Faculty of Humanities (ETDs)

Permanent URI for this communityhttps://hdl.handle.net/10539/37922

Browse

Filters

2023 - 20243

Settings

Has files: YesSubject: search.filters.subject.Resilience

Search Results

Now showing 1 - 3 of 3
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Adverse Childhood Experiences and Psychological Resilience among HIV Positive Youth in South Africa
    (University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2024) Sigoda, Nozipho; Patel, Ruby
    Research has revealed and highlighted the plight of HIV and its effects on individuals, their families and larger communities. Through a qualitative research approach, this study sought to explore the experiences of black South African Youth who are living with HIV and their exposure to Adverse Childhood experiences. Experiences of stigma, inequality and disparity were also explored. The research was largely informed by the resilience theory (Garmezy, 1978) which enabled the researcher to make sense of the participants’ experiences. The researcher then employed a non-probability purposive convenience sampling approach to recruit participants who were either born with HIV or contracted it while they were young. Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) was then used to analyse the data that was derived from the semi-structured interviews conducted. Further, the use of IPA allowed the researcher to pay attention to the lived experiences of the participants. The themes extracted from this study suggest that children growing up with HIV in South Africa are often subjected to various adverse experiences that often challenge health and developmental outcomes. This is demonstrated by the dominant themes of navigating changes in identity, experiences of stigma, discrimination and marginalisation, exposure to poor socio-economic conditions and lastly resilience strategies employed to mitigate harm from the experiences.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Breaking the Chains of Intergenerational Childhood Poverty: A Narrative Retrospective Study of Resilience
    (University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2024) Wong , Caitlyn; Jithoo, Vinitha; Besharati, Sahba
    The experience of poverty is well-documented, however, there is a notable gap in the existing research concerning the unique narratives of university students who have undergone experiences of poverty during childhood. These students have been successful in gaining admission into university despite facing major financial hardships stemming from their experiences of intergenerational childhood poverty. These university students identified with having experiences of childhood poverty as well as resilience, thus becoming an important and under-researched sample. This qualitative study aims to explore these students’ narratives of childhood impoverishment, with an emphasis on the identification and understanding of resilience within these experiences. This topic was investigated through the utilisation of the resilience theoretical framework. The study employed a Narrative Analysis (NA) to assess the experiential and retrospective narrative accounts of emerging adults within the university student demographic using semi-structured interviews. Three overarching themes were identified: (1) narratives within the living environment; (2) the nexus of poverty, education, and opportunity; and (3) participants’ constructions of resilience. The results illustrated that the narrative experience of childhood poverty contained great levels of experienced difficulties within the home and schooling environment, and with emotional implications of poverty resulting in difficulties with coping and social exclusion. However among this plethora of hardship, participants constructions of resilience related to motivation, strength, acceptance, adaptation, and rewriting the narrative towards positive meaning-making. Therefore this study provided further subjective insight into the topic of poverty and resilience by way of presenting the data as experienced by the research participants, as well as having made recommendations for future research.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Predictors of COVID-related Risk and Resilience in South African Young Adults
    (University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-06) Benvenuti, Sabrina Lucia; Cockcroft, Kate
    The Coronavirus Disease of 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has been a lengthy and stressful event for people worldwide, placing increased strain on vulnerable populations. This prompts interest in the field of risk and resilience research. There are several apparent gaps in resilience research such as in the context of a pandemic, and in adult and non-western populations. This research report aimed to identify socio-demographic variables that predict risk and resilience outcomes in young, emerging South African adults, following the COVID-19 pandemic. This study fell into a post-positivist paradigm and used a quantitative, non-experimental, correlational, ex-post facto design. Descriptive, correlational and regression analyses were conducted to identify possible socio-demographic predictors of risk and resilience outcomes in this given population. Overall, the sample population exhibited low-moderate levels of depression, and on average displayed high levels of resilience, overall and across individual, relational and contextual resilience Several significant correlations and predictors, although weak, were identified for the outcome variables of depression (risk) and resilience (at individual, relational and contextual levels) including age, gender and education, pandemic-related and perceived stress, loneliness, parental involvement and warmth, childhood and community experiences. Depression was significantly predicted by gender, perceived stress, loneliness, satisfaction with life and parental involvement, where being female, having stronger feelings of loneliness, and dissatisfaction with life predicted higher levels of depression. Furthermore, parental involvement significantly predicted all five outcomes, where high parental involvement predicted low depression and high resilience across all levels. Perceived stress significantly predicted all but one outcome, namely relational resilience. High levels of perceived stress predicted high levels of depression and poor overall, individual, and contextual resilience. All three levels of resilience were significantly predicted by both parents’ level of education and parental involvement, where levels of maternal education predicted better resilience across all domains, while paternal education had the opposite effect. Identifying such predictors can help to better the knowledge base around risk and resilience in the South African, context and in low- and middle-income contexts. Furthermore, this allows for the targeted implementation of tools and interventions to address these outcomes, such as promoting parental involvement, the implementation of targeted stress-management tools, and more female-focused depression interventions.