Magister Philosophiae - MPhil / One of the population structures associated with demographic dividend is “demographic transition”, which is a shift from high fertility and mortality to low fertility and mortality. It is understood that low dependency ratio (shows that there are relatively more adults of working age who can support the young and the old of the populace) is one major factor in achieving a successful demographic dividend (DD) (Esther, 2013). DD refers to the fast-economic growth that is achieved by a country when there are dependency ratios. This definition means that the proportion of people of working age group (15-64) is higher, compared to those of ages lower than 15 and above 64 years (Statistics SA, 2017). In addition, having a large proportion of working age people does not necessarily guarantee a successful demographic dividend. There are certain conditions to support a successful DD. According to Dewald Van Rensburg, 2017, South Africa is almost done with the achievement of demographic transition. These does not guarantee a successful demographic dividend. This study will therefore look at socio-economic conditions in support of a demographic dividend, because most of the working age people are still not employed, therefore are not productive enough to contribute to the economic growth. Socio economic conditions include (favorable labor market, economic growth, good governance, education and training, health care, family planning and gender equity) (StatsSA, 2017). These conditions if well-established will lead to a reduction of unemployment and therefore result in more labor resources becoming available to devote to production. Since many people entering working age find it difficult to get employment. Statistics South Africa shows that 38.2% of youth were unemployed in the first quarter of 2018 (Statistic South Africa, 2018), this study will have a close look at South African youth unemployment in relation to the demographic characteristics such as gender, population group, marital status, geography type and province of residence.

The demographic revolution in developing countries and Africa with special regards to Zimbabwe Abstract This dissertation aimed to examine the demographic revolution in developing countries, Africa and Zimbabwe. The decline of mortality and fertility everywhere in the world demonstrates the importance of the demographic revolution as a global process. While this universality was central to classic revolution theory, for many decades, it was questioned by demographers because fertility and mortality in Africa did not seem to follow the expected pathway. In sub-Saharan Africa the demographic revolution has been characterised by lagging, discontinuation and is occurring at a faster pace against low levels of socioeconomic development than observed in Europe, which has consequences for population dynamics. Questions have emerged if Africa is indeed different and a homogenous continent regarding demographic processes? However, empirical studies that have explored the unique demographic revolution starting from developing countries, Africa and Zimbabwe are lacking. The first part of the thesis on developing countries showed variations in the reaction of fertility to mortality decrease with historically small gaps and extended gaps in more recent revolutions, plus the much faster decrease in vital rates in many...

1. Organisms of all species must balance their allocation to growth, survival and recruitment. Among tree species, evolution has resulted in different life-history strategies for partitioning resources to these key demographic processes.Life-history strategies in tropical forests have often been shown to align along a trade-off between fast growth and high survival, that is, the well-known fast–slow continuum. In addition, an orthogonal trade-off has been proposed between tall stature—resulting from fast growth and high survival— and recruit- ment success, that is, a stature−recruitment trade-off. However, it is not clear whether these two independent dimensions of life-history variation structure tropical forests worldwide. 2. We used data from 13 large-scale and long-term tropical forest monitoring plots in three continents to explore the principal trade-offs in annual growth, sur- vival and recruitment as well as tree stature. These forests included relatively undisturbed forests as well as typhoon-disturbed forests. Life-history variation in 12 forests was structured by two orthogonal trade-offs, the growth−survival trade-off and the stature−recruitment trade- off. Pairwise Procrustes analysis revealed a high similarity of demographic relationships among forests. The small deviations were related to differences between African and Asian plots. 3. Synthesis. The fast–slow continuum and tree stature are two independent di- mensions structuring many, but not all tropical tree communities. Our discovery of the consistency of demographic trade-offs and life-history strategies across different forest types from three continents substantially improves our ability to predict tropical forest dynamics worldwide.

Sustainability is a topic that has gained significant traction over the last decade. To ensure that we meet the needs of the present without compromising future generations' needs, this study examines the relationship between ESG (environmental, social and governmental) scores and external demographic pressure in an attempt to examine the relationship and a direction between the two. The primary purpose is to investigate whether external demographic pressure drives corporate sustainability. The study uses Age, Education, Gender and Income as variables for demographic pressure, where Age implies median age, Education tertiary attainment, Gender distribution of the sexes, and Income GNI per capita. Through utilizing a quantitative method, ESG scores have been collected from the Thomson Returns Eikon database, and for the demographic factors The United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA) and the World Bank have been used.  To produce a model that works globally, a global sample has been used, with the majority of the companies based in western countries. The theoretical models Behavioural Finance, Stakeholder Theory and Agency Theory have been used to analyse the underlying dynamics of the relationships between demographic pressure and corporate sustainability performance. The conclusion is that such a relationship exists, and more specifically, that all four variables used display statistically significant effects on ESG scores. However, our results diverge from previous research on corporate sustainability performance, suggesting that higher Age in a population increases ESG scores, while higher numbers of males to females, higher education level, and higher income level decreases corporate sustainability performance.  The conclusion of this study contributes to new knowledge of sustainability and an expanded understanding of the role of demographic factors in corporate sustainability. This further suggests that sustainability should be a more integrated part in companies and civil society.

