As one aspect of a study of individual and organizational conditions contributing to faculty vitality, the career socialization and current career attitudes of three faculty generations were compared. These generational comparisons were done separately for two groups of tenured university faculty members: (1) a representative group drawn from the humanities, biological sciences, physical sciences, and social science fields; and (2) a selected group of faculty, drawn from the same areas, who had been identified as highly active in teaching, research, and service. The analyses focused on similarities and differences in the professional socialization experiences of the two sets of generational groups that appear to be indicative of career success. The highly active faculty understood that their colleagues expected them to engage in research and scholarly work, and their own interests and preferences ran strongly to research rather than to teaching. At each socialization stage, a general pattern emerged in which the socialization process most favorable to a research university was increasingly evident in successive cohorts of the highly active group. Policy-oriented questions and implications for the university are noted. (Author/SW)