The classification of adult criminal populations for training, treatment, and security purposes has been time-consuming and expensive. The main purpose of this study was to develop a classification system which considered a wide variety of behavioral, biographical, and psychometric variables and yet was efficient in terms of time and money.

This investigation was concerned with the effects of electromyographic biofeedback on the muscular tension of patients diagnosed in a particular personality state. These personality traits were manic, agitated, depressed, and a comparison group.

M.Comm. / The concepts of logistics and supply chain management are relatively new in South Africa. The concept of logistics management was more commonly known in the 1960s and 1970s as physical distribution. In the late 1970s, the concept evolved to logistics management and in the late 1980s and early 1990s, it evolved into supply chain management. It was only after the end of apartheid in 1994 when South Africa was able to compete globally that there was great interest in supply chain management in South Africa. There is virtually no business or industry untouched by the business of logistics and supply chain management. Getting the right product to the right customer at the right time as efficiently and cost-effectively as possible is the main objective of logistics and supply chain management (Gordon, 2000a: 14). Logistics is “the process of strategically managing the acquisition, movement and storage of materials, parts and finished inventory (and the related information flows) through the organization and its marketing channel in such a way that current and future profitability is maximised through the cost-effective fulfillment of orders” (Anon1. ,2002). The term supply chain is described by Lummus and Vokurka (1999) as “all of those activities associated with moving goods from raw materials stage through to the consumer. This includes procurement, production scheduling, order processing, inventory control, transportation, warehousing, and customer service. The information systems necessary to monitor all of these activities are also included. All these activities are then integrated and coordinated into a seamless process to involve all the partners in the supply chain”. With every step in the supply chain management process, there are costs involved and two of the major cost drivers in the supply chain according to Palmieri and Africk (1999) are inventory holding and transportation. Stout is of the opinion that this is more than a valid statement from a South African business perspective and emphasizes that unnecessary inventory costs money as does inventory that is distributed inefficiently (Gordon, 2000b: 21). Excessive inventory holding together with under-utilization of transport can lead to a major negative financial impact on total supply chain costs (Cooke, 2000: 12; Lambert, Stock & Ellram, 1998: 165; Hankanson, 1999). Therefore, the reciprocal relationship between inventory holding and transportation cost is very important. Christopher (1992: 25) also stipulates that the ultimate purpose of any supply chain is to satisfy customers. The importance of customer service in total supply chain functioning must therefore always be considered in a logistics supply chain system design. In South Africa, transport and inventory are two of the main cost drivers in the supply chain. Factors that make inventory and transport two of the main cost drivers in the supply chain are, among others: high fuel prices, high interest rates, poor road conditions, security concerns and the weak performance of the rand against major foreign currencies. It can therefore be said that inventory and transport are just as important in obtaining an optimized supply chain in South Africa as in the rest of the world. / Mr. P. Kilbourn Prof. J. Walters

M.A. (Industrial Psychology) / The South African Personality Inventory (SAPI) project is an attempt to develop an indigenous personality measure that can be applied within the South African context. Such a measure is important as test developers and users are required to meet the requirements stipulated in South African legislation. The Extraversion cluster is one of the nine factors that make up the SAPI measure. The main aim of this study was to validate the Extraversion cluster for use within South Africa which included testing for equivalence and bias amongst the Germani, Nguni and Sotho language groups. A quantitative, cross-sectional research design was used within the current study. Data was gathered from working South Africans (N= 891) within the Gauteng province. The preliminary Extraversion scale consists of 31 items that yielded a three factor structure, namely Sociability, Talkativeness and Positive Emotionality. The Talkativeness factor was not found to be reliable although the overall Extraversion scale was identified as reliable. It was also found that Extraversion, as the higher order factor, was valid and reliable and had greater explanatory power than that of the individual factors. The results of the study also indicated that some of the language groups viewed the factors differently and that bias did occur for several of the items across the groups.

