Meanwhile groups of further problems have been definitely organized, and preliminary steps taken toward their solution. The formulation of systematic guides to self-analysis and introspection and the study of the reliability to be placed in the individual's estimates of his own characteristics are making definite and interesting progress. The examination of the time-honored "recommendation" and the estimates of associates and friends, and the investigation of the accuracy of such judgments as are based on these testimonials, on letters of application, on the school records, etc., have already thrown long-desired illumination on several aspects of vocational psychology. The effort to base the vocational endeavors of women on the data of exact inquiry, rather than on the maintenance of primitive taboos and domestic and literary traditions, has played its own valuable part in one of the most vital economic adjustments of our age.
The very fact that a systematic presentation of the problems and methods of vocational psychology is possible signifies an enormous advance beyond the very recent stage in which all vocations were mysteries, all choices a serious form of gambling, and all employment confessedly a matter of impressionistic prejudice. To those who become familiar not only with the program of this new branch of applied science, but as well with the outstanding definite and positive contributions which that program has already yielded, the words of a constructive pioneer in this branch of scientific inquiry seem to be already becoming a statement of fact, rather than the mere expression of a hope. "The nineteenth century witnessed an extraordinary increase in our knowledge of the material world, and in our power to make it subservient to our ends; the twentieth century will probably witness a corresponding increase in our knowledge of human nature, and in our power to use it for our welfare."
APPENDIX
CLASSIFIED BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR VOCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY
1. Motives of Vocational Psychology
Bloomfield, M.: The Vocational Guidance of Youth
—— Readings in Vocational Guidance
Davis, J. B.: Moral and Vocational Guidance Hollingworth, H. L.: Vocational Psychology