PAPERS OX PSYCHOLOGY AND EDUCATION 451 



THE SELF-ANALYSIS DEVICE AS AN AID IN 

 GUIDANCE 



Joseph V. Banna, Personnel Director, Joliet Town- 

 ship and Junior College, Joliet 



The brief treatment of the subject of self -analysis 

 herewith presented has grown out of the writer's ex- 

 perience in the development and use/ of self-analysis 

 materials at Bradley Polytechnic Institute, supplement- 

 ed by a rather thorough study of prevailing systems in 

 use elsewhere. It is not the purpose of the present 

 paper to evaluate the different angles of self-analysis in 

 its relation to guidance, comprehensively. A limited 

 background of practical experience, however, seems suf- 

 ficient justification in raising certain questions with re- 

 spect to prevailing conceptions and practices with re- 

 spect to administration. In this brief experience the 

 writer finds sufficient enthusiasm for self-analysis, con- 

 servatively used, to impel him to make certain criticisms 

 which are in no sense meant to be unkind. 



The self-analysis blank is a device which aims to arouse 

 and utilize the interest of the individual in the analysis 

 and solution of his personal problems. Since the prin- 

 ciples of vocational guidance recognize that the individ- 

 ual himself must ultimately make educational and vo- 

 cational choices, it can be seen readily that any device 

 or plan which in any way stimulates and directs self- 

 activity, and brings the individual to a realization of 

 his personal responsibility, is valuable. 



It is not the purpose of the present paper to deal with 

 the historical side of analysis in any of its phases. It 

 should be pointed out in the beginning, however, that 

 in so far as content and technique of blanks and forms 

 are concerned self-analysis makes no wide departure 

 from the general subject of "analysis" or "rating". 

 Self -analysis differs from other types of analysis, in the 

 main, only in the methods of administration. The same 

 blank is sometimes used by students and employees in 

 rating themselves, and by teachers, foremen, etc., in rat- 

 ing those whose responsibility they share. A discussion 

 of the minor differences as to form between self-analysis 



