The aim of this research was to analyse the competitiveness of the South African mining industry in order to assess the viability of mineral beneficiation. This study also aimed to establish what was required in the mining industry in order to provide an environment which enables competitiveness going forward. The Diamond Model of Industry Competitiveness developed by Michael Porter was utilised in analysing the mining industry's competitiveness. In the process of the analysis, the model was interrogated for validity in a developing and dynamic country via inference of the analysis of the South African mining industry. Based on the results of this research, a new model, built on the findings outlined by the Diamond Model, was developed. The research found that the mining industry is not competitive at present and will not be able to provide an environment conducive to beneficiation in South Africa. Investigation further revealed that, as a result of the importance placed on the elements of the model, the Diamond Model is viable in a developing and dynamic environment. The results further provided sufficient feedback regarding how to utilise the elements from the Diamond Model in redesigning the competitive analysis in a forward-looking manner. / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2014. / zkgibs2015 / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / Unrestricted

Orientador: Sergio Campos / Coorientador: Anselmo Jose Spadotto / Banca: Yara Manfrin Garcia / Banca: Lincoln Gehring Cardoso / Resumo: A energia é uma das bases de maior importância para a sociedade já que contribui no desenvolvimento dos países, as mudanças na matriz energética para uso de fontes renováveis causarão impactos positivos, contribuindo num desenvolvimento sustentável. As modificações na matriz energética brasileira e hondurenha com o propósito de torná-las mais eficientes e procurando contribuir com o desenvolvimento ambiental e jurídico configuram o tema de interesse desta pesquisa. O presente trabalho teve como objetivo geral analisar o desenvolvimento qualitativo e jurídico da matriz energética do Brasil e de Honduras e como objetivos específicos estudar as características da matriz energética e suas dependências de energia não renovável no período de 2000 a 2016 para o Brasil e de 2000 a 2015 para Honduras e avaliar o efeito das estratégias jurídicas na mudança da matriz energética de ambos países por meio de uma análise comparativa na legislação energética do Brasil e de Honduras. A metodologia empregada foi qualitativa por meio de uma pesquisa de sondagem, o período experimental foi de 15/11/2016 a 30/03/2018 onde se procuraram informações e normas legais referentes ao objetivo deste trabalho. Foram consultados artigos científicos em sites especializados, os dados estatísticos do consumo energético foram obtidos de organizações internacionais. Em sites oficiais governamentais consultou-se a legislação energética de Brasil e Honduras e usando-se como critério transversal a atualização e vi... (Resumo completo, clicar acesso eletrônico abaixo) / Abstract: Energy is one of the most important bases for society since it contributes to the development of countries, changes in the energy matrix for use of renewable sources will cause positive impacts, contributing to sustainable development. The changes in the Brazilian and Honduran energy matrix in order to make them more efficient and seeking to contribute to environmental and legal development are the theme of interest in this research. The present work had as general objective to analyze the qualitative and legal development of the energy matrix of Brazil and Honduras and as specific objectives to study the characteristics of the energy matrix and its dependencies of nonrenewable energy in the period from 2000 to 2016 for Brazil and 2000 to 2015 for Honduras and to evaluate the effect of the legal strategies in the change of the energy matrix of both countries through a comparative analysis in the energy legislation of Brazil and Honduras. The methodology used was qualitative by means of a survey, the experimental period was from 11/15/2016 to 03/30/2018 where information and legal norms regarding the objective of this work were sought. Scientific articles were consulted on specialized websites, statistical data on energy consumption were obtained from international organizations. Government official websites consulted the energy legislation of Brazil and Honduras and using as a transversal criterion the updating and validity of the same. As results it was found that both countries are dependent on non-renewable energy to cover energy demand but are on the right path in diversifying their energy matrix, it was also possible to verify that there is a convergence between some energy laws of Brazil and Honduras, as well as other laws that can help in the energy efficiency of the countries improving the socioeconomic development ... / Mestre

The current study was undertaken as a preliminary evaluation of a qualitative extension measure for use with emerging adults. A series of studies have been previously conducted to provide evidence for the reliability and validity of the RDA framework in evaluating youth development programs (Kurtines et al., 2008) and this study furthers this research to utilize RDA with emerging adults. Building on previous RDA research, the current study analyzed psychometric properties of the Identity Dimensions of Emerging Adulthood-Qualitative Extension (IDEA-QE) using RDA. Inter-coder percent agreement among the Theoretical Open Coders (TOC) and Theoretical Content Coders (TCC) for each of the category levels was moderate to high, ranging from .67 to .87. The Fleiss’ kappa across all category levels was from moderate agreement to almost perfect agreement, ranging from .60 to .88. The correlation between the TOC and the TCC demonstrated medium to high correlation, ranging from r(31)=.65, pr(31)=.74, p<.001.

