Access to abstract restricted until December 2014. / Review of relevant literature -- Efficiency of constructed wetlands to remove an antimicrobial agent triclosan from wastewater -- The removal of triclosan from laboratory scale constructed wetlands with four species of wetland plants -- Additional research : determination of the hydraulic retention time in an operational subsurface constructed wetland -- Additional research methods : the evaluation of the subsurface constructed wetland for the treatment of iron, phosphorus, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, dissolved oxygen, pH and E. coli. / Access to thesis restricted until December 2014 / Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Management

Child Sexual Abuse is a serious and complex issue for South Africa, demonstrating one of the highest prevalence rates in the world. Scarcity of professional resources demands effective intervention through prevention programmes which largely rely on non-profit organisations as a last hope to decrease the excessively high rates of abuse. Due to lack of resources within the non-profit organisations, they largely rely on volunteers who are often from the late adolescent developmental stage to present these prevention programmes. The aim of this study was to explore the perceptions and experiences of emerging adult volunteers presenting a sensitive child sexual abuse prevention programme in schools in South Africa. The objectives were to gain further insight and understanding into the late adolescent developmental stage in regard to the participants’ views of presenting a child sexual abuse prevention programme and to identify what aspects of the programme should be altered, improved or continued to avoid risk and harm to these volunteers. The research approach was qualitative, with the use of case-study and phenomenological strategies that allowed for in-depth insight into how a small group of late adolescents made sense of their experiences and transformed these into subjective, conscious meanings. Criterion-based sampling was used to find the participants who had previously presented the child sexual abuse prevention programme. Data were collected by means of six semi-structured one-on-one interviews and six open-ended questionnaires with twelve participants between the ages of 18-22. Common themes, patterns, and regularities that recurred throughout the interviews and open-ended questionnaires were identified and the main themes that were evident formed the overall image reflective of the experiences of the volunteers. The findings suggest that the late adolescent stage may be a good age group for presenting this challenging and imperative task. To allow for the most positive impact and avoid harm it is, however, essential that non-experiences of late adolescents presenting a child sexual abuse prevention programme profit organisations provide adequate psychological and emotional support to the volunteers throughout the duration of the programme. The study shows that late adolescents, who felt they had received adequate psychological support, indicated an overall more beneficial and rewarding experience. Participants who felt they had not received sufficient support, reported feelings of helplessness and depressive thoughts, indicating emotional and possibly psychological harm. The study highlights the necessity for adequate support of the late adolescent volunteers presenting sensitive programmes in the future. / Thesis (MA (Psychology))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013.

Child Sexual Abuse is a serious and complex issue for South Africa, demonstrating one of the highest prevalence rates in the world. Scarcity of professional resources demands effective intervention through prevention programmes which largely rely on non-profit organisations as a last hope to decrease the excessively high rates of abuse. Due to lack of resources within the non-profit organisations, they largely rely on volunteers who are often from the late adolescent developmental stage to present these prevention programmes. The aim of this study was to explore the perceptions and experiences of emerging adult volunteers presenting a sensitive child sexual abuse prevention programme in schools in South Africa. The objectives were to gain further insight and understanding into the late adolescent developmental stage in regard to the participants’ views of presenting a child sexual abuse prevention programme and to identify what aspects of the programme should be altered, improved or continued to avoid risk and harm to these volunteers. The research approach was qualitative, with the use of case-study and phenomenological strategies that allowed for in-depth insight into how a small group of late adolescents made sense of their experiences and transformed these into subjective, conscious meanings. Criterion-based sampling was used to find the participants who had previously presented the child sexual abuse prevention programme. Data were collected by means of six semi-structured one-on-one interviews and six open-ended questionnaires with twelve participants between the ages of 18-22. Common themes, patterns, and regularities that recurred throughout the interviews and open-ended questionnaires were identified and the main themes that were evident formed the overall image reflective of the experiences of the volunteers. The findings suggest that the late adolescent stage may be a good age group for presenting this challenging and imperative task. To allow for the most positive impact and avoid harm it is, however, essential that non-experiences of late adolescents presenting a child sexual abuse prevention programme profit organisations provide adequate psychological and emotional support to the volunteers throughout the duration of the programme. The study shows that late adolescents, who felt they had received adequate psychological support, indicated an overall more beneficial and rewarding experience. Participants who felt they had not received sufficient support, reported feelings of helplessness and depressive thoughts, indicating emotional and possibly psychological harm. The study highlights the necessity for adequate support of the late adolescent volunteers presenting sensitive programmes in the future. / Thesis (MA (Psychology))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013.

