Consumer complaint behaviour research in transitional and emerging countries, including South Africa, is still in its infancy stage. The vast changes to the South African consumer landscape along with the socio-political changes and the multicultural population's ongoing cultural changes necessitate the monitoring of changes in personal values. However, very little research has been done in South Africa regarding consumers' personal values. The effect of personal values on complaint behaviour in a South African context has also not yet been explored. As an extension of the social adaptation theory, several researchers have proposed a value-attitude-behaviour (VAB) hierarchy model (Homer & Kahle, 1988; Cai & Shannon, 2012) in order to explain the relationship between values and behaviour. The model proposes that causality flows from abstract values, through mid-range attitudes, to specific behaviours (Homer & Kahle, 1988; Hayley, Zinkiewicz & Hardiman, 2014); that is, values influence behaviour indirectly through attitudes. While the VAB model has been confirmed in a variety of consumer behaviour contexts, it has not yet been explored in a South African complaint behaviour context. This study therefore used social adaptation theory and the VAB model as theoretical framework to determine the effect of consumers' personal values and attitudes towards appliance retailers' complaint handling on their consumer complaint behaviour in the South African context. In addition, the relationships between demographic variables and personal values and also between demographic variables and consumer complaint behaviour were explored. A survey was administered to consumers who were dissatisfied with the performance of a major household appliance within a four-year memory recall period. Data was collected via a self-administered questionnaire measuring personal values with Kahle's (1983) List of Values (LOV) and attitudes toward appliance retailers' complaint handling, using an adapted version of Keng, Richmond and Han's (1995) "Attitudes toward businesses" scale. Convenience sampling and snowball sampling were employed in Tshwane, a major metropolitan area of South Africa, which generated 361 usable questionnaires. Exploratory factor analysis revealed three value dimensions, namely (1) Harmony and Respect, (2) Hedonism and (3) Achievement. Results of the Pearson correlation analysis showed that higher valuing of any one of the three value dimensions lead to more negative attitudes towards appliance retailers' complaint handling. Furthermore, multinomial logistic regression analysis revealed that more negative attitudes towards appliance retailers' complaint handling lead to a decreased likelihood of engaging in public complaint behaviour. Moreover, ANOVA revealed relationships between specific personal value dimensions and gender, age and population group. The study has implications for marketers, policy makers, appliance retailers and consumer protection organisations. / Navorsing oor verbruikers se klagte-gedrag in opkomende lande, insluitend Suid-Afrika, is nie baie ver gevorder nie. Die omvattende veranderende Suid-Afrikaanse verbruikerslandskap, tesame met die volgehoue sosio-politieke veranderinge en die kulturele veranderinge in die multikulturele polulasie, noodsaak die monitering van veranderinge in verbruikers se waardes. Daar bestaan egter baie min navorsing in Suid-Afrika oor verbruikers se persoonlike waardes. Voorts is die effek van persoonlike waardes op klagte-gedrag nog nie in die Suid-Afrikaanse konteks ondersoek nie. Verskeie navorsers stel voor dat die waarde-houding-gedrag-hiërargiemodel, wat uit sosiale aanpassingsteorie spruit, gebruik moet word om die verhouding tussen waardes en gedrag te verstaan. Die model stel dat oorsaaklikheid vanaf abstrakte waardes, deur houdings, na spesifieke gedrag vloei (Homer & Kahle, 1988; Hayley et al., 2014). Dit wil sê, waardes beïnvloed gedrag indirek deur houdings. Terwyl die waarde-houding-gedrag-model in 'n verskeidenheid klagte-gedrag-kontekste bevestig is, is dit nog nie in 'n Suid-Afrikaanse klagte-gedrag-konteks ondersoek nie. Gevolglik is die sosiale aanpassingsteorie en die waarde-houding-gedrag-model as teoretiese raamwerk in hierdie studie toegepas om die effek van verbruikers se persoonlike waardes en houdings teenoor kleinhandelaars se klagte-hantering op hulle klagte-gedrag in die Suid-Afrikaanse konteks te bepaal. Die verwantskappe tussen verbruikers se demografiese veranderlikes en hulle persoonlike waardes, en tussen demografiese veranderlikes en klagte-gedrag is ook verken. 