An analysis of experiences of immigrant parents, in a Midwestern college community, accessing services for their child with a disability. A qualitative study using phenomenological theory was used wherein access to services was explored from the parents lived experience. Four immigrant parents were chosen using purposive sampling. Grand tour questions were asked leading to follow-up questions based on respondent answers. Interviews were audio recorded in a location chosen by respondents, and transcribed. Home environment and interactions with child were noted. Grounded theory emerged from analysis using the constant comparative method. Transcripts were read multiple times and categories began to emerge. Based on emergent categories transcripts were cut into segments and categorized accordingly. Comparisons of categories led to reanalysis and emergence of three primary themes; experience of accessing services, feelings about services, and factors affecting experience of accessing services. To enhance credibility, negative case analysis was used to incorporate differential experiences. Thick description was used to increase transferability. Dependability and Confirmability were addressed using an audit process. Two parallel theories emerged from the analysis; one regarding factors leading to positive experiences of accessing services, one regarding factors leading to negative experiences. The theories are supported by original data from the interviews and show how providers, the Department of Human Services, school systems and advocates can improve the situation. This study adds knowledge by exploring a previously unexplored type of community in this research area, but is limited by researcher requirement of English speaking respondents.

abstract: One of the measures to determine the intelligence of a system is through Question Answering, as it requires a system to comprehend a question and reason using its knowledge base to accurately answer it. Qualitative word problems are an important subset of such problems, as they require a system to recognize and reason with qualitative knowledge expressed in natural language. Traditional approaches in this domain include multiple modules to parse a given problem and to perform the required reasoning. Recent approaches involve using large pre-trained Language models like the Bidirection Encoder Representations from Transformers for downstream question answering tasks through supervision. These approaches however either suffer from errors between multiple modules, or are not interpretable with respect to the reasoning process employed. The proposed solution in this work aims to overcome these drawbacks through a single end-to-end trainable model that performs both the required parsing and reasoning. The parsing is achieved through an attention mechanism, whereas the reasoning is performed in vector space using soft logic operations. The model also enforces constraints in the form of auxiliary loss terms to increase the interpretability of the underlying reasoning process. The work achieves state of the art accuracy on the QuaRel dataset and matches that of the QuaRTz dataset with additional interpretability. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Computer Science 2020

Organisations depend on strong and competent leaders for their sustainability, profitability and competitiveness. Therefore organisations have an extremely strong focus on development, and especially on leader development. Mentoring has been recognised as a developmental tool (Truter, 2008, p.61) and is therefore employed by many organisations to foster such development. The primary aim of this study is to determine whether and to what effect, mentoring can be used to foster leader development in a business context. The research is of a qualitative, phenomenological nature and enquires into the perceptions, personal experiences and knowledge of people who have been exposed to mentoring and leader development, in order to understand how mentoring has played a role in the development of their leadership. In-depth interviews were conducted with a sample of six participants in order to collect the required data; and South African and international literature was consulted in order to interpret the interview data accurately in terms of the primary aim of the study. The study revealed the following results amongst others: <ul> <li> There is a connection between mentoring and leader development and mentoring can be used to develop leaders.</li> <li> Leader development is not possible in the absence of mentoring.</li> <li> Mentoring can contribute to leader development by focussing on a person’s development and teaching that person to become a good or a better leader.</li> <li> Mentoring has the ability to positively impact or benefit leader development.</li> <li> Mentoring has the ability to develop a person’s leadership capability and competence (i.e. his/her ability to be a leader).</li> <li> Mentoring can be used as a tool to develop effective leaders.</li> </ul> / Dissertation (MCom)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Human Resource Management / unrestricted

