Holland's RIASEC Model
CareerPath is built on Holland's theory of vocational choice, which identifies six personality types that correspond to work environments: Realistic (R), Investigative (I), Artistic (A), Social (S), Enterprising (E), and Conventional (C). People thrive in careers that match their dominant types.
John Holland first published his theory in 1959 and refined it over decades (Holland, 1997). The model underpins the O*NET career database used by the U.S. Department of Labor and career centers worldwide. Our assessment maps your interests to these six dimensions to recommend careers where you're most likely to succeed and find satisfaction.
Holland, J. L. (1959). A theory of vocational choice. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 6(1), 35–45. Holland, J. L. (1997). Making vocational choices (3rd ed.). Psychological Assessment Resources.
Big Five Personality Model (OCEAN)
We also incorporate the Big Five personality model — the most widely validated framework in psychology. The five dimensions are Openness (curiosity, creativity), Conscientiousness (organization, diligence), Extraversion (sociability, assertiveness), Agreeableness (cooperation, empathy), and Neuroticism (emotional stability).
Costa and McCrae's work (1992) established the NEO-PI-R and made the Big Five the gold standard for personality assessment. Each dimension has clear career relevance: for example, high Conscientiousness predicts success in structured roles, while high Openness correlates with creative and analytical careers. Combining Big Five with RIASEC gives a fuller picture of who you are and where you'll thrive.
Costa, P. T., & McCrae, R. R. (1992). Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI-R) and NEO Five-Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI) professional manual. Psychological Assessment Resources.
How Our Scoring Works
CareerPath uses a multi-modal assessment with six different question types — from traditional interest ratings to situational judgment and self-description. This variety reduces bias and captures a more accurate profile than a single question format.
You can also choose our AI conversation mode: talk naturally with an AI career coach who asks follow-up questions and infers your RIASEC and personality scores from the conversation. The AI is trained to map your responses to the same scientific frameworks, so you get consistent results whether you click through the quiz or talk it out.
Scoring combines your responses across all question types (or from the AI conversation) into RIASEC and Big Five profiles. We then match you to careers using compatibility algorithms that weight both interest fit and personality fit.
Our Career Database
Our database includes 500+ careers with detailed information: job descriptions, typical tasks, required skills, and education pathways. Salary data comes from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), and we include growth projections so you can see which fields are expanding.
Each career is tagged with RIASEC codes and personality-relevant attributes, allowing us to rank matches by how well they align with your unique profile.
Expertise & Scientific Review
My Career Path was built by a dedicated team of career counselors, data scientists, and organizational psychologists. Because career advice can significantly impact your future (what Google calls a "Your Money or Your Life" topic), we ensure all our tools and recommendations are grounded in peer-reviewed science and validated by experts.
Dr. Sarah Chen, Ph.D.
Lead Occupational Psychologist
Dr. Chen specializes in vocational psychology and psychometrics. She oversaw the adaptation of the RIASEC and Big Five models into our multi-modal AI assessment to ensure high validity and reliability.
Marcus Rodriguez, MS, NCC
National Certified Counselor
Marcus brings 15 years of experience in career counseling at top universities. He leads the curation of our 500+ career database, ensuring the salary data, growth metrics, and required skills reflect the real-world job market.