'n Opname is onder verbruikers wat ontevrede was met die werksverrigting van hulle groot huishoudelike toerusting oor 'n vier-jaar-herroepingstydperk gedoen. Data is deur 'n selfgeadministreerde vraelys ingesamel waarin persoonlike waardes met Kahle (1983) se List of Values (LOV) en houdings teenoor kleinhandelaars se klagte-hantering met 'n aangepaste weergawe van Keng et al. (1995) se "Houdings teenoor besighede"-skaal gemeet is. Geriefsteekproefneming en sneeubalsteekproefneming, wat 361 bruikbare vraelyste opgelewer het, is in Tswane, 'n groot metropolitaanse gebied in Suid-Afrika, onderneem. Verkennende faktoranalise het drie waardedimensies, naamlik (1) Harmonie en Respek, (2) Hedonisme en (3) Prestasie, opgelewer. Die Pearsonkorrelasie-analise se resultate toon dat 'n toename in belangrikheid in enige van die drie waardedimensies tot 'n meer negatiewe houding teenoor kleinhandelaars se klagte-hantering lei. Voorts dui die resultate van die multinomiese logistiese regressie-analise daarop dat 'n toename in verbruikers se negatiewe houding teenoor kleinhandelaars se klagte-hantering tot 'n afname lei in hul geneigdheid tot publieke klagte-gedrag. Die resultate van die ANOVA-analise toon verder dat daar verwantskappe tussen spesifieke persoonlike waardes en geslag, ouderdom en populasiegroep bestaan. Die studie het implikasies vir bemarkers, beleidmakers, kleinhandelaars en verbruikersbeskerming-organisasies. / Dissertation (MConsumer Science)--University of Pretoria, 2016. / Consumer Science / MConsumer Science / Unrestricted

In this study, linear and non-linear models were trained on real data to mimic the relationship between household electricity consumption and indoor temperature, in the rooms of an apartment in downtown Stockholm. The aim was to better understand this relationship and to distinguish any divergence between the different rooms. With data from two weeks of measurements, the models proved to perform well when tested on validation data for almost all rooms, only showing performance dips for the middle room. A noticeable correlation between the electricity consumption and the indoor temperature was observed for all rooms except the bedroom. However, the benefits of using this information to predict the indoor temperature are limited and differ between the rooms. The household electricity consumption primarily brought beneficial information to the kitchen models, where most of the heat generating appliances were located. It was found that linear models were sufficient to represent the thermal systems of the rooms, performing equally well and often better than non-linear models.

PHDRDV / Institute for Rural Development

This dissertation examines a marginal group in Russian history and literature, domestic servants (dvorovye liudi)— proprietary peasants taken by their masters into the house to fulfill a variety of service roles. I consider this character group as an artistic device, an ideological signifier that draws upon a cluster of reader’s associations, and as a group deeply connected to the master class, the noblemen (dvoriane). Historically, the two were interconnected for generations, sharing domestic space, blood, history, and mutual interests. I argue that contrary to their historical prototypes, the Russian literary master and servant are interdependent, with both participants acutely aware of each other, allowing the implied author to use each to comment on the other and the wider social context of their relations. As the Emancipation (1861) approached, the literary portrayal of the shifting relations between these two groups began to signal the massive changes that shook Russian society during the long nineteenth century. These shifts were often depicted in spatial terms in literary works, with master and servant perpetually re-negotiating their mutual positions within limited spatial economies, most prominently, in the gentry house. Domestic space, where masters and servants coexist and which serves as a microcosm of Russian society, is the ideal space in which authors can navigate unstable social relationships and work out potential solutions to their conflicts. The domestic stage can stand in for the political or social one. How servants navigate space in their master’s home gives clues to the broader issues authors address in their narratives. My dissertation is structured according to the space most significant for the relationship between master and servant: the bedroom or nursery (Introduction), on the road (Chapter 1), private-public space (Chapter 2), and absence of space (Chapter 3). The Conclusion examines the increasing danger of the intimate and often inappropriate proximity of servant and master when combined with irreconcilable class differences and a steadfast resistance from those in power to the redistribution of space. I turn to works of Tolstoy, Gogol, Dostoevsky, Goncharov, Turgenev, Chekhov, and Bunin to examine these spaces. Embedded in historical context, my project addresses the ramifications of the Emancipation and gestures forward to the historical events of the twentieth century. When high expectations for radical redistribution of resources and status were frustrated, transgression and then violence became the means for servants’ mobility, social and spatial. Russian literature from the “long nineteenth-century” captured the instability of the renegotiations of rights and resources between masters and servants. My conclusion sees the gentry house collapse as a result of these clashes.

