Leona E. Tyler - Work

Work

Tyler conduced several research and published many books and research papers on psychology. She focused on the construct of organized choices in the late 1950s. Her concerns about vocational interests led to a longitudinal study of the broader question of the directions of development that interests and personality take. A major research finding was that, as people thought about careers, dislikes and avoidances were more important than likes. This research led to the study of how choices organized peoples' lives. She developed the Choice Pattern Technique, that required people to indicate their construals of occupations and free-time activities. In 1962, she received the Fulbright scholarship to work at the University of Amsterdam. This allowed her to test her ideas and methods cross-culturally. Her research was extended to India and Australia and expanded to take in values, daily activities, and future time-perspectives in adolescents. Her work in the Choice Pattern Technique was included in The Work of the Counselor.

In 1947, she wrote The Psychology of Human Differences. She developed her own view of behavior. She began blending concepts of Carl Rogers, individual differences, and psychometrics, psychoanalytic theory, behaviorism, developmental stage theory, and existentialism. Her thinking shifted from behavioristic to cognitive during this time. In 1969, Tyler wrote The Work of the Counselor. From 1967 to 1968, she wrote the latest revision of Developmental Psychology with Florence Goodenough. She applied her theory of possibilities to the choice behavior of scientists in Thinking Creatively in 1983. This suggested perceptions of choices for scientific inquiry are distorted or limited by professional education and discipline based on conformity.