M.Comm. (Industrial Psychology) / The objective of this study is to examine the construct validity of the Openness scale in the South African Personality Inventory (SAPI). The SAPI project aims to develop a personality questionnaire that is applicable in the multicultural South African context. A total of 891 students and working adults, of different race groups (White, Black, Indian and Coloured), with a minimum of Grade 12 or equivalent and speaking eleven different languages participated in the study. A cross sectional design was used to collect data using paper and pencil questionnaires administered in English. The Openness scale consisted of 23 items. A hierarchical Schmid-Leiman factor solution was used to investigate if a strong general Openness factor could be retrieved from participants’ responses. Tucker’s phi coefficient was used to determine factor congruence across language groups. The results suggest that more work is needed to improve validity and reliability of the current SAPI Openness scale, as it failed to produce a general Openness factor. Results show that it is difficult to attach meaningful psychological interpretations to scores on the Openness scale can be made.

M.Comm. (Industrial Psychology) / The purpose of the South African Personality Inventory (SAPI) project is to develop a personality measure that can be used within the South African context and that can account for the diversity that exists within the South Africa. This study is intended at validating the Conscientiousness scale of the SAPI as well as considering how well the measure replicated across language groups (Germanic, Nguni and Sotho) in South Africa. The data utilised in this study was collected from working individuals from a number of different organisations in South Africa (N = 890). The Conscientiousness scale consists of 36 items that yielded a five factor structure namely, Dedication, Discipline, Commitment, Orderliness, Organised. It was found that the Conscientiousness scale is a valid and reliable measure of the personality trait Conscientiousness scale. The results indicated that the general factor, Conscientiousness replicated well across the different language groups in South Africa, but the five factor solution did not yield conclusive results. Furthermore, the results of the Differential Test Functioning (DTF) analysis revealed that the scale had a significant effect size and upon further investigation it was shown that two of the items that had significant Differential Item Functioning (DIF) effect sizes could be removed in order to obtain a non-bias measure of Conscientiousness on the SAPI.

Psychometric instruments are used internationally in organisations to assist companies when making recruitment or development decisions. But the differences that exist on similar psychometric instruments between international groups of people with similar qualifications necessitate the evaluation of the construct validity of these instruments. The objective of this study was to determine the construct validity of the locus of control inventory developed by Udai Pareek in 1998. The instrument consists of 30 items and it was completed by 155 pre-and postgraduate students at the University of Pretoria. Oblimin rotation was used to assist with the interpretation of the factors. In the pattern and structure matrix the highest loadings were highlighted which meant that these items measured the construct that they were supposed to measure. Items were deleted where there was no clear indication as to what the item was measuring. Item analysis was done on each of the constructs identified to further investigate the appropriateness of each item and even more items were deleted, which also had an impact on the Cronbach’s alpha value. The chi-square as well as other fit indices was used to determine the model fit. Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted to establish how well the model fitted the data. It was clear that the two-factor model fitted the data considerably better than the three-factor model because of a high correlation between two of the factors which indicated that they might be measuring the same construct. The results indicate that the locus of control instrument is not suitable for use in the South African context and should therefore be modified until a satisfactory model fit is found. AFRIKAANS: Psigometrise instrumente word wereldwyd benut om maatsappye te help met werwing en ontwikkelings besluite. Maar die verskille wat ontstaan wanneer internasionale groepe met soortgelyke kwalifikasies teen mekaar opgeweeg word vereis dat die konstruk geldigheid van die instrumente bepaal word. Die doel van die studie was om die konstruk geldigheid van die lokus van kontrole vraelys, wat deur Udai Pareek ontwikkel is, te ondersoek.Die instrument bestaan uit 30 items en dit was voltooi deur 155 voor-en nagraadse studente van die Universiteit van Pretoria. Oblimin rotasie was gebruik om die interpretasie van die faktore te vergemaklik. Die items wat werklik meet wat dit ontwikkel is om te meet is ingekleur sodat dit maklik geidentifiseer kan word.Items is slegs uit die vraelys gehaal waar daar geen duidelike indikasie was wat die item meet nie. Item analise was op elke konstruk toegepas, en die chi-square en ander passings indekse was gebruik om te bepaal hoe die model op die data pas. Dit was duidelik dat die twee-faktor model die data baie beter pas as die voorgestelde drie-faktor model. Volgens die drie faktor model is daar twee van die voorgestelde drie faktore wat moontlik die selfde konstruk kan meet. Die resultate dui aan dat die lokus van kontrole vraelys nie geskik is vir gebruik in Suid–Afrika nie, en sal daarom aangepas moet word totdat „n aanvaarbare model gevind is. Copyright 2009, University of Pretoria. All rights reserved. The copyright in this work vests in the University of Pretoria. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the University of Pretoria. Please cite as follows: Engelbrecht, C 2009, Determining the construct validity of Udai Pareek's locus of control inventory , MCom dissertation, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, viewed yymmdd < http://upetd.up.ac.za/thesis/available/etd-02092012-100414 / > C12/4/75/gm / Dissertation (MCom)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Human Resource Management / unrestricted