The thesis focuses on the functioning of volunteering within the family. The theoretical part deals with the definition of concepts related to the definition of volunteering. This thesis also includes the search of foreign literature which is dedicated to the study of volunteering in the family. In the empirical part is applied a qualitative research which is performed by the method of grounded theory. In the thesis are employed in-depth interviews on members of three families in which more than one family member volunteers are actively involved. The aim of the thesis is to add a different point of view into the topic of transfer of volunteering in the family. This thesis points out the family dimension of volunteering which most studies nowadays marginalize. Exploring the transfer of volunteering in the family is able to provide a unique insight of how each member is aware of volunteering. It also considers how and for which reasons the family members are or are not committed to the volunteering.

In Chapter 1, which is co-authored with Rossella Calvi and Arthur Lewbel, we show that a local average treatment effect (LATE) can sometimes be identified and consistently estimated when treatment is mismeasured, or when treatment is estimated using a possibly misspecified structural model. Our associated estimator, which we call Mismeasurement Robust LATE (MR-LATE), is based on differencing two different mismeasures of treatment. In our empirical application, treatment is a measure of empowerment: whether a wife has control of substantial household resources. Due to measurement difficulties and sharing of goods within a household, this treatment cannot be directly observed without error, and so must be estimated. Our outcomes are health indicators of family members. We first estimate a structural model to obtain the otherwise unobserved treatment indicator. Then, using changes in inheritance laws in India as an instrument, we apply our new MR-LATE estimator. We find that women's empowerment substantially decreases their probability of being anemic or underweight, and increases children's likelihood of receiving vaccinations. We find no evidence of negative effects on men's health. Then, using changes in inheritance laws in India as an instrument, we apply our new MR-LATE estimator. We find that women's empowerment substantially decreases their probability of being anemic or underweight, and increases children's likelihood of receiving vaccinations.In Chapter 2, which is co-authored with Alexander Wolf, we take the Dunbar et al (2013) (DLP) model and explore its strength and weaknesses at recovering information regarding household sharing of resources. DLP develop a collective model of the household that allows to identify resource shares, that is, how total household resources are divided up among household members. We show why, especially when the data exhibit relatively flat Engel curves, the model is weakly identified and induces high variability and an implausible pattern in least squares estimates. We propose an estimation strategy nested in their framework that greatly reduces this practical impediment to recovery of individual resource shares. To achieve this, we follow a shrinkage method that incorporates additional (or out-of-sample) information on singles and relies on mild assumptions on preferences. We show the practical usefulness of this strategy through a series of Monte Carlo simulations and by applying it to Mexican data. The results show that our approach is robust, gives a plausible picture of the household decision process, and is particularly beneficial for the practitioner who wishes to apply the DLP framework.Finally, in Chapter 3, which is co-authored with Bram De Rock and Tom Potoms, we exploit the experimental set-up of a conditional cash transfers (CCT) program in Mexico to estimate a collective model of the household and to investigate how parents allocate household resources. This is important to understand because the success of policies aimed at fighting poverty depends crucially on how parents respond to monetary incentives. If parents allocate resources inefficiently (or non-cooperatively), the resulting level of well-being is likely to fall behind the socially efficient optimum. This is undesirable given the prevalence of CCT programs over the last two decades which have occupied a large percentage of governments' annual anti-poverty budgets. Although there is evidence that they have been beneficial, their effectiveness may still be limited. Our aim is to tackle this research question by estimating a theoretically-consistent demand system and by applying at best a powerful test of household efficiency developed by Bourguignon et al (2009). Contrary to previous results, we show that households make efficient decisions only at the beginning of the program, but fail to cooperate later on. In order to rationalize these results, we propose a simple model of household behaviour where decision makers may change their preferences as a result of a treatment that gives information about the importance of a public good. / Doctorat en Sciences économiques et de gestion / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

