Computers in guidance

Abstract

Computers offer both a major opportunity and a possible threat to guidance practitioners. The opportunity is that they provide a powerful resource which potentially can improve both the quality of guidance provision and its accessibility to those who need it. The threat is that they may be used to mechanise the human interaction that has been considered central to guidance practice. This is, of course, merely one illustration of a much wider social dilemma. The impact of computer technology on the workplace has caused much of the destabilisation of work structures, from which the increased demand from guidance partly stems. It is thus ironic but also appropriate that in seeking to respond to this demand, guidance services should turn to harnessing the very technologies that are its cause. The challenge for such services, as for society as a whole, is to utilise such technologies in ways which supplement and extend human potential rather than acting to restrict or replace it. The history of computer-aided careers guidance systems can be divided into two periods (Harris-Bowlsbey, 1989). The first period, from 1965 to 1980, might be termed the demonstration and limited implementation period. It was characterised by the use of main-frame computers, which made it very expensive for the user to interact directly with the computer. A number of systems based on interactive usage were developed, demonstrating its potential: these notably included, in the UK, the Interactive Careers Guidance System (Butler and Dowsey, 1978; Watts, 1975). But the only systems that proved widely practicable in cost terms were based on batch processing: questionnaires were completed in the guidance location and sent to a computer centre where they were processed; print-outs were then despatched back to the guidance location. The static nature of this process and the delays it involved limited the appeal of such systems. The second period, starting around 1981, might be termed the diffusion and extensive implementation period. The advent of the microcomputer made interactive usage much more economical, and also made it much easier to develop and market limited software packages; its attractions grew as more powerful versions of the personal computer were developed. The result was a huge increase in the number of computer-aided guidance systems. Whereas in 1975176 there were only seven such systems in the UK (Watts, 1978), by 1990 there were 56 (Offer, 1990). At the same time, the use of these systems developed so that by the late 1980s it was difficult to find a guidance service in any sector which did not make use of one or more such system. The rapid growth of interest in the use of computers in guidance has been fuelled not only by the enterprise of some guidance practitioners and commercial software developers, but also by two other factors. One is the interest of policymakers, who have seen computers as a way of making cost savings or (more plausibly) of increasing the effectiveness of guidance services in a cost-effective way. The other is the recognition that clients - particularly younger ones - who are accustomed to making everyday use of computer technology in other areas of their lives will increasingly expect guidance services to harness such technology, and will regard services which fail to do so as outdated and lacking in credibility.