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Doctoral Degrees (Psychology)

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/10413/6475

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Browsing Doctoral Degrees (Psychology) by SDG "SDG4"

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    Career development narratives and experiences of post-matriculants in a disadvantaged community: a study of Douglas in the Northern Cape.
    (2022) Hoorn, Caroline.; Mkhize, Nhlanhla Jerome.
    Post-matriculants in disadvantaged communities such as Douglas encounter a number of career challenges. The transition to the democratic dispensation in 1994, coupled with the rapid changes in the information domain that are characteristic of post-industrial life, complicate the career development trajectories of black youth in the rural areas in particular. Legally, South Africa has moved from an apartheid to a democratic system. Although this democratic system is approximately 27 years old, the legacy of apartheid runs deep and more so in rural settings. The career development stories and experiences of black rural youth in provinces such as the Northern Cape have not been told, leading to their marginalisation. It is against this background that the current study explored the career development narratives and experiences of post-matriculants in the Douglas community in the Northern Cape. Using a qualitative, narrative approach, the researcher elicited career development stories from 23 participants in Douglas using semi-structured interviews. The study revealed that the career development narratives and experiences extracted are those filled with a mixture of a few positive experiences but mainly those of frustration, stagnation, and loss of hope resulting from the uncontrollable external environmental conditions in Douglas. Key pillars like family, teachers, some people in the community, as well as non-governmental organisations, played a critical role in enabling post-matriculants to choose and pursue careers amidst constant frustration with social, environmental, and socio-economic factors that posed serious obstacles. Another key factor that the study showed was that gender did not have any influence on the career choices of the post-matriculants. The perceptions around career choices and gender were being challenged partly by the urge to affirm equality and the constant reminder of the poverty-stricken conditions prevalent in the households. However, the constraints experienced by the post-matriculants outweighed the enablers’ needed for consistent career development. In addition, the study concluded that while the systems of influence like individual, society and environmental-societal are critical in shaping individual career pathways, individuals are pushed by a strong sense of self-concept, and self-efficacy propelled by constant resilience to emerge with successful careers even amid existing deeply entrenched structural systems designed to disadvantage black people. Lastly, the study concluded that the development of self as individuals is not done in the absence of the community or society. The study revealed a lot of attachment to society that was expressed in the future plans of Douglas’ post-matriculants should they succeed in their career pursuits. Therefore, the importance of stakeholder roles and integration within the planned strategies towards the effectiveness of career development processes and approaches would alter the career development narratives and experiences of post-matriculants and would enable them to have successful career pathways and growth.
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    Infusing an African-centred pesperctive into life skills education at primary school level in Kenya: a case study of the Nandi community.
    (2022) Magut, Amos Kiprotich.; Mkhize, Nhlanhla Jerome.
    The indigenous healing and care practices in Kenya were forced to go underground during colonial times and thereafter during the design and roll-out of Western-type education. Consequently, therapy in Kenyan schools is largely dominated by contemporary psychological theories that have been conceptualized from a Eurocentric framework, and their treatment utility designed for European-Americans. Healing processes that are based on this worldview are in total conflict with African indigenous understandings of the person and reality, and hence the healing processes. With many primary schools reporting an increase in delinquency, there is need to enrich counselling offered in Kenyan primary schools through tapping into the cultural resources. The nature of the indigenous African psychosocial resources, and the exact techniques involved, remain unclear and have not been given much attention. Afrocentricity provided the philosophical basis for this study. It was informed by the mixed methods research approach whereby Nandi elders through interviews and focus group discussion contributed values during the exploratory phase. The second phase involved instrument development based on findings of phase one, and the third entailed administration of the instrument to a sample (260) of school counsellors. The results indicated that Nandi people have psychosocial resources. Moreover, school counsellors have positive views of the role these resources can play. However, most counsellors have minimal or no knowledge of indigenous resources and interventions. Schools are grappling with many psychosocial challenges, which counsellors feel cultural resources can help mitigate. However, the challenge remains that most indigenous resources have not been documented. Results indicate that these challenges can be managed as there is interest among educational stakeholders to use them. Finally, the results showed that actualisation of infusion is possible if values are documented and sensitisation on their viability is made. These findings have the following implications for policy, research, theory and practice: infuse indigenous tenets in management of disruptive behaviours in schools; change policy to have mother tongue taught and tested in all primary schools; indigenous psychosocial resources and interventions be documented and the mechanisms identified to infuse them into life skills curriculum, and teachers be inducted on the tenets and efficacy of indigenous resources.