Industrial and organisational (I-O) psychology is a profession which entails a broad spectrum of working activities. One of these activities is workplace counselling which forms a significant part of the internship programme. However, interns often lack the necessary skills to provide counselling. In order to function in a counselling role, the I-O psychologist should have the necessary training to be equipped with counselling skills. It is evident from previous studies that I-O psychology practitioners often feel they lack the ability to counsel individuals sufficiently. Therefore it is important for I-O psychology students to focus on their development to become effective counsellors by focussing on their inter- and intrapersonal skills as part of the skills package as a counsellor. Personal Growth Initiative (PGI) is one way of measuring a person’s intrapersonal skills in terms of the individual’s intention to change and grow. The main aim of this study was to measure the prevalence of PGI among I-O psychology students. Participation in this study was limited to I-O psychology students (N = 568). The students differed in terms of gender, age, ethnicity, and language. The results provided the researcher with an indication of what the students’ intention to grow and develop as an individual entails in order to provide a basis for further research, namely to develop a training programme for I-O psychology students as workplace counsellors.. The PGI of the students were measured by means of the Personal Growth Initiative Scale (PGIS). This is a nine-item instrument with a six-point Likert type scale ranging from 0 (definitely disagree) to 6 (definitely agree). The results indicated that PGI is prevalent among the I-O psychology students. Furthermore, the study showed that PGI is relevant to all gender and ethnic groups amongst I-O psychology students. Significant differences were found for the different ages and languages. From the results it is recommended that higher education institutions adapt training programmes to foster personal growth initiative amongst I-O psychology students. Future research can also make use of the PGIS-II to measure PGI as this is the latest version of the construct. In terms of the organisation it is recommended that I-O practitioners should be more growth focussed. / MCom (Industrial Psychology), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

Background: The study examined the effects of the determinants of under-five mortality in Malawi. It therefore aimed to estimate the rate or prevalence of under-five mortality in Malawi and to examine differentials in infant and child mortality by socio-economic, demographic, environmental, health-seeking behaviour and nutritional value. Methods: This study involved a secondary data analysis of the 2010 Malawi Demographic and Health Survey (MDHS) data set of children under five years old and women who had given birth in the five years preceding the survey. The Kaplan-Meier survival analysis and multivariate hazard analysis were used to examine the relationship between under-five mortality and socio-economic. demographic, environmental, health-seeking behaviour and nutritional factors. Results: The results show that birth order, mother's education, place of residence. region and exclusive breastfeeding were significantly associated with under-five mortality. The results also show that there was no significant association between under-five mortality and other indicators of socio-economic. demographic. environmental, health-seeking behaviour. The results also show that more deaths of under-fives occurred during infancy than during childhood. Conclusion: The results show that more deaths occurred during the first months after birth than after 12 months of age. This showed that mother's education, birth order, place of residence, region and breastfeeding had a greater influence on the survival of the child. / Thesis (M.Soc.Sc. Population Studies) North-West University, Mafikeng Campus, 2014

This study investigated the psychodemographic determinants of family values among undergraduate students in a South African University. Psychodemographic variables in this study include gender, age, emotional distance and family support. Data was collected using a family value validated questionnaire administered on a sample of 100 male and 100 female undergraduate students, giving a total of 200. All participants were randomly sampled. The validated questionnaire has four sections (demography, family value scale, family support, and emotional distance). Five hypotheses were stated based on gender, age, emotional distance, family support and interaction effect and anchored on a 4-Way ANOVA. The results showed that all the three way interactions were significant. Specifically, gender, age and emotional distance have interaction effects on family values (F(14, 1); 3.81; p<.01). Also, gender, age and family support have interaction effects on family values (F (14, 1); 3.31; p<01 ). Similarly, age, emotional distance and family support have significant interaction effects on family values (F (14, 1); 4.79; p<.01). The results also showed that all the two way interactions were not significant (i.e. gender * age; gender * emotional distance; gender * family support; age * emotional distance; age * family support; emotional distance * family support). Therefore, hypotheses one to four were not upheld. Only hypothesis five was upheld. Some of the results are particularly important for young adults and their parents in terms of family management and conflict issues. In conclusion, some recommendations were made for the formulation of relevant strategies that might help undergraduate students in adopting stronger family values. / Thesis (M.Soc.Sc.(Clinical Psychology) North-West University, Mafikeng Campus, 2012