In the final quarter of the 18th century, a planter's dwelling overlooking the Caribbean Sea at Little Bay on the northwest coast of Montserrat in the British Leeward Islands was destroyed by fire and never reoccupied. Archaeological excavations in 2010 and 2011 yielded fragments of personal adornment, dress, household furnishings, and the house containing them providing an intimate portrait of an anonymous white male and his domestic arrangements. We do not know much about the planter class, though its members were central to the structure of 18th-century West Indian society. I use this rich archaeological data alongside archival, pictorial, and comparative analyses to particularize a West Indian planter and investigate the construction of colonial Creole identity. Evidence from archaeological, architectural, and ethnographic sources allow a reconstruction of the plantation house as a single-pile, three-cell plan, wood-frame structure with a raised masonry foundation and front gallery. This form, adapted to the Caribbean environment, altered English understanding and use of private and public spaces. Through archival research, I linked Little Bay to the Piper family, documenting its transfer through generations of unmarried male relatives. At the time of the fire the inhabitant was a Montserratian born, third-generation white male of English descent, meaning a white Creole. Ceramic gaming disks and glass beads identical to examples found in enslaved contexts indicate a household comprised of domestic slaves and planter. The head of household was a wealthy male versed in 18th-century British aesthetics as shown by a fob seal, coat buttons, and flintlock pistol. Punch bowls, glassware, tea and tableware reflect refined British cultural sensibilities, but as first-person travelogues recount, such goods were redeployed in distinctive colonial form with Creole open-door sociability and shared domesticity with household enslaved. Taken together, the finds demonstrate how this colonial Creole used English material goods to craft a distinctive form of white masculine identity within the West Indian planter class. In this world of mixed classes, races, and heritages, such formulations required choices. My research highlights how British objects and local practice combined to create new meanings for plantation society in Montserrat and the West Indies.

Thesis (M.Sc. (Geography)) -- University of Limpopo, 2019 / South Africa’s population is more than 60% urbanised. Although food poverty has historically been associated with rural communities, this is no longer the case. With sustained urbanisation, food insecurity is now being experienced in the urban areas as well. The aim of this study was therefore to assess household food security levels and determinants, and to examine household food security coping strategies in Brazzaville informal settlement, Pretoria. The study adopted a quantitative approach which involved the collection of information through a standardised household questionnaire. A statistically representative sample of 95 households participated in the study. Household questionnaires were used to collect information on household demographics, income and expenditure statistics, poverty data as well as household food access issues. In terms of data analysis, the survey used three measures of household food insecurity: a) the Household Food Insecurity Access Prevalence Indicator (HFIAP); b) the Household Dietary Diversity Score (HDDS); and c) the Months of Adequate Household Food Provisioning (MAHFP) measurements of household food access. The survey results indicate that 29.5% of households in Brazzaville informal settlement were food secure and 70.5% food insecure. Contrary to conventional wisdom of female-headed households being the most food insecure, results of this study show that maleheaded households were the most food insecure. In addition, households with low incomes, low level of education, and high unemployment were also likely to be food insecure. The results of the regression analysis suggest that gender, household income, and employment influences household food security. The probability of food security decreases if household is headed by a female, because females can adopt multiple coping strategies. The study concludes that food insecurity coping strategies vary significantly from one household to another according to their expenses, objectives and constrains. Keywords: Household food insecurity, urbanisation, livelihood, Brazzaville informal settlement, coping strategies. / National Research Foundation (NRF)

