The most popular reason for people to take temporary or contract work in the US is the belief that it can lead to a permanent job, according to a 2006 American Staffing Association (ASA) survey.

However, the reality tends to fall short of their hopes, the ASA researchers found.

There was a minus 6% difference between the importance of that factor in workers' decision to temp and their assessment of the subsequent reality.

"It's not quite meeting their expectations," commented ASA vice president Steve Berchem.

But in other areas the reality exceeded expectations. For example, a narrow majority of the workers (4%) said the additional income exceeded expectations. Workers also found that temporary or contract work was less stressful than they had anticipated.

Berchem, who heads the ASA's research arm, presented the findings at the ASA conference in Las Vegas this month.

The ASA survey was conducted to gauge the workers' attitudes toward their employment, recruitment agencies and end-user clients; and to improve understanding of workers' demographics.

The 13,196 contractors and temps surveyed were also asked why they temped.

In addition to providing a means to a permanent job and extra income, the most popular reasons included flexibility of schedule and potential for training.

Twenty-three percent of the respondents said they had "little or no interest" in a permanent job. Within that group, the flexibility factors rated most important were flexible work times (23%), choice of assignments (22%) and needing time for family (20%).

The temporary workers were also asked how they preferred to be described — and were presented with more than 80 descriptive titles for their work.

Most of the people working in the professional and technical/IT sectors said they would prefer to be referred to as "contractors". But overall most participants chose the description "temporary".