The application of personality assessment techniques for clinical and personnel decisions has
always been a major activity for psychologists all over the world. In South Africa personality
assessment tools are often used for purposes of selection, placement, determination of job
satisfaction and development. Psychological testing in South Africa was originally initiated
with white test-takers in mind, and currently none of the available personality questionnaires
used in South Africa have been found to provide a reliable and valid picture of personality for
all cultural (language) groups.
Since 1994 South Africa has had a new constitution and there are stronger demands for the
cultural appropriateness of psychological tests. In this study, the implicit perspectives of
personality of Sesotho-speaking South Africans are being determined in order to develop a
more culturally fair personality assessment tool for South Africans.
A qualitative research design was used with an interview as data-gathering instrument. A
Sesotho-speaking fieldworker was recruited to interview 120 Sesotho-speaking South
Africans from the Free State Province. The study population was purposely drawn from
different sections of the Sesotho-speaking population. A total of 4873 Sesotho-speaker
personality descriptors were obtained from the participants and then translated into English.
Content analysis was used to analyse, interpret and reduce these descriptors to a total of 94
personality characteristics, which highlights the most important perspectives of personality
for Sesotho-speaking individuals.
The personality characteristics were divided into seven categories, namely sociability,
interpersonal relatedness, emotionality, meanness, conscientiousness, dominance and other.
The majority of the characteristics are representative of communalism or the collective
consciousness in African communities. Sesotho-speaking persons are socially active and are
sympathetic, caring and tolerant towards others, they are willing to become involved in the
feelings, problems and welfare of others.
The findings of this study were compared to the Five Factor Model and evidence were found
for the extraversion, conscientiousness, neuroticism and agreeableness factors, but not for the
openness to experience factor. In comparison with the Chinese Personality Assessment
Inventory support were found for 17 of the 22 personality scales. Characteristics such as
admonitory, resourcefulness, religion, humour, fair, judgemental and discriminating can be
seen as characteristics indigenous to the Sesotho culture.
Limitations in the research are identified and recommendations for future research are made. / Thesis (M.A. (Industrial Psychology))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2006.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:NWUBOLOKA1/oai:dspace.nwu.ac.za:10394/1080 |
| Date | January 2006 |
| Creators | Kruger, Sonet Beatrice |
| Publisher | North-West University |
| Source Sets | North-West University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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