Attempts to describe the identity and unique characteristics of counseling psychology have been made almost since the beginning of the specialty area in the post-World War II era. This study was conducted as an attempt to describe the specialty area of counseling psychology as it exists in 1990. A national survey of 800 members of Division 17 (Counseling Psychology) of the American Psychological Association was conducted to assess attitudes about selected work sites and professional activities for counseling psychologists. The total number of questionnaires completed was 521, a return rate of 65%. Survey items were written to represent work sites and activities which have been traditionally associated with either counseling or clinical psychology. Responses were analyzed through an oblique rotation principal components analysis of survey items, the assignment of standardized scores to respondents' data, and subsequent cluster analysis of those standardized scores. Based on responses to the attitude survey items, three subgroups of respondents emerged: (1) Clinical Counseling Psychologists, who favored long-term treatment and advocated working with clients with more severe pathology; (2) Central Counseling Psychologists, who emphasized a normal developmental approach in work with clients and strongly opposed prescription privileges; and (3) Traditional Counseling Psychologists, who strongly opposed counseling psychologists performing long-term therapy and working with the severely disturbed, and who instead adopted a lifespan developmental approach and viewed counseling and clinical psychology as distinct specialty areas. (Author/NB)