Obesity is a worldwide problem which affects individuals regardless of age, culture or ethnicity. Obesity is associated with health risks, financial implications, and social consequences. There are numerous explanations for obesity, although even with these explanations, long-term treatment for obesity has not been highly effective. Focussing on the lived experiences of obese individuals may illuminate different understandings which could aid in explaining this. Phenomenology, as a branch of philosophy and employed in this dissertation is concerned with individuals’ lived experiences. The present study conducted a qualitative systematic literature review on phenomenological research on individuals’ experiences of obesity. Nine studies were analysed using a qualitative systematic literature review methodology. The data analysis revealed obese individuals’ experiences in three main themes: control, acceptance, and restriction. The three themes were understood to have an interrelationship with one another, and to be in a continuous dynamic interplay, which cannot be separated and understood in isolation, regarding the participants’ experiences. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2014. / lmchunu2014 / Psychology / unrestricted

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Cognitive difficulties can persist for months and years after stroke and adversely impact confidence, mood and functional recovery. Stroke survivors, carers and healthcare professionals collectively agree that improving cognition is the number one research priority for life after stroke. Future research should include measurements of outcome that service users deem important. Patient reported outcome measures (PROMs) are a means of gaining patient perspectives that can be standardised for use in a trial. PROMs should be developed with service users to incorporate their priorities but people with cognitive difficulties are often systematically excluded from the development and use of PROMs. Study 1 used qualitative interviews (N=16) to explore stroke survivor perspectives on the important and measureable impacts of persisting cognitive problems. The results of this study generated requirements for a PROM that related to conceptual underpinning and face validity of a measurement tool. Study 2 was a systematic review of existing PROMs related to cognition. 20 Identified PROMs were critically appraised against the requirements generated in the qualitative study. No existing PROMs were identified that met all of the qualitative study review criteria. The next stage described in chapter 3, was to develop a new PROM that: utilised the strengths of existing tools; met qualitative study requirements; and was refined through consultation with different stakeholders, prioritising feedback of stroke survivors with cognitive difficulties. The result of this work was the Patient Reported Evaluation of Cognitive State (PRECiS) scale. Study 3 was a psychometric study with stroke survivors (N=164) to test PRECiS in a large sample. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected on acceptability, feasibility and other psychometric properties of validity and reliability. PRECiS demonstrated good acceptability to stroke survivors and performed well psychometrically. Future validation work required for PRECiS is described in discussion chapter 4. Subject to further validation work, PRECiS may be particularly useful for pragmatic trials of cognitive rehabilitation after stroke.