Underpinning economic growth is the emergence of entrepreneurial ventures with the potential to grow that boost job creation and provide new sources of products for mature companies. The critical role associated with new firms, underscores the importance of understanding how entrepreneurship unfolds. Network-based research, while leading the way to rich empirical studies provides a limited understanding of how entrepreneurial networks are built and their impact on the emergence of a new venture. Employing a multiple case study design and a perspective based on organizational path building, three young technology ventures were investigated in terms of the formation of networks around five key entrepreneurial activities defined by entrepreneurs. Rich insight into new venture emergence is presented in terms of the reciprocal relationship between specific activities enacted by entrepreneurs and the networks that form to execute those activities revealing the path building mechanisms that evolve to drive network development. The findings of this research not only contribute to theories of new venture emergence, but also offer an interesting opportunity for future research into factors that may influence the outcome of entrepreneurial ventures and provide practical insight for organizations seeking to sustain or develop an entrepreneurial path.

The focus of this research is on the specific relational and particular circumstances that result in an emerging cancer identity expressed through the daily lived- experiences of emerging adults via personal weblogs. Identity, a complex term in its own right, is discussed here under the rubric of social identity as processual, therefore it is expected that an emerging cancer identity will develop as the participants begin to narrativize their daily experiences with cancer on their weblogs. By critically engaging with notions of emerging adulthood theories with theories on the sociology of death and dying and illness narratives, this research seeks to understand the specific psychosocial changes that occur as the participants engage with their illness on their weblogs, which arguably contributes to an emerging cancer identity.

Economic growth in emerging economies has been changing the livelihoods of many smallholders. Typically, disparity increases as economies emerge, and the agricultural sector experiences lower growth relative to other sectors. Growing inequalities and economic vulnerabilities during this critical period of development in emerging economies are often associated with social problems and political tensions, as this is the case in Thailand. In the latter, the Philosophy of Sufficiency Economy (SE) has been employed through the monarchy in a number of ways. Due to laws prohibiting critique of the monarchy, these projects are not fairly evaluated and the perspectives of smallholders affected are largely unknown. Knowledge on the effectiveness of Thailand’s Philosophy of SE in combating the disparity problem and economic vulnerability in the agricultural sectors of emerging economies was gained through semi-structured interviews. An organic farming project run by a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO), called ISAC follows the principles of Sufficiency Economy, and is located in the Mae Taeng district in the north of the province of Chiang Mai. A sample of 20 farmers from two villages (Don Chiang and San Pa Yang) who participate in the project was interviewed. Questions regarding age and education level of all family members also created a quantitative sample of 72 individuals. An epistemological framework based in critical realism was employed with the use of purposive interview sampling methods Results indicate that employing SE can help a select group of farmers to escape economic vulnerability. This group includes farmers in an older age group with sufficient land and access to guidance. The philosophy may help keep this group of farmers satisfied as the countries economy evolves. The project appears to be sustainable only in the short-term as younger generations seem to be reaching higher levels of education than their elders and are likely to pursue lives outside of agriculture. In addition, some benefits of farming with the principles of SE include, lower financial stress, improved health, and a better family life. Conversely, a decision to live by the principles of SE can lead to a stigmatization of farmers within their community, creating in-groups and out-groups.

Emerging adulthood, the period between 18 and 30 years of age, is particularly relevant for identity development. During this time, relational disconnections such as intimate partner violence (IPV) can inhibit the growth that occurs within interpersonal relationships. There has been little in-depth exploration of how emerging adult women describe the impacts of IPV on their sense of self. Using qualitative case study methodology, six young women shared their stories of IPV during open-ended narrative interviews and completed an exploration of their Possible Selves. Thematic analysis identified impacts of IPV relating to participants’ sense of self, future possible selves, and subsequent intimate relationships. The findings highlight participants’ self-descriptions of strength and resilience, as well as accounts of challenges and growth since the relationships ended. The findings have meaningful implications for theory and research on IPV for young women, and for counselling practice. / Graduate / kateborsato@gmail.com

