3. Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs) - All submissions
Permanent URI for this communityhttps://wiredspace.wits.ac.za/handle/10539/45
Browse
6 results
Search Results
Item Exploring the implementation of an internet based rehabilitation programme for HIV adults in a public health centre(2016) Msimanga, LeratoAbstract South Africa has one of the largest population of adults living with HIV. About 30 to 60% of people living with HIV have been found to have HAND which can affect treatment with HAART which requires 95% compliance rate in order to be effective. Interventions that seek to alleviate the cognitive deterioration that is associated with HIV can include Internet based rehabilitation programmes. However, internet based interventions are plagued by poor adherence and attrition rates. The aim of the study was to describe the challenges and facilitating factors in the process of implementing the CogMed™ Working Memory Training Programme at a public HIV clinic for adults living with HIV. The study used a qualitative method with an ethnographic approach. Data was collected through CogMed™ administrator console, observations, interactions with gatekeepers, interactions and interviews with participants and interviews healthcare workers. The factors involved in the implementation process were categorised into the four “Stages of Use”. In the Recruitment/Consideration Stage perception of need, identifying and defining an ideal user were the main themes. Factors affecting the Initiation of Use Stage were sense of obligation, time to commit and access to suitable training environment. Utilisation of Service was influenced by ease of drop out, ease of use, perceived cost versus the perceived benefits of participating. Predisposing, enabling, and needs factors that affected adherence and participation were explored. Finally the Outcomes Stage covered the experiences and perceptions of using the rehabilitation tool. Limitations of the study were also discussed. Keywords: CogMed, Working Memory, HIV, HAND, Internet based interventions, Stages of UseItem Can working memory work for university students? the relationship between working memory and academic success.(2012-03-15) Paton, TristanThis study examined performance on the Memory Quotient Tester (MQT) and the Raven’s Advanced Progressive Matrices (RAPM) in relation to academic performance in a sample of 51 Psychology students. The relationship between working memory (MQT), non-verbal intelligence (RAPM), demographic factors and academic success were determined. Results indicated no significant relationship between working memory and academic success in undergraduate Psychology courses, whereas the first set of the RAPM revealed some significance in relation to both academic success and the variables of race and language. This indicates the possible role of eductive reasoning in tertiary level academic success.Item SLI or 'slow' to develop English additional language (EAL) learners - how do we know? : an in depth investigation of English additional language learners in the foundation phase with suspected specific language impairment.(2011-10-06) Rijhumal, Meera SurendarBackground: This study formed part of a larger longitudinal research study by Jordaan (2009), who tracked the development of language for academic purposes in grade 1- 3 English Additional Language (EAL) and English First Language (EFL) learners attending English only programmes in Gauteng over a period of three years. These learners attended schools in two different educational contexts where there is a marked heterogeneity in the linguistic backgrounds of both the learners and teachers investigated. Results from Jordaan’s (2009) study revealed that some EAL and EFL learners appeared to be slow in the development of their academic language abilities (as no progress was evident over the period of three years), relative to their peers, and thus these learners may have a language impairment. Purpose: This study investigated in detail, these “slow to learn” EAL and EFL learners in the foundation phase, in order to determine whether they have a language impairment and to determine how the language impairment manifests in these learners. Participants: Sixteen learners (5 EFL learners and 16 EAL learners) who demonstrated no improvement in their academic language abilities from grade one to grade two as determined by their performance on the Diagnostic Evaluation of Language Variation Criterion Referenced (DELV-CR) test were the participants of this study. Method: The participants were assessed on the Automated Working Memory Assessment (AWMA) test, a Non Word Repetition test (Dollaghan & Campbell, 1998), a Sentence Repetition test (Redmond, 2005) and the Gray Oral Reading Test (GORT-4). Educators were also asked to rate these learners’ oral language, written language and reading comprehension abilities on a scale of 0- 5. The research design utilized was a non experimental, descriptive quantitative design, involving both correlational and comparative components. The data obtained was then analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Pearson correlation coefficients were calculated to establish whether there was a relationship between the cognitive processing and the language proficiency measures as well as the teacher ratings in order to provide information regarding these tests as