General comments for the postgard conference 2008

It is hoped that visitors to the blog that attended the conference would post there comments about what they thought of the conference.

Exploring the possible relationship between conformity to stereotypical masculinity, and the acceptance of rape myths: Barry

Barry Lachlan Kevin Viljoen is an honours student at Howard College. His project was conducted at a male single sex, government school, with the specific aim of identifying the presents of two variables amongst participants. The two variables being, firstly that of the participants level of subscription to a stereotypical and traditional masculinity, followed by establishing the participants level of rape myth acceptance. From the initial scores received by the participants for the respective variables, it is investigated as to whether or not a correlation does exist between the scores obtained for these two variables.

Psychology in the varnacular:Nolwandle, Sinenhlanhla, Nondumiso, Ndumiso, Zabathembu, Ayanda, Thabisile, Nandisa

The aim of this initiative is to develop indigenous languages as languages of science and technology. This initiative was started because research has shown that students learn easier when taught in their mother-tongue. The University Council approved UKZN’s policy of bilingualism, with English and isiZulu being the two languages of instruction, as these are the most widely spoken in KZN. The translation task team, were given the task to translate Psychology terms from first and second year tutorials into isiZulu. The translation of terms was done through brainstorming and the analysis of each term. There were many challenges faced by the team during translation. Among these were firstly, Psychology being set in the Western context and secondly, the danger of changing the concept when translating. We reflect on these and other challenges in this presentation

Indianness and its objectives: Prathna

Prathna Singh is an honours student at UKZN. Her project is a qualitative study aimed at investigating Indian university students’ notions of contact with other race groups. Indians from segregated schools, as well as those who were schooled in desegregated school contexts were included in the sample. The study was particularly concerned with the working models of contact deployed by such groups

Strategies to improve adverse event reporting in a community based intervention trial in KwaZulu Natal: Sandile & Mbongeni

Sandile Magwenyane and Mbongeni PG Ngcoya are Community Coordinators at the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC), working at Project Accept in Vulindlela. Project Accept is part of a multi-site research trial that is testing the efficacy of providing three strategies- community mobilization, mobile voluntary counseling and testing, and post test support services, in reducing the prevalence of HIV in communities. The major focus of their work involves coordinating the study in implementing the intervention

The sexual double standard: gendered differences in attitudes toward sexuality: Ahmed

Ahmed Goolam is an Honours student at UKZN. Working on a descriptive quantitative study using standardized instruments to identify whether a traditional double standard exists in society amongst adolescents. As well as to measure the relationship between adolescent attitudes toward sexuality (gendered differences) and the degree to which they adhere to the sexual double standard.

A Comparison of the Unmatched Count Technique and a Self-Report: Marche'

Marche' Grendon is a Psychology honours student at UKZN. Interested in exploring different factors that may put the young adult population at risk for HIV infection. The current study aimed to firstly compare two different methodological techniques, the self-report questionnaire and the unmatched count technique questionnaire, to test which the two is better suited to estimate reliable and accurate data concerning sensitive behaviours such as risky sex and risky sex following alcohol consumption. This research study was conducted at UKZN with a sample of 545 students.