This study investigated community members’ understanding of research and res earch collaboration. Their attitudes towards research, as well as their perceptions of research, were explored as were factors that affected their understanding of research and research collaboration. The study used maximum variation sampling to select 12 participants who occupy di fferent influential positions in the community. The current study was conducted in the eas tern part of KwaZulu-Natal. An interview guide was used to collect data, aimed at acquir ing in-depth understanding of community conceptions of research and research collaboration. The at titudes and perceptions of the research were examined. Lastly, factors that affect research and research collaboration were explored. The results suggest that the participants have a limited understanding of Wes tern research. Community training and education is thus warranted. Participants indicated that community members would appreciate the establishment of relationships characterised b y mutual respect for different world views held by researchers and participants. This was viewed a s a vehicle towards a more consultative approach to research which does not overlook the interface of world views for research outcomes to be useful. This was also perceived as likely to facil itate adequate participation in decision making in the research process. The involvement of key community members was emphasised. / Thesis (M.Soc.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2009.

Over the past thirty years, public interest science organizations have had significant and varied effects on the course of several contemporary social movements, on public knowledge of science, and on policy ranging from weapons to toxic waste to recombinant DNA. This dissertation considers the origins of these organizations, and their differential ability to survive. Archival, interview, and secondary data analyses of three prominent public interest science organizations: Scientists' Institute for Public Information, Science for the People, and the Union of Concerned Scientists are used to examine these questions. This research shows that these organizations were formed by scientists in the 1950s and 1960s who found that their political commitments were increasingly at odds with scientific demands for objectivity and value-neutrality. The tension arose as a result of three factors: the liberalization of the political climate in the 1950s and 1960s, the development of political protest that charged science with being complicit making war possible and the encouragement, even demand, that Leftists find ways to join their professional and political lives. As a result, some scientists created new organizations that publicly defined scientists as socially responsible. Once created, however, these organizations faced a rapidly changing political, scientific and organizational climate that made their survival difficult. I show how early choices about goals, membership, activities, and division of labor in each group strongly shaped the differential ability of organizations to survive over time. Adaptive survival is shown to be related to the ability of an organization to engage in repeated and routinized exchanges with other individuals and groups, which is in turn dependent on choices organizations make within months of their founding. The last section of the dissertation suggests how public interest science organizations (both individually and collectively) expand the political capacities of scientists and the public, affect the practice and subject matter of science, and shaped the lives of the participants.

Research in resource-limited, multi-cultural contexts raises complex ethical concerns. The term ‘over-researched community’ (ORC) has increasingly been raised as an ethical concern and potential barrier to community participation in research. However, the term lacks conceptual clarity and is omitted from established ethical guidelines and academic literature. In light of the concern being raised in relation to vitally needed HIV prevention research in developing countries, a critical exploration of the meaning of the notion was undertaken. Guided by Emanuel et al.’s (2004) eight principles for ethically sound research in developing countries, this study explored the relevance and meaning of the terms ‘over-research’ and ‘over-researched community’ through a thorough review of ethical guidance documents and analysis of key stakeholder perspectives. In-depth interviews were conducted with 23 resource persons from research ethics committees, community advisory boards and research organisations in South Africa. Interviews were transcribed and translated where necessary and data were analysed thematically. ‘Over-research’ was found to reflect a conglomeration of ethical concerns, often being used as a proxy for existing ethical concepts. ‘Over-research’ might be interpreted to mean exploitation. However, exploitation itself could mean a range of different things. ‘Over-research’ seemed fundamentally linked to disparate positions and perspectives between different stakeholders in the research interaction, arising from challenges in inter-stakeholder relationships. Analysis of the data suggests that using the term may lead to an obscured understanding of real or perceived ethical transgressions, making it difficult to intervene to address the underlying concerns. It is recommended that the term not be used in research ethics discourse. However, because it represents other legitimate concerns, it should not be dismissed without careful exploration. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2010.

Classical attribution theorists developed models of causal attribution that reflected their belief that people were primarily interested in attribution accuracy. These models did not consider contextual factors such as relationships and societal norms which resulted in the emergence of several empirical puzzles many of which are related to the use of consensus information. This study investigates whether the puzzle of the differential treatment of consensus information can be solved if it is assumed that people are primarily concerned with social features of the attribution setting rather than strict attribution accuracy. This study experimentally tests the role of key aspects of the social context such as the impact of social strategies in Kelley’s model of attribution to explore whether some of its empirical anomalies could have their origins in the social aspects of attribution in research contexts. The study found that participants were 2.63 times more likely to provide ‘inaccurate’ responses when there was a risk that the accurate answer would be socially disruptive. Findings from this study suggest that participants prioritise the implications of the social context over attribution accuracy. / Thesis (M.Soc.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2009.

This thesis seeks to demonstrate, by way of a multidisciplinary study, that consent is, despite its legal definition which refers to the free and enlighted expression of individual will, in fact, at times limited if not eliminated, by social considerations, arising from the medical, economic and legal context. These considerations reflect what one might call the social norm. An appropriate understanding of consent serves, therefore, to express the social norm as a constraint, which, in turn, acts as a measure of what it means to belong in society. Thus, while consent is often presented as the fundamental principle to be respected in biomedical research, it is in reality, merely one principle to respect among others. These limitations connected to consent are exacerbated in emergency situations where consent is sometimes reduced to mere signature, and in some cases it has been recognized that research can be undertaken without the subject's prior consent.

This study explores online dating by studying the relationship between self-disclosure and self-efficacy in an online dating environment. This research study examines the way self-disclosure, self-efficacy, self-esteem, and gender interrelate in an online dating environment. This study includes, but is not limited to, discussion of the type of correlation between self-efficacy and self-esteem, the relationship between self-disclosure and self-efficacy, and the differences between men's and women's self-disclosure in an online dating environment. From conducting this study, the researcher was able to determine that there is a statistically significant relationship between gender and how it relates to self-disclosure and self-efficacy. With the results from the study, the understanding of how different variables relate to online dating and romantic relationships has been taken one step further as it helps fill the gap in the literature.

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The report is about participatory action research with caregivers at the 'Tsoga 0 ltirele" centre for the mentally disabled. It was a process where the caregivers were involved in a series of action, plan and reflection in researching their situation. The facilitation process assisted the caregivers to look at their problems at the centre and improve service delivery in caring for the mentally disabled children. Several meetings were held where action, plan and reflection took place. Caregivers decided on their own when to meet and discuss issues that concerned them. They planned what needed to be dealt with and took collective action to address these needs. The facilitation process enabled caregivers to research their own problems, embrace errors experienced and recognise progress. People Centred Approach, Community Development and Participatory Action Research complemented one another in capacitating caregivers. Through it they learned to improve their own programmes and to run their meetings, improve marketing skills and fundraising. / Social Work / M.A. (Social Science (Mental Health))

The report is about participatory action research with caregivers at the 'Tsoga 0 ltirele" centre for the mentally disabled. It was a process where the caregivers were involved in a series of action, plan and reflection in researching their situation. The facilitation process assisted the caregivers to look at their problems at the centre and improve service delivery in caring for the mentally disabled children. Several meetings were held where action, plan and reflection took place. Caregivers decided on their own when to meet and discuss issues that concerned them. They planned what needed to be dealt with and took collective action to address these needs. The facilitation process enabled caregivers to research their own problems, embrace errors experienced and recognise progress. People Centred Approach, Community Development and Participatory Action Research complemented one another in capacitating caregivers. Through it they learned to improve their own programmes and to run their meetings, improve marketing skills and fundraising. / Social Work / M.A. (Social Science (Mental Health))