Industrial and organisational (I-O) psychology is a profession which entails a broad spectrum of working activities. One of these activities is workplace counselling which forms a significant part of the internship programme. However, interns often lack the necessary skills to provide counselling. In order to function in a counselling role, the I-O psychologist should have the necessary training to be equipped with counselling skills. It is evident from previous studies that I-O psychology practitioners often feel they lack the ability to counsel individuals sufficiently. Therefore it is important for I-O psychology students to focus on their development to become effective counsellors by focussing on their inter- and intrapersonal skills as part of the skills package as a counsellor. Personal Growth Initiative (PGI) is one way of measuring a person’s intrapersonal skills in terms of the individual’s intention to change and grow. The main aim of this study was to measure the prevalence of PGI among I-O psychology students. Participation in this study was limited to I-O psychology students (N = 568). The students differed in terms of gender, age, ethnicity, and language. The results provided the researcher with an indication of what the students’ intention to grow and develop as an individual entails in order to provide a basis for further research, namely to develop a training programme for I-O psychology students as workplace counsellors.. The PGI of the students were measured by means of the Personal Growth Initiative Scale (PGIS). This is a nine-item instrument with a six-point Likert type scale ranging from 0 (definitely disagree) to 6 (definitely agree). The results indicated that PGI is prevalent among the I-O psychology students. Furthermore, the study showed that PGI is relevant to all gender and ethnic groups amongst I-O psychology students. Significant differences were found for the different ages and languages. From the results it is recommended that higher education institutions adapt training programmes to foster personal growth initiative amongst I-O psychology students. Future research can also make use of the PGIS-II to measure PGI as this is the latest version of the construct. In terms of the organisation it is recommended that I-O practitioners should be more growth focussed. / MCom (Industrial Psychology), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

This research addresses the novel application of design of experiment, artificial neural net-works and logistic regression to study the effect of demographic characteristics on the risk of acquiring HIV infection among the antenatal clinic attendees in South Africa. The annual antenatal HIV survey is the only major national indicator for HIV prevalence in South Africa. This is a vital technique to understand the changes in the HIV epidemic over time. The annual antenatal clinic data contains the following demographic characteristics for each pregnant woman; age (herein called mother's age), partner's age (herein father's age), population group (race), level of education, gravidity (number of pregnancies), parity (number of children born), HIV and syphilis status. This project applied a screening design of experiment technique to rank the effects of individual demographic characteristics on the risk of acquiring an HIV infection. There are a various screening design techniques such as fractional or full factorial and Plackett-Burman designs. In this work, a two-level fractional factorial design was selected for the purposes of screening. In addition to screening designs, this project employed response surface methodologies (RSM) to estimate interaction and quadratic effects of demographic characteristics using a central composite face-centered and a Box-Behnken design. Furthermore, this research presents the novel application of multi-layer perceptron’s (MLP) neural networks to model the demographic characteristics of antenatal clinic attendees. A review report was produced to study the application of neural networks to modelling HIV/AIDS around the world. The latter report is important to enhance our understanding of the extent to which neural networks have been applied to study the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Finally, a binary logistic regression technique was employed to benchmark the results obtained by the design of experiments and neural networks methodologies. The two-level fractional factorial design demonstrated that HIV prevalence was highly sensitive to changes in the mother's age (15-55 years) and level of her education (Grades 0-13). The central composite face centered and Box-Behnken designs employed to study the individual and interaction effects of demographic characteristics on the spread of HIV in South Africa, demonstrated that HIV status of an antenatal clinic attendee was highly sensitive to changes in pregnant mother's age and her educational level. In addition, the interaction of the mother's age with other demographic characteristics was also found to be an important determinant of the risk of acquiring an HIV infection. Furthermore, the central composite face centered and Box-Behnken designs illustrated that, individual-ally the pregnant mother's parity and her partner's age had no marked effect on her HIV status. However, the pregnant woman’s parity and her male partner’s age did show marked effects on her HIV status in “two way interactions with other demographic characteristics”. The multilayer perceptron (MLP) sensitivity test also showed that the age of the pregnant woman had the greatest effect on the risk of acquiring an HIV infection, while her gravidity and syphilis status had the lowest effects. The outcome of the MLP modelling produced the same results obtained by the screening and response surface methodologies. The binary logistic regression technique was compared with a Box-Behnken design to further elucidate the differential effects of demographic characteristics on the risk of acquiring HIV amongst pregnant women. The two methodologies indicated that the age of the pregnant woman and her level of education had the most profound effects on her risk of acquiring an HIV infection. To facilitate the comparison of the performance of the classifiers used in this study, a receiver operating characteristics (ROC) curve was applied. Theoretically, an ROC analysis provides tools to select optimal models and to discard suboptimal ones independent from the cost context or the classification distribution. SAS Enterprise MinerTM was employed to develop the required receiver-of-characteristics (ROC) curves. To validate the results obtained by the above classification methodologies, a credit scoring add-on in SAS Enterprise MinerTM was used to build binary target scorecards comprised of HIV positive and negative datasets for probability determination. The process involved grouping variables using weights-of-evidence (WOE), prior to performing a logistic regression to produce predicted probabilities. The process of creating bins for the scorecard enables the study of the inherent relationship between demographic characteristics and an in-dividual’s HIV status. This technique increases the understanding of the risk ranking ability of the scorecard method, while offering an added advantage of being predictive.

