1,720,973 research outputs found
Employee Sentiments Concerning Workplace Greening
No full textA research report submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science ((Coursework & research), to the Faculty of Science, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023.For centuries, people have continuously impacted the environment, resulting in an exponential rise in environmental problems and deterioration. In the quest to find solutions, business organisations have employed or tried to institute greening programmes, such as promoting waste at source and installing solar panels. However, it is essential for people, specifically in occupational settings, to see this as a need - for greening programmes to be effective. To this end, this study aimed to identify the elements that drive individuals to conduct environmentally responsible behaviours at work. This qualitative study collected data by administering surveys to research participants. Information related to eco-helping, eco-initiatives and eco-civic engagement was collected by administering surveys to local contractors at the PepsiCo site in Kempton Park, Johannesburg. The survey amassed 70 responses during October 2023. The study found that gender was an important indicator of pro-environmental behaviour, and that age affected a person’s inclination to act pro-environmentally. As this study relied on proclamations of good environmental intentions from participants, future studies should test this hypothesis in the field to quantify its success.MM202
Modelling risk exposure of BTEX emissions from a diesel refuelling station in Johannesburg, South Africa
Full text linkA thesis submitted to the Faculty of Science, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Johannesburg, August 2015.Petrol and diesel fumes are known to be anthropogenic sources of air pollutants that have a negative impact on both environmental and human health. In developing countries, attendants are still employed to pump fuel for customers. In South Africa gas pump attendants refuel vehicles with various octane unleaded petrol, lead replacement petrol (LRP) and diesel on a daily basis. Attendants are particularly at risk to adverse health effects associated with inhalation of hazardous air pollutants (HAPs). Of increasing concern in recent years are the volatile organic compounds (VOCs), with particular reference to the six aromatic hydrocarbons (benzene, toluene, ethyl benzene and three isomeric xylenes), namely the BTEX
Lending patterns and adaptations made to the Grameen Bank Model in South Africa
Full text linkM.A.In South Africa, high unemployment rates, uneven distribution of opportunities and poverty are major concerns for the government. Poverty is defined as the deprivation of people due to the lack of access, and their right, to certain commodities. In 2004, close to 15,4 million people were living below the poverty line. In addition to this, in 2005, 53 percent of South Africans, equating to 16,4 million persons, were excluded from formal financial services. Microcredit has been advocated as a tool to reduce poverty. A world renowned microfinance model, the Grameen Bank model of Bangladesh has had success in not only reducing poverty, but also allowing poor people access to formal financial services. The bank has 7,93 million borrowers, with 97 percent being female clients, and one third of its borrowers have crossed the poverty line. Four organisations in South Africa have replicated this model. These organisations are the Small Enterprise Foundation, Marang Financial Services, The Women's Development Businesses, and the South African National Zakah Fund. These organisations have achieved in reaching 130,000 clients across South Africa, and extended over R1 billion in loans. However, only four of the nine provinces in the country have been infiltrated effectively. The impacts on these borrowers lives, and their households has been exceptional. Many of the families now have increased selfworth, a stable income, job security and access to credit in order to advance their businesses. In addition, Grameencredit has allowed thousands of South Africans access to legal, formal financial services. Thus, Grameencredit has been advocated to be an effective method in the fight against poverty
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
Perceptions of external costs of dust fallout from gold mine tailings: West Wits Basin
Full text linkMining is important for the South African economy, as it is for many developing African nations. In 2017, mining was reported to contribute 6.8 % to the South African GDP and provided more than 460, 000 jobs. Though mining adds an enormous amount of value to the country, it has significant impacts on the environment and the socio-economic factors of society. The well-documented environmental impact of mining operations on surface and groundwater systems, known as Acid Mine Drainage (AMD), is just one of these environmental impacts. There are also other impacts such as the pollution of agricultural soils, the creation of sinkholes and air pollution. For example, airborne dust remains a persistent problem in South African urban areas due to the climatic conditions, extensive surface mining, unrehabilitated tailings storage facilities and mineral processing. However, very little is reported on the socio-economic costs that are due to poor environmental management. Some scholars assert that despite the Mine Health and Safety Act, deposition monitoring guidelines and national dust regulations, South Africa still experiences persistent dust problems, especially in coal and gold mining districts. This paper investigates the effect of gold mining dust pollution in and around a Gold Mining Village, in South Africa. A quantitative and qualitative approach was used, where a questionnaire and interviews were conducted to examine the Gold Mine Village perceptions on dust pollution and their socio-economic environment. This paper further examines how poor and premature mine closure by liquidation results in unrehabilitated mine tailings and how this has significant impacts on the socio-economic status of individuals and surrounding businesses. The community being investigated in this study, perceives the dust fallout impact to be a socio-economic threat. The paper finds that the community believes it incurs medical financial expenditures due to treating respiratory-related diseases triggered by dust fallout
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