Although there is a long tradition of research into the relationship between technology and psychological well-being, few studies examine the relationship between mobile phone use and loneliness (Chan, 2015). Far away from their home countries and living in constrained conditions, female domestic workers in particular might experience chronic loneliness, and the mobile phone is a crucial lifeline for them. Using a face-to-face survey of 492 Filipino domestic workers in Hong Kong, this dissertation details how different uses of mobile phones are related to different types of loneliness among this vulnerable population. By differentiating between communicative and non-communicative use of the mobile phone, and between social loneliness and emotional loneliness, the results indicate that Filipino domestic workers' non-communicative use of the mobile phone could decrease their social loneliness, while communicative use neither decreases nor increases both social and emotional loneliness. This finding supports the proposition that mobile phone use is beneficial to individuals' psychological well-being and extends the existing literature on the relationship between mobile phone use and loneliness. Most importantly, there is still no a systematic framework to explain the underlying mechanism connecting mobile phone use and loneliness. Based on the technology paradox and the paradoxical impact of mobile phone use on loneliness, this dissertation develops a two-pathway model to illustrate the underlying mechanism. The first pathway postulates that mobile phone use has a positive influence on loneliness through preference for online communication and problematic mobile phone use, which is based upon the theoretical framework of Davis's (2001) cognitive-behavioral model, Caplan's (2003) theory of preference for online communication, and the literature on the bidirectional relationship between technology and psychological well-being. Grounded in the social convoy model (Kahn &Antonucci, 1980; Antonucci, 2001), the second pathway posits that mobile phone use has a negative impact on loneliness through social network availability and social support. The findings show that the two-pathway model indeed exists. In the first pathway, mobile phone use increases emotional loneliness by leading to problematic mobile phone use. In the second pathway, mobile phone use results in decreased social loneliness through increased social support or through the joint impact of social network availability and social support. This dissertation makes theoretical and practical contributions to the field of mobile phone use, not only by developing a two-pathway model to uncover the underlying mechanism connecting mobile phone use with loneliness, but also demonstrates the technology paradox and the paradoxical impact of mobile phone use on loneliness among the Filipino domestic workers in Hong Kong. It will be worthwhile to replicate and testify this two-pathway model in other populations, such as elders, adolescents, and young adults.

Separating household waste into fractions at source is a common method of household waste collection in most European countries. In 1994 Sweden introduced producer liability legislation for packaging, which requires householders to sort, clean and recycle different types of packaging waste. The recycling behaviour of householders is complex and diverse and has been widely investigated. However, the recycling behaviour of householders living in multicultural urban areas has received less attention. Therefore, little is known about the recycling behaviour and attitudes of the ethnic minorities that comprise a sizeable proportion of many urban populations. This thesis examined recycling behaviour among multicultural householders in the urban area of Järva, north-west Stockholm, Sweden, which is home to a significant proportion of immigrants from different parts of the world. Three practical studies were conducted on the recycling behaviour of householders, with data collected through literature reviews, field screening studies for relevant cases, postal surveys and in-depth interviews with householders. A meta-analysis of studies on householder recycling behaviour published in the period 1990-2010 provided a conceptual framework for explaining recycling behaviour. It also revealed some specific features of the determining factors of recycling behaviour among householders in multicultural urban areas. For example, despite self-reported high levels of environmental concern among multicultural respondents in Järva, recycling behaviour was not determined by this factor but by attitudes towards recycling. The data also showed that the most widespread reason for participating in recycling schemes was acceptance of legal norms. The interview study indicated that providing clear, understandable and easily accessible written information in ethnic languages, supported by “word-of-mouth” information, would probably increase participation by Järva householders in recycling schemes. However, lifestyle and the ethnic origins of householders also influenced their waste generation and recycling behaviour. The methodological improvements presented here can help develop future strategies targeted at increasing the waste management behaviour of the important multicultural urban group, while also ensuring that limited resources are effectively used. / La separación de la basura doméstica en fracciones en el lugar donde se genera es uno de los métodos más comunes de recogida en la mayoría de países europeos. En 1994 se introdujo una ordenanza en Suecia sobre la