Much change has resulted from pressures at a global level, which now impact on
South Africa as a member of the international community. Some changes were
dramatic and, to a limited extent, resulted in revolutionary transformation. Various
problems were experienced in the higher education sector in general. Merging of
some higher education institutions in South Africa as part of transformation seemed
to be an obvious solution. This was welcomed by some, yet resisted by others.
Various forces started to evolve in the merging process. Owing to one of the most
important characteristics of a force, namely its directedness, it can only be perceived
(visibly) in its psychological context.
The first objective of this study was to conceptualise some psychological forces
within the context of a merging higher education institution. The second objective
was to determine the perceptions and attitudes of academic school directors, deans
and vice-rectors towards the thematically identified psychological forces in a
quantitative manner. The last objective was to make recommendations on how the
psychological conceptualisation of forces could be utilised in the future development
of the merged university in this study.
A qualitative exploratory and descriptive design was used to identify items that could
be used in a quantitative survey. The quantitative data collected were used to assess
interrelations among constructs. Constructs consisted of items related to the force as
well as the psychological domain. Cronbach alpha coefficients and factor analysis of
items linked to each construct were performed to confirm uni-dimensionality.
Practically significant differences between certain constructs were reported by using
Cohen's d-value. A measure of sampling adequacy (MSA) was also conducted as
developed by Kaiser. Variances were explained and communalities were also
indicated.
Regarding the first objective, it was determined that the government, council,
management, students and alumni, culture, strategy, peers and resources were
identified in the three psychological domains. Regarding the second objective, the
results indicated the highest affectivity towards management and the lowest towards
council; the highest cognition for management and the least for council; and a
positive conation towards management and a less positive conation towards council.
However, communalities lower than 50% were reported on the construct "conative
towards council". It could therefore be concluded that, based on the identified forces
and their respective links with the psychological domains, evidence exists of
negative affectivity towards and limited understanding of council. The contrary,
however, applies in the case of management, which attracted much affectivity,
cognition and conation in respect of the merger.
Recommendations are made for the organisation and for future research. / Thesis (M.A. (Human Resource Management))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2007.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:nwu/oai:dspace.nwu.ac.za:10394/1623 |
| Date | January 2007 |
| Creators | Jacobsz, Johannes Marthinus |
| Publisher | North-West University |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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