Bakgrund: Endometrios är en sjukdom som drabbar var tionde kvinna i fertil ålder. Fysioterapi rekommenderas som alternativ behandling eftersom det kan ha en smärtlindrande effekt och höja kvinnornas livskvalité. I litteraturen framkommer inte hur kvinnor med endometrios upplever den fysioterapeutiska behandlingen som helhet. Det finns därför behov av att undersöka hur den fysioterapeutiska behandlingen upplevs av kvinnor med endometrios. Syfte: Utforska kvinnors erfarenheter och upplevelser av endometrios och fysioterapeutisk behandling vid endometrios. Metod: Studien var av kvalitativ design. Semistrukturerade intervjuer genomfördes med fem kvinnor i åldrarna 24–40 år som diagnostiserats med endometrios. Deltagarna rekryterades via en Facebookgrupp och ett Instagramkonto för kvinnor med endometrios. Bekvämlighetsurval tillämpades. Databearbetning av materialet gjordes genom kvalitativ innehållsanalys. Resultat: I analysprocessen formulerades fyra huvudkategorier: Att leva med endometrios, Betydelse av fysioterapeutens förkunskap, Att skapa en trygg miljö med patienten och Individuella upplevelsen av de fysioterapeutiska behandlingarna. Kategorierna lyfter upplevelser och erfarenheter av sjukdomens påverkan i vardagen, fysioterapeutens kunskap och bemötande samt effekten av behandlingsmetoderna. Slutsats: Endometrios beskrevs ständigt påverka informanternas vardag där fysioterapin bidragit till lindring av symtom genom att de fått ny kunskap om smärtan samt individuellt anpassade behandlingar. Det ansågs värdefullt för informanterna att vara delaktiga i val av behandling. Att bli hörd och bekräftad upplevdes som viktigt i mötet med fysioterapeuten. Det framkom olika upplevelser av effekten av TENS, akupunktur, fysisk aktivitet och behandling av bäckenbotten. För att tydliggöra vad som gör behandlingen effektiv behövs fler studier. / Background: Endometriosis is a disease that affects every tenth woman of reproductive age. Physiotherapy is recommended as part of a treatment because it can have a pain-relieving effect and increase quality of life. The literature does not present how women with endometriosis experience the physiotherapeutic treatment. Therefore, there is a need to investigate how physiotherapeutic treatment is experienced by women with endometriosis. Objectives: Examine women's experiences of endometriosis and physiotherapeutic treatment in endometriosis.  Method: The study was of qualitative design. Five semi-structured interviews were conducted with women aged 24–40 diagnosed with endometriosis. They were recruited through a Facebook group and an Instagram account. Convenience sampling was applied. Data processing was done with qualitative content analysis. Results: Four main categories were formulated: Living with endometriosis, Importance of physiotherapist's knowledge, Creating a safe environment with the patient and Individual experience of the physiotherapeutic treatments. The categories highlight experiences of the impact of the disease, the physiotherapist's knowledge and the effect of treatment methods. Conclusion: Endometriosis was described as constantly influencing the everyday lives of informants where physiotherapy has contributed to relief of symptoms by obtaining new knowledge and by individually tailored treatments. It was considered valuable for informants to be involved in the choice of treatment. Being heard and validated was perceived as important. Various experiences of the effect of TENS, acupuncture, physical activity and treatment of the pelvic floor emerged. To clarify what makes the treatment effective, more studies are needed.

Over the last several years, there has been an increased awareness regarding consensual sexual relationships (CSRs) between professors and students. Specifically, there has been a growing movement for academic institutions to develop policies addressing, discouraging, and/or prohibiting these relationships due to the potential for sexual harassment cases. Even though the appropriateness of such relationships has been widely debated among the university community, a limited amount of empirical work has examined this issue with the majority focusing on attitudinal studies. The current exploratory study consists of a content analysis of 278 faculty and student responses to the question, “If there is a difference between consensual sexual relationships and sexual harassment, what is it?” Responses indicate that there are several overlapping themes for both faculty and students in how they view these differences, with a large number of responses specifically indicating themes such as “CSR is consensual” while “sexual harassment is one sided.” There are also some unique perspectives given by faculty regarding the complexities and acceptability of CSRs, who are generally more specific and nuanced in their answers. Considering the complexities of this issue, it is the recommendation of the current study that much more research fully exploring the attitudes of faculty and students is needed to develop a well-rounded and comprehensive policy.