assessment tools for EAL learners as well as to further enhance the validity of this study. Independent sample t-tests were also conducted to determine whether there were any significant differences between the EFL and EAL learners’ performance in the two different educational contexts, so as to establish whether bilingual learners with language impairment are more severely impaired than monolingual learners with language impairment. Results: Based on the analysis of these learners’ performance on the DELV-CR test, results indicated that all sixteen participants presented with SLI and were not just “slow to learn”. The EAL-SLI learners in both contexts performed poorly on the reading comprehension test and were rated lower than their aged matched peers on the teacher rating scales. Furthermore, when comparing these EAL-SLI learners’ performance on the DELV-CR test to the performance of the EFL-SLI learners, the EAL-SLI learners as a group appeared to have performed more poorly than the EFL-SLI learners on all three subtests. As significant differences were found between the EAL and EFL learners’ performance on the DELV-CR test, the results suggested that bilingual learners with SLI, who acquire a second language sequentially, are more impaired than monolingual learners with SLI. The EAL-SLI learners also presented with visuo-spatial short term and working memory deficits and even though a large majority of the learners presented with verbal short term and working memory difficulties, not all the learners presented with cognitive processing difficulties. This finding has implications for the theories of SLI. However, the sentence repetition task was found to be a useful tool in differentiating between the “slow to learn” EAL learners and EAL-SLI learners and furthermore this test also positively correlated with various sections of the DELV-CR test which adds to the value of this test as an assessment tool in EAL learners. Positive correlations were also found between the teacher ratings of the EAL-SLI learners and the subtests of the DELV-CR test which indicates that teachers have the ability to correctly identify learners with language learning difficulties. Positive correlations were also found between the digit repetition subtest, the non word repetition test and the sentence repetition test which adds to the validity of this study. Conclusion: The results obtained from this study demonstrated that bilingual learners with SLI who acquire a second language sequentially are additionally disadvantaged compared to their EFL-SLI peers in the acquisition of certain aspects of academic language. Furthermore, although research has shown that cognitive processing measures are less biased in the assessment of linguistically diverse learners, results indicated that the DELV-CR test identified more accurately, learners with language impairment whereas the cognitive processing measures provided contradictory and biased results with the verbal working memory subtest over identifying learners “at risk” for language impairment. Finally, the use of sentence repetition tasks in the differentiation between “slow to learn” and language impaired EAL learners proves to be promising.Item Subgroups of working memory deficits and reading comprehension.(2011-05-19) Irons, DianeRationale : Investigating the relationship between working memory and reading comprehension will lead to an improved understanding of the nature of working memory and will reveal how working memory contributes to reading comprehension failure. A pattern of working memory deficits will determine if ‘signature’ working memory profiles exist which will assist in the diagnosis and treatment of children with reading comprehension difficulties. Aims : (1) To explore the relationship between working memory and reading comprehension to determine if there are ‘signature’ working memory profiles that distinguish subgroups of Grade 5 English language learners with different comprehension capabilities. (2) To determine if a domain-specific or general working memory system is implicated in reading comprehension. (3) To explore the particular role played by the episodic buffer zone in reading comprehension. Method : Eighty Grade 5 English learners were tested on the GORT-4, AWMA and CELF- 4 Recalling Sentences Subtest. Based on their accuracy/decoding and comprehension scores on the GORT-4, participants were assigned to one of four reading ability groups: Skilled Reader Group; Reading Disabled Group; Poor Comprehender Group; or Poor Fluency Group. Comparison of mean standard scores determined how the four reading ability groups fared on the five memory components. Correlation and regression methods investigated the relationships between the five working memory variables and reading comprehension across the four reading ability groups. Results : Working memory plays a role in reading comprehension. The Skilled Reader group displayed intact working memory profiles, whilst the Reading Disabled group performed in the low average range on four working memory variables and below average on the fifth viz. sentence recall. The Poor Comprehender group’s working memory performance resembled that of the Skilled Reader group on two working memory variables. The Poor Fluency group performed below average on visuo-spatial short-term memory. These findings gave evidence of the inter-play between domain-specific