Die verband tussen persoonlikheid en wysheid

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT:The need for the wise employee in modern organisations can,especially in the light of technological advancement and globalcompetition, not be denied. The current work environment is dynamicand poses numerous challenges to employees. Attributes such asinsight, good judgement and decision-making are required; attributesthat correlate with wisdom. Certain personality attributes such asmaturity, tranquility, flexibility and empathy are often being used inthe description of wise individuals and are also being set asrequirements for the modern employee. Research and studies withregard to wisdom are limited. As limited and contradictory results existwith regard to the Industrial Psychological enquiry into wisdom, aneed exists for further research, especially with regard to thecircumstances and factors that are applicable to the South Africanbusiness organisation.As a potential relationship between wisdom and personality traitsexists, it has been set as the subject of investigation for this study.Certain personality traits grant possible access to or might faseilltatethe development of wisdom. If the wise employee can be identified bymeans of a personality test, it can be of significant value in forexample the selection process.Wisdom, for the purpose of this study, refers to expert knowledge withregard to insight, good advice and judgement for complicated lifeproblems. The concept of personality is for the purpose of the study,based on the trait approach where the second order factors of the 16PF-questionnaire, namely extroversion, anxiety, tough mindedness,independence and compulsivity, serve as the structural components ofpersonality.The sample comprises 67 employees who are employed at the centraloffice of a big South African retail company. A wisdom knowledgeinstrument has been used for the measurement of wisdom knowledgewhere participants advise on three difficult life problems. Theadjusted evaluation instrument of Hira and Faulkender (1997), basedon Smith and Baltes' definition of wisdom (1995) as an expertknowledge system, has been used by two evaluators for theevaluation of the responses. The biographical questionnaire wasspecifically developed to comply with the requirements of theinvestigation.The results of this investigation shows that a significant correlationbetween wisdom knowledge and the second order personality factors(-traits) of the 16PF exists, namely anxiety and independence. Nosignificant correlation has been found between wisdom knowledge andthe other three second-order factors, namely extroversion, toughmindedness and compulsivity. The personality traits have alsoindicated a low, but significant variance of the wisdom counts.Personality nevertheless shows a correlation with wisdom, in thisstudy.Biographical variables that show a significant positive correlation withwisdom knowledge counts are sex and level of training. Maleparticipants have performed significantly better than femaleparticipants. It is evident from the study that age does not have asignificant influence on wisdom knowledge performance.It is also evident from the results that the measuring instrumentreflects a valid measurement of wisdom performance and that the twoevaluators' evaluations show a positive correlation with each other. Conclusions and suggestions for future research are made inaccordance with the results of the investigation.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University