The home economist's role as perceived by trainers and employers of home ecomomists

Abstract

This research was designed to study and compare the perceptions of three groups regarding the actual performance of the role of today's home economist, and the way it ideally should be performed. To accomplish this, a questionnaire listing 30 possible role functions for home economists was mailed to 200 secondary homemaking teachers, 200 Home Economists in Business, and 200 College or University home economics professors. The homemaking teachers and the Home Economists in Business were asked to request that their principal or employer respond to the questionnaire, and the professors were asked to complete it themselves. Sixty-eight principals, 73 employers, and 87 professors returned usable questionnaires. Means for the ratings given each function on the questionnaire were computed and rank-ordered, and significance of difference was determined by analysis of variance. Statistically significant differences of opinion were found within all three groups, and between all three groups. The greatest within-group difference was found for the home economics professors, indicating dissatisfaction with the role they see their graduates stepping into. Public school principals and business-industry employers were more satisfied with the role of home economists, although doubtful of some of the functions. Between-group statistics indicated significant difference of opinion between home economics professors versus public school principals, home economics professors versus business-industry employers, and public school principals versus business-industry employers. Of the items representing significant disagreement, the professors generally rated ideal functions higher than principals or employers, with the principals holding high rating means for the actual scale. Greater agreement existed between professors and employers than between professors and principals. Public school principals and business-industry employers disagreed significantly about 10 role functions that ideally should get more attention from home economists, and 10 that actually claim a home economist's effort. Most of the 10 items on the actual scale were the same for the ideal scale, indicating similar viewpoints for these two groups.