Abstract
M.A.
South Africa is a country which has undergone many changes since its first democratic elections in 1994. Amongst other societal implications, these changes have catapulted South African businesses and employees into the global economy. Being part of the global economy means that South African employees, like their northern hemisphere counterparts, are struggling to create balance in their lives. The stress resulting from the often opposing demands of work and family has lead to increasing scientific attention being paid to the matter of life balance. The present study has endeavoured to shed some light on this subject. Life balance was defined as the state that people reach when they experience contentment regarding their time involvement, emotional involvement and level of satisfaction achieved from each life role. This conceptualisation encompassed Super’s five adult life roles, namely those of student, worker, citizen, leisurite and home and family person.
The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between personality traits and life balance amongst employees of the South African corporate sector (N = 175). Each participant completed the Basic Traits Inventory, a life balance questionnaire and a biographical data questionnaire. The general hypotheses stated in the research pertained to the relationship between personality traits and life balance. More specific hypotheses were formulated pertaining to the relationships between individual traits and life balance, as well as the combined and predictive effect of personality traits on life balance.
Examination of the individual personality traits in relation to life balance was done through the use of Pearson’s product-moment correlations. The results indicated that Extroversion (r = 0.151; p < 0.05), Conscientiousness (r = 0.303; p < 0.01) and Openness to Experience (r = 0.204; p < 0.01) had statistically significant positive relationships with life balance, while Neuroticism (r = -0.192; p < 0.05) surrendered a statistically significant negative relationship with life balance.