Introduction: The scarcity of rigorous evidence regarding rare disease therapies contributes to uncertainty for stakeholders who make decisions about the use, prescription, or funding of such therapies. My dissertation objective was to integrate stakeholder perspectives and evidence related to how rare disease therapies are evaluated to better understand drivers of uncertainty in decision making and develop an evaluation framework for future evidence generation, synthesis, and decision support. Methods: To better understand the perceived challenges in generating robust treatment effectiveness evidence, and describe various methods for mitigating these challenges, I used a meta-narrative literature review. I also conducted focus group interviews with key rare disease stakeholders (patients/caregivers, physicians, and policy advisors) to elicit different perspectives on how evidence is generated, evaluated, and synthesized in the context of health care decision making, both at a personal and population level. Finally, I integrated the focus group findings with a targeted literature review to identify characteristics of rare diseases and their candidate therapies that may warrant special consideration in health technology assessment (HTA) and health care decision making. Findings: My dissertation data revealed three fundamental challenges in generating robust treatment effectiveness evidence for rare diseases: limitations in recruiting a sufficient sample; inability to account for clinical heterogeneity; and reliance on outcomes with unclear clinical relevance. Several methodological solutions have been proposed to overcome these challenges. In addition, study participants described different perspectives on how they choose to participate in and use research in their roles as health care users, care providers, and policy advisors. Notably, conventional wisdom that patients/caregivers participate in clinical research studies because of therapeutic misconception was not supported. Finally, focus group and literature review findings identified information that potentially warrants special consideration in future HTA specific to rare diseases, including characteristics of the disease, understanding of causal hypotheses relevant to the therapy, and complexities of cost-effectiveness given the high price of many rare disease therapies. Discussion: Together, the findings from this dissertation support an evaluation framework with eight key principles that aim to mitigate important aspects of uncertainty from various stakeholder perspectives and promote evidence-informed decision making about rare disease therapies.

In the South African context, a geographical region prone to the occurrence of frequent and intense periods of drought, the emergence of climate conditions reaching new extremes raises concerns of adaptability to sustain living and work well-being in such circumstances. The realisation of economic, social, environmental and psychological impacts resultant from drought conditions is particularly relevant to farmers, an occupation group who are often characterised by socio-economic vulnerability in South Africa. Consequently, this research seeks to explore the yet undocumented experiences of farmers living and working in the current drought conditions, located in the Karoo region of South Africa. A further aim of this research is to explore how these experiences have affected farmers' psychological well-being, as well as understanding the coping mechanisms they have used to deal with this long-standing crisis situation. The present study adopted an exploratory case study design using an interpretivist paradigmatic stance. Based on research conducted and reviewed within the climate change domain, it was understood that farmers' experiences of working in drought conditions were complex, context specific and differed amongst individuals. Therefore, knowledge was viewed as subjective as there was no particular, correct path to knowledge as it emerged through various contexts. The case under study was Karoo farmers in the Western Cape province. Their living and working experiences, and coping mechanisms were specific to their surrounding landscapes and chosen type of farming. Furthermore, this case study was particularly concerned with farmers who retained close living, working and cultural relationships to their natural environments. Consequently, the unit of analysis in this study was the individual. A purposive sampling strategy was adopted and a total of eight participants were interviewed. An inductive approach to analysing the data was undertaken, using Braun and Clarke's (2006) Thematic Analysis. Three major themes emerged during the analysis with a number of associated sub-themes. The results describe the sample's shared ecological grief experiences due to both implicit and explicit impacts resultant from sustained drought conditions. The negative psychological outcomes the sample endured as a result of these experiences, demonstrates the implication of living and working in such conditions for work and psychological well-being. The common coping mechanisms employed over this time are also extracted from the themes. The discussion presents the findings of this study through the lens of the Sustainable Livelihoods Approach framework, to understand how drought conditions presents barriers to these farmers sustaining their well-being.