
Culturally Diverse Populations
 Group differences have not been a
focus of TWA. Dawis and Lofquist
(1984) have focused on the large
differences within groups, rather than
the small differences that might exist
between groups.
 There are very few small differences
between men and women on the
achievement scale and some
differences on various MIQ needs.

22. Culturally diverse populations
(continued).
 TWA can be applied to discrimination
experienced by homosexual men and women
as well as heterosexual women.
 TWA predicts job satisfaction of lesbian, gay,
and bisexual individuals, despite the
discrimination that they may experience in
their workplace.
 Dawis (1994) states that “gender, ethnicity,
national origin, religion, age, sexual
orientation, and disability status are seen as
inaccurate and unreliable bases for
estimating the skills, abilities, needs, values,
personality style and adjustment style of a
particular person.”

23. Linear and Non-Linear clients
 Linear thinking clients could benefit
from the step-by-step process of
matching their own abilities, values
and reinforcers to those required of a
specific job.
 Non-linear clients could be guided in a
general direction of what jobs they are
a better match that will allow them to
explore different careers.

24. Counselor Issues
 Lofquist and Dawis (undated) believe
that it is necessary for the counselor to
identify basic abilities and reinforcers
within himself or herself and the client
so that effective counseling can take
place. A key characteristic for a
counselor is flexibility.
 They suggested that it is helpful for
counselors to see themselves, as well
as their clients, as environments.

25. How might identifying his/her
own abilities and reinforcers help
a counselor be more effective in
counseling clients?

26. References
Borgen, F.H., Weiss, D.J, Tinsley, H.E., Dawis, R.V. & Lofquist, L.H. (1968a)
Minnesota Job Description Questionnaire. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota,
Psychology Department, Vocational Psychology Research.
Dawis, R.V. (1994). The theory of work adjustment as a convergent theory. In M.L.
Savickas & R.W.Lent (Eds.), Convergence in career development theories (pp.33-
44). Palo Alto, CA: Consulting Psychologists Pres.
Dawis, R.V. and Lofquist, L.H. (1984) A psychological theory of work adjustment: An
individual-differences model and its applications. Minneapolis: University of
Minnesota.
Eggerth, D. E. (2008). From theory of work adjustment to person-environment
correspondence counseling: Vocational psychology as positive psychology
[Electronic Version]. Journal of Career Assessment, 16, 60-74.

27. References
Harper M.C. and Shoffner, M.F. (2004) Counseling for Continued
Career Development After Retirement: An Application of the Theory
of Work Adjustment. The Career Development Quarterly. Mar 2004
. Vol. 54.
Renfro-Mitchel, E.L., Burlew, L.D., and Robert, T. (2009) The
Interaction of Work Adjustment and Attachment Theory: Employment
Counseling Implications. Journal of Employment Counseling . Mar
2009. Vol 46.
Rounds, J.B., Henley, G.A., Dawis, R.V., Lofquist, L.H. & Weiss, D.J.
(1981) Manual for the Minnesota Importance Questionnaire.
Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota, Psychology Department,
Work Adjustment Project.
Sharf, R.S. (2010). Applying Career Development Theory to
Counseling. Fifth Edition. Brooks/Cole, Cengage Learning. University
of Delaware.
Tinsley, H. E. A., and Eggerth D. E. “Theory of Work Adjustment.”
Encyclopedia of Counseling. Ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE, 2008.
1656-58. SAGE Reference Online. Web. 7 Jun. 2012.