Please read the abstract in the section 00front of this document. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Industrial and Systems Engineering / unrestricted

The primary problem of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of two teaching techniques in relation to their respective influence on changing behavior by a group process.

In understanding the importance of career adaptability in an individual‟s career development, career counsellors require a valid assessment technique for measuring career adaptability. The Career Adapt-Abilities Inventory (CAI) was originally developed by Mark Savickas (2008) as a measure of career adapt-abilities. The present study forms part of an international collaboration investigating the psychometric properties and construct validity of the CAI. The aims of the present study involved the following: conducting exploratory factor analysis in order to determine whether interrelationships within the items of the CAI can be explained by the presence of unobserved variables; conducting confirmatory factor analysis in an attempt to confirm the hypothesised factor structures of the CAI; and to explore and describe South African university students‟ perceptions of the underlying constructs of the CAI in terms of the language usage and comprehension of the inventory‟s item content. A sample of South African first-year university students were employed in this current study. In an exploratory factor analysis of the CAI, preference was given to the a priori criterion forcing the extraction of five factors. The oblique rotation method was employed using the OBLIMIN method provided by the statistical package in order to derive the simplest and most interpretable factor structure. Exploratory factor analysis supported a five factor solution after the fourth iteration, reflecting the underlying dimensions of Curiosity, Concern, Confidence, Cooperation and Control. These factors support the five scales presented by Savickas (2008). Confirmatory factor analyses were subsequently performed in order to test both the original CAI factor model as well as the factor model that emerged through exploratory factor analysis. After using several goodness-of-fit indices, it can be concluded that the inventory items adequately represent the five CAI scales based on the value obtained using the Root Mean Square Error of Approximation index. The factor model derived through EFA demonstrated a slightly better fit when compared to the original CAI factor model using other fit indices. In terms of the qualitative findings of this current study, participants indicated that the meaning of several items were unclear to them causing comprehension difficulty. Items 8 and 50 were marked by participants several times and can be viewed as the items causing most difficulty with regard to comprehension, with participants pointing out the words „keeping upbeat‟ (item 8) and „conscientious‟ (item 50). Participants were also asked to provide additional comments with regard to the readability, comprehension and applicability of the CAI. On investigation of these comments, three main themes were generated relating to: the comprehension and clarity of the CAI; the CAI enhancing participants‟ understanding of themselves; and the structure, length and general layout of the CAI. In essence, the current study provided useful information regarding the psychometric properties of the CAI using a sample of South African first-year university students. Factor analyses provided some support for the validity of the CAI while the qualitative results provided aspects for consideration in making the CAI more applicable for South African usage. Moreover, a foundation has been laid for further research to be conducted in South Africa regarding the validity and applicability of the CAI for South African populations.