Abstract
D.Ed. (Educational Psychology)
Career orientation is a developmental process that can be facilitated by career development
programmes. One of the most recent developments in these programmes was the
introduction of computerized career orientation which enables the user to explore career
activities independently.
An experimental investigation in which the MENTOR computerized vocational guidance
system was used, was conducted at the Rand Afikaans University in an attempt to
determine whether the MENTOR could be a useful aid for career orientation in South Africa.
Standard nine high school pupils were randomly assigned to one of two groups according to
the pre-test post-test experimental design. Subjects completed a biographical questionnaire,
an evaluation questionnaire concerning the use of MENTOR and the Career Development
Scale (CDS). Goal and aid orientated criteria were applied to evaluate the MENTOR
programme.
The main hypothesis, namely that there would be a statistically significant difference
between the mean posttest scores on the Career Development Scale (CDS) of the
experimental and control groups, was tested according to the integrated statistical
procedure suggested by Spector (1981): It was determined during the first phase of the
experiment that there were no statistically significant differences between the average
pretest results of the experimental and control groups. During the second phase it was
determined that the mean post-test results differed statistically significantly from that of the
control group. In the last phase it was determined that the mean post-test results of the
experimental group were statistically significantly higher than the mean pre-test results.
Furthermore the average follow-up test results indicated that there was a statistically
significant higher score regarding self-knowledge, career information, as well as the
integration of self-knowledge and career information.
The research results showed that there was a statistically significant increase in the career
readiness of pupils after they had used the MENTOR system, compared with pupils from the
control group. It could be predicted with 95% certainty that a person who used the
MENTOR programme would show an increase in career development.