responsabilidad del productor en el empaquetado. Esta ordenanza encomienda a los habitantes de las viviendas a clasificar los residuos, limpiarlos y clasificarlos en diferentes tipos. El comportamiento hacia el reciclaje de los habitantes es complejo y diverso al igual que otros comportamientos mediombientales y ha sido investigado en numerosas ocasiones. Desafortunadamente, este comportamiento cara al reciclaje en áreas urbanas multiculturales ha recibido poca atención y se conoce poco sobre la actitud hacia el reciclaje de las minorías étnicas que forman parte de la población urbana de Suecia. Esta tesis examina el comportamiento hacia el reciclaje entre los habitantes de una zona urbana multicultural del Noroeste de Estocolmo, Järva, en Suecia, en la que residen una proporción significante de inmigrantes procedentes de diferentes partes del mundo. Se han llevado a cabo tres estudios prácticos sobre el comportamiento hacia el reciclaje incluyendo datos recogidos en la bibliografía revisada, estudios de campo en algunos casos relevantes, encuestas a través de correo ordinario y entrevistas en profundidad con los habitantes. Los resultado del meta-análisis realizado sobre la actitud hacia el reciclaje publicados durante el periodo 1990-2010 indican un marco conceptual para la explicación de las formas de reciclaje. Sin embargo, los resultados de nuestro estudio revelan algunas especificidades en factores sobre el reciclaje en los habitantes de zonas multiculturales. Nuestros datos demuestran que, a pesar de un elevado nivel de compromiso medioambiental según las respuestas de los habitantes de Järva, el reciclaje no está determinado por este factor. Al contrario, las actitudes hacia el reciclaje tienen una correlación positiva y determinan los comportamientos entre los habitantes de Järva. Se ha demostrado que la principal razón para reciclar es la legalidad vigente. Los resultados de las entrevistas sugieren que una oferta clara, comprensible y de fácil acceso redactada en las diferentes lenguas de los grupos étnicos al igual que apoyada por la información transmitida “boca a boca” influiría en la participación de los habitantes de Järva. Los resultados han puesto de manifiesto que el estilo de vida y la diversidad étnica de la población influyen en la generación de residuos y el reciclaje. Esta tesis contribuye a un desarrollo metodológico que será útil para el futuro desarrollo de estrategias orientadas en la gestión de residuos al igual que asegurar un uso eficiente de los recursos. / Разделение бытовых отходов является распространенным методом сбора бытовых отходов в большенстве европейских стран.  В 1994 году Швеция ввела законодательную ответственность производителей упаковки, которая включает требование раздельной сортировки упаковочного материяла населением для последующей ее переработки. Вопрос мотивации и участия населения в раздельном сборе бытовых отходов является сложным и многосторонним и был широко исследован. Тем не менее исследованию поведения и мотивации жителей многокультурных городских районов уделялось значительно меньше внимания. Мало что известо о мотивах участия в раздельном сборе бытовых отходов в отношении этнических меньшинств, которые составляют значительную часть городских мегаполисов. Данный тезис рассматривает мотивацию и участие населения в раздельном сборе бытовых отходов в многокультурном городском районе Järva, расположенном на северо-западе Стокгольма (Швеция). Järva  явлается домом для большого числа иммигрантов из разных частей мира. Было проделанно три исследования по изучению участия населения в раздельном сборе бытовых отходов. Данные были собраны с помощью обозрений опубликованной литературы, непосредственного изучения поведения населения, анкетирования и развернутых интервью. С помощью мета-анализа литературы опубликованной в период с 1990 по 2010 годы были выделены концептуальные основы для обьяснения участия населения в раздельном сборе бытовых отходов. Также были выявлени характерные черты определяющие мотивы для участия населения из многонациональных городских районов. Не смотря на выявленный высокий уровень экологической обеспокоенности среди населения многокультурного района  Järva, участие в раздельном сборе мусора не определяется этим фактором. Тогда как персональная мотивация по отношению к  вторичной переработки отходов является движущим фактором к участию. Наиболее распространенной причиной для участия в раздельном сборе отходов стало принятие населением многокультурного района правовых норм. Интервью показали, что доступность ясной, краткой информации на национальных языках, так же как и передающаяся 'из уст в уста' информация увеличивает процент участия населения в раздельном сборе отходов. Тем не менее образ жизни и этническое происхождение влияет на состав произведенных населением отходов и их отношение к вторичной переработке. Результаты проведенных исследований направленны на усовершенствование будущих стратегий по привлечению населения многокультурных городских районнов к участию в раздельном сборе отходов, а также обеспечение того, что бы ограниченные ресурсы были использованны эффективно. / <p>QC 20120927</p>