and domain-general components of working memory during the complex task of reading comprehension. In addition, the findings highlighted the predictive role of sentence recall, as well as that of verbal working memory in reading comprehension. The episodic buffer was shown to play an important binding function between fluid and crystallised knowledge. The results suggested that reading comprehension was affected by a learner’s working memory capacity, however, working memory alone did not account for variations in performance. Lower-order and higher-order cognitive processes, as well as the interaction between fluid and crystallised knowledge appear essential to authentic reading. This has ramifications for prevention and remediation of reading comprehension deficits and underscores the important role of the speech therapist in literacy promotion.Item Working memory capacity in English monolingual and Afrikaans/English bilingual grade 1 learners.(2009-09-10T10:15:34Z) Van Rooyen, TahitiMany learners in South Africa first encounter English when it is used as a medium of instruction at the start of formal schooling. This has ramifications for literacy acquisition and academic performance. Working memory is responsible for distributing cognitive resources among the various processing and storage tasks. It has been pivotal in many cognitive theories linking working memory to academic skills like reading comprehension and mathematics ability. In addition, research indicates that both Short Term Memory (STM) and Working Memory (WM) are instrumental in cognitive processing but that in bilinguals their roles are more complex than they are in monolinguals. This research explored the capacity of WM and the role of WM in reading comprehension and mathematical ability in two South African populations: a monolingual English group (L1) and a bilingual Afrikaans/English group (L2). No significant differences were found in the WM capacity of the two groups. In the second part of the study it was found that both reading comprehension and bilingualism depend on the same verbal domain resources of WM, which act as constraining factors for the L2 group. However, in the L1 group, there appeared to be less competition for verbal domain resources and more for visuospatial resources probably due to the phase of literacy acquisition these learners were in. In terms of WM and mathematical ability it was found that bilinguals exceed their storage capacity (STM) before they run out of processing capacity (WM). STM therefore is a constraining factor for this group. However, for the L1 group, visuospatial processing is the constraining factor. The research concludes that bilinguals use WM both for semantic processing of their nondominant language and for complex cognitive processing. While the WM capacity for monolingual and bilingual learners appears to be equivalent, the way the resources are allocated during cognitive tasks differ.Item Working memory and phonological awareness.(2009-01-07T09:10:28Z) Milwidsky, CarolPhonological awareness, and working memory, as a component of phonological awareness, have been found to be highly correlated, not only with the acquisition of reading skills, but also with each other. Existing data does not address this aspect of emergent literacy in South African children, for whom bilingualism may impact on their levels of phonological awareness, and possibly working memory. This research study was designed and conducted in an attempt to identify the relationship between these two skills in a sample of seventy-nine South African Grade 1 children (mean age 86 months). The sample consisted of two language groups, namely first-language English (EL1), an opaque orthography (n=42) and second-language English with first-language one of the nine official African languages of South Africa (EL2), a transparent orthography (n=37). The primary aim was to examine the relationship between phonological awareness (comprising a sound categorisation task, a phoneme deletion task, and a syllable splitting task) and working memory (comprising a verbal short-term memory task, a visuo-spatial short-term memory task, a verbal working memory task and a visuo-spatial working memory task). A measure of non-verbal intelligence was included as a control. Separate analyses were run for the two language groups in order to draw a comparison between their performance on the tasks. Results generally supported existing literature that showed that the relationship between working memory and phonological awareness appears to be dependent on the depth of analysis of phonological awareness, which determines the level of demand made on working memory, yet the relationship differed between the language groups, indicating that the EL2 children draw more on general or apparently unrelated skills to conduct working memory and phonological awareness tasks. A secondary aim of this study was to explore the predictive power of firstly, the four memory skills on phonological awareness; secondly, the sound categorisation skills on phoneme deletion and finally, non-verbal intelligence on working memory. Results again differed between the language groups, suggesting that a broader range of working memory skills predict performance on phonological awareness tasks in the EL2 group than in the EL1 group. The implications of these results are discussed in detail.