Abstract
M.A.
Questions regarding the possible interrelations of work-related constructs of
person-environment congruence, job satisfaction and job involvement were
posed in this dissertation. These constructs were defined in terms of three
separate theoretical frameworks, namely Holland's (1985b) vocational
choice theory, the Theory of Work Adjustment (Lofquist & Dawis, 1984), and
Kanungo's (1982b) conceptualisation of job involvement, respectively. In
accordance with these theories, the Self-Directed Search questionnaire, the
Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire, and the Job Involvement
Questionnaire were used to operationalise these variables for the 114
psychologists and 44 optometrists who participated in the study. The
person-environment congruence scores were computed by means of the
Congruence Index (Brown & Gore, 1994).
A secondary aim of the study was to evaluate the accuracy of environmental
codes (one of the components of person-environment congruence) as have
been provided by The South African Dictionary of Occupations (1987) for
samples of psychologists and optometrists in the South African context.
Different research designs were used to accommodate the diversity of the
research objectives and hypotheses. A factorial research design was used
to determine the potentiality of influences of person-environment congruence
and job involvement on overall job satisfaction, intrinsic job satisfaction and
extrinsic job satisfaction. Possible differences between the samples of
psychologists and optometrists, and males and females were built into the
general linear models encompassed by this design. Similarly, this design
was used to determine whether job involvement is a function of personenvironment
congruence, overall job satisfaction, intrinsic job satisfaction,
extrinsic job satisfaction, gender and occupational group. Possible divergent
effects of the samples and gender were further probed by means of
generalised linear models (regression). Gender and sample-specific
differences in terms of the variables of the study separately were examined
through inferential statistics (t-tests).
The possibility of a significant effect of job involvement on the relationship
between person-environment congruence and job satisfaction assumed by
Holland (1985b), was investigated by means of correlational analyses to
conclude the examination of the relations among these variables.
For the secondary aim of this study, the Environment Assessment Technique
(Holland, 1985b) was used to calculate the respective environment codes of
this sample of optometrists, and samples from four categories of registration
of psychologists, namely clinical, counselling, educational and industrial
psychologists, and then compared to the codes for these vocations listed in
The South African Dictionary of Occupations (1987).
The results of this study revealed significant effects of job involvement on
overall job satisfaction and intrinsic job satisfaction, but nonsignificant effects
of occupational group (or sample) and gender. Of the independent
variables, only person-environment congruence had moderately significant
effects on extrinsic job satisfaction. When job involvement served as
dependent variable, only overall job satisfaction or intrinsic job satisfaction
and the occupational group had any significant influence on it. The effect of
the psychologist sample on job involvement was greater than that of the
optometrist sample. No gender differences were found in terms of these
linear models, or in terms of the variables of the study separately.
Further findings revealed that job involvement does not have any significant
effect on the hypothesised congruence-job satisfaction, congruence-intrinsic
job satisfaction, or congruence-extrinsic job satisfaction relationships.
When the environmental codes of the various samples were compared to the
proposed Holland ISE (investigative-social-enterprising) environment code,
vast discrepancies were found. A predominantly social environment code
was obtained for clinical, counselling and educational psychologists, but an
enterprising code for industrial psychologists. Although the optometrists
obtained a predominately investigative code, their environment's subtypes
could not be characterised as social and enterprising, but rather as
enterprising and realistic.
Suggestions were made that research employing sample-specific
environmental codes in studies of person-environment congruence and its
possible covariates is warranted. A need for empirical examinations of
environmental codes of other vocational populations in South Africa was
also identified. It was further recommended that the job involvement
construct should be included in theories describing the antecedents,
correlates and consequences of job satisfaction.
This study was then evaluated in terms of criterion validity and external
validity requirements, and the conclusion was drawn that within the
limitations of the study, the research questions had been answered.