Neurocomputers offer a massively parallel computing paradigm by mimicking the human brain. Their efficient use in statistical information processing has been proposed to overcome critical bottlenecks with traditional computing schemes for applications such as image and speech processing, and associative memory. In neural networks information is generally represented by phase (e.g., oscillatory neural networks) or amplitude (e.g., cellular neural networks). Phase-based neurocomputing is constructed as a network of coupled oscillatory neurons that are connected via programmable phase elements. Representing each neuron circuit with one oscillatory device and implementing programmable phases among neighboring neurons, however, are not clearly feasible from circuits perspective if not impossible. In contrast to nascent oscillatory neurocomputing circuits, mature amplitude-based neural networks offer more efficient circuit solutions using simpler resistive networks where information is carried via voltage- and current-mode signals. Yet, such circuits have not been efficiently realized by CMOS alone due to the needs for an efficient summing mechanism for weighted neural signals and a digitally-controlled weighting element for representing couplings among artificial neurons. Large power consumption and high circuit complexity of such CMOS-based implementations have precluded adoption of amplitude-based neurocomputing circuits as well, and have led researchers to explore the use of emerging technologies for such circuits. Although they provide intriguing properties, previously proposed neurocomputing components based on emerging technologies have not offered a complete and practical solution to efficiently construct an entire system. In this thesis we explore the generalized problem of co-optimization of technology and architecture for such systems, and develop a recipe for device requirements and target capabilities. We describe four plausible technologies, each of which could potentially enable the implementation of an efficient and fully-functional neurocomputing system. We first investigate fully-digital neural network architectures that have been tried before using CMOS technology in which many large-size logic gates such as D flip-flops and look-up tables are required. Using a newly-proposed all-magnetic non-volatile logic family, mLogic, we demonstrate the efficacy of digitizing the oscillators and phase relationships for an oscillatory neural network by exploiting the inherent storage as well as enabling an all-digital cellular neural network hardware with simplified programmability. We perform system-level comparisons of mLogic and 32nm CMOS for both networks consisting of 60 neurons. Although digital implementations based on mLogic offer improvements over CMOS in terms of power and area, analog neurocomputing architectures seem to be more compatible with the greatest portion of emerging technologies and devices. For this purpose in this dissertation we explore several emerging technologies with unique device configurations and features such as mCell devices, ovenized aluminum nitride resonators, and tunable multi-gate graphene devices to efficiently enable two key components required for such analog networks – that is, summing function and weighting with compact D/A (digital-to-analog) conversion capability. We demonstrate novel ways to implement these functions and elaborate on our building blocks for artificial neurons and synapses using each technology. We verify the functionality of each proposed implementation using various image processing applications based on compact circuit simulation models for such post-CMOS devices. Finally, we design a proof-of-concept neurocomputing circuitry containing 20 neurons using 65nm CMOS technology that is based on the primitives that we define for our analog neurocomputing scheme. This allows us to fully recognize the inefficiencies of an all-CMOS implementation for such specific applications. We share our experimental results that are in agreement with circuit simulations for the same image processing applications based on proposed architectures using emerging technologies. Power and area comparisons demonstrate significant improvements for analog neurocomputing circuits when implemented using beyond- CMOS technologies, thereby promising huge opportunities for future energy-efficient computing.

Corporate Social Responsibility is attracting more public attention in business world nowadays. It has evolved well in developed countries while there still remains some CSR issues in emerging economies such as China and Turkey. Thus, when some multi- national enterprises select suppliers in China and Turkey they come with CSR requirements and pressure. In this supplier-buyer context, less study has been carried out from suppliers’ perspective on how they implement the CSR pressure and whether it has positive or negative impact on their relationship with the buyer and impact on themselves. In addressing this problem in this particular supplier-buyer environment, the purpose of this study is to explore the perspectives and practices of suppliers regarding CSR in emerging economies like China and Turkey with strong export relationships to companies in developed countries. In order to achieve this purpose, this thesis presents a qualitative study supported by primary data gathered by interviews and secondary data gathered by examining company documents. One Chinese supplier and one Turkish supplier were chosen as two cases in this study. Both have supplier-buyer relationships with the same buyer which has a large role in the textile industry. Interviews were conducted with two suppliers respectively to gain research data. The result of the study shows that: (1) CSR is perceived differently by Turkish and Chinese supplier. The Chinese supplier emphasizes their CSR perspectives on only economic and philanthropic levels while the Turkish supplier includes also ethical and legal levels. (2) In supply chains, both suppliers comply with codes of conduct from the buyer and additionally conduct CSR activities voluntarily. Both suppliers focus on philanthropy and community contribution but the Turkish supplier work on environmental friendly products. (3) There is no direct positive impact linked with CSR compliance in terms of supplier-buyer relationship for both suppliers. In other words, requirements on CSR from the buyer do not contribute much to their supply chain relationships. (4) CSR practices bring competitive advantages for both suppliers. Those competitive advantages include innovation capability and positive corporate reputation.

Recent research has proposed a new stage in human development, termed emerging adulthood by Jeffrey Arnett, which is characterized by a prolonged journey to adult roles and responsibilities. This thesis explores the experience of Chinese emerging adults, university students aged 20-25 years using Erikson’s and Levinson’s developmental theories as a theoretical framework. These authors proposed that three major developmental tasks are necessary for the transition to adulthood: separating from family of origin, forming an adult identity and finding the place for the self in the larger society. Qualitative interviews were conducted virtually with 12 Chinese university students to understand their perceptions and lived experience. Qualitative thematic analysis was used to analyze the interview transcripts. The results suggest Chinese emerging adults (a) have a low level of separation from parents; (b) have not formed a clear sense of identity and have not achieved a self-definition in adulthood; and (c) have not made initial commitments to love and work. It is speculated that the Chinese sociocultural context may further postpone its young adults’ independence and autonomy, and this prolonged transition to adulthood is both positive and problematic to Chinese young adults. This study lends support to Arnett’s emerging adulthood theory through its exploration of emerging adulthood in China, where, to date, little research has been done on this subject. It provides rich descriptions of the experience of Chinese emerging adults’ lives and enhances understandings of the role of culture in influencing the emerging adulthood period.