This research addresses the novel application of design of experiment, artificial neural net-works and logistic regression to study the effect of demographic characteristics on the risk of acquiring HIV infection among the antenatal clinic attendees in South Africa. The annual antenatal HIV survey is the only major national indicator for HIV prevalence in South Africa. This is a vital technique to understand the changes in the HIV epidemic over time. The annual antenatal clinic data contains the following demographic characteristics for each pregnant woman; age (herein called mother's age), partner's age (herein father's age), population group (race), level of education, gravidity (number of pregnancies), parity (number of children born), HIV and syphilis status. This project applied a screening design of experiment technique to rank the effects of individual demographic characteristics on the risk of acquiring an HIV infection. There are a various screening design techniques such as fractional or full factorial and Plackett-Burman designs. In this work, a two-level fractional factorial design was selected for the purposes of screening. In addition to screening designs, this project employed response surface methodologies (RSM) to estimate interaction and quadratic effects of demographic characteristics using a central composite face-centered and a Box-Behnken design. Furthermore, this research presents the novel application of multi-layer perceptron’s (MLP) neural networks to model the demographic characteristics of antenatal clinic attendees. A review report was produced to study the application of neural networks to modelling HIV/AIDS around the world. The latter report is important to enhance our understanding of the extent to which neural networks have been applied to study the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Finally, a binary logistic regression technique was employed to benchmark the results obtained by the design of experiments and neural networks methodologies. The two-level fractional factorial design demonstrated that HIV prevalence was highly sensitive to changes in the mother's age (15-55 years) and level of her education (Grades 0-13). The central composite face centered and Box-Behnken designs employed to study the individual and interaction effects of demographic characteristics on the spread of HIV in South Africa, demonstrated that HIV status of an antenatal clinic attendee was highly sensitive to changes in pregnant mother's age and her educational level. In addition, the interaction of the mother's age with other demographic characteristics was also found to be an important determinant of the risk of acquiring an HIV infection. Furthermore, the central composite face centered and Box-Behnken designs illustrated that, individual-ally the pregnant mother's parity and her partner's age had no marked effect on her HIV status. However, the pregnant woman’s parity and her male partner’s age did show marked effects on her HIV status in “two way interactions with other demographic characteristics”. The multilayer perceptron (MLP) sensitivity test also showed that the age of the pregnant woman had the greatest effect on the risk of acquiring an HIV infection, while her gravidity and syphilis status had the lowest effects. The outcome of the MLP modelling produced the same results obtained by the screening and response surface methodologies. The binary logistic regression technique was compared with a Box-Behnken design to further elucidate the differential effects of demographic characteristics on the risk of acquiring HIV amongst pregnant women. The two methodologies indicated that the age of the pregnant woman and her level of education had the most profound effects on her risk of acquiring an HIV infection. To facilitate the comparison of the performance of the classifiers used in this study, a receiver operating characteristics (ROC) curve was applied. Theoretically, an ROC analysis provides tools to select optimal models and to discard suboptimal ones independent from the cost context or the classification distribution. SAS Enterprise MinerTM was employed to develop the required receiver-of-characteristics (ROC) curves. To validate the results obtained by the above classification methodologies, a credit scoring add-on in SAS Enterprise MinerTM was used to build binary target scorecards comprised of HIV positive and negative datasets for probability determination. The process involved grouping variables using weights-of-evidence (WOE), prior to performing a logistic regression to produce predicted probabilities. The process of creating bins for the scorecard enables the study of the inherent relationship between demographic characteristics and an in-dividual’s HIV status. This technique increases the understanding of the risk ranking ability of the scorecard method, while offering an added advantage of being predictive.