He is known for his work with John L. Holland on the development of various assessment tools commonly used by counseling psychologists, such as the Position Classification Inventory.
[3] Gottfredson was a research scientist at Johns Hopkins University's Center for Social Organization of Schools from 1977 to 1985.
He also received the John Holland Award for Outstanding Achievement in Career and Personality Research from the Society for Counseling Psychology.
[1] Gottfredson met Linda Howarth while they were both attending the University of California, Davis.
They both received their undergraduate degrees from Berkeley in psychology in 1969, and they remained married until their divorce in 1979.