Principle of the Closest Profession for Creating Vector Vocational Guidance Tests

This article presents the principle of the closest profession, which is a practical application of the principle of vector representation of professions, presented by the authors in the previous works. The latter postulates that any profession can be represented as a vector in the n-dimensional space of activity elements. This representation allows defining measures of similarity (for example, Euclidean distance) between different professions. The principle of the closest profession postulates that if with the help of some test, the vector of a person in the vector space of professions is determined, the Euclidean distances can be calculated from a person to all vectors of professions and the n-closest to him or her can be deduced. Such a test, which is called by the authors a vector test, in contrast to traditional vocational guidance methods, represents not just recommendations for a certain class of professions (for example, socionomic or technonomic), but an ordered list of professions recommended for the respondent to master. The paper presents a description of the algorithm for the development of vector vocational guidance tests, which consists of three stages—vectorization of professions, development of test materials, and assessment of the validity and reliability of the method. This algorithm was tested, which resulted in a screening vector questionnaire of professional preferences. An assessment of the retrospective validity of the questionnaire is presented. This questionnaire can serve as a confirmation of the efficiency of the principle of the closest profession for creating vocational guidance tests. However, additional research is required to substantiate its practical use.