Farewell to Lawrence Schlemmer: initiator of quality-of-life studies in South Africa
- Authors: Moller, Valerie
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67175 , vital:29055 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-011-9965-8
- Description: publisher version , Professor Lawrence Schlemmer, affectionately known as Lawrie, was the father of South Africa’s quality-of-life studies and social indicators movement. He died on 26 October 2011 at the age of 75 after a short illness. In 1978, Lawrence marched into my office at the Centre for Applied Social Sciences, University of Natal, brandishing two books. We need to do some work on quality of life in South Africa, he announced, before handing me the volumes. At the time, South Africa’s leaders assumed that smiling black faces meant that South Africans were happy with their lot in life under apartheid. Our surveys were to prove otherwise. That weekend was spent reading cover to cover the classic works by Frank Andrews, Angus Campbell and their colleagues. The next week we pored over lists of concerns voiced by South Africans which we later put to test in the field. In 1982, we submitted our findings by ‘slug’ post to the editor of Social Indicators Research. We received a letter by return mail from Alex Michalos to say he would publish our paper and we should not be too disappointed with our regression results!
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: Moller, Valerie
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67175 , vital:29055 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-011-9965-8
- Description: publisher version , Professor Lawrence Schlemmer, affectionately known as Lawrie, was the father of South Africa’s quality-of-life studies and social indicators movement. He died on 26 October 2011 at the age of 75 after a short illness. In 1978, Lawrence marched into my office at the Centre for Applied Social Sciences, University of Natal, brandishing two books. We need to do some work on quality of life in South Africa, he announced, before handing me the volumes. At the time, South Africa’s leaders assumed that smiling black faces meant that South Africans were happy with their lot in life under apartheid. Our surveys were to prove otherwise. That weekend was spent reading cover to cover the classic works by Frank Andrews, Angus Campbell and their colleagues. The next week we pored over lists of concerns voiced by South Africans which we later put to test in the field. In 1982, we submitted our findings by ‘slug’ post to the editor of Social Indicators Research. We received a letter by return mail from Alex Michalos to say he would publish our paper and we should not be too disappointed with our regression results!
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
How does subjective well-being evolve with age? A literature review
- López Ulloa, Beatriz Fabiola, Moller, Valerie, Sousa-Poza, Alfonso
- Authors: López Ulloa, Beatriz Fabiola , Moller, Valerie , Sousa-Poza, Alfonso
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67185 , vital:29056 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s12062-013-9085-0
- Description: publisher version , This literature review provides an overview of the theoretical and empirical research in several disciplines on the relation between ageing and subjective well-being, i.e., how subjective well-being evolves across the lifespan. Because of the different methodologies, data sets and samples used, comparison among disciplines and studies is difficult. However, extant studies do show either a U-shaped, inverted U-shaped or linear relation between ageing and subjective well-being.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: López Ulloa, Beatriz Fabiola , Moller, Valerie , Sousa-Poza, Alfonso
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67185 , vital:29056 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s12062-013-9085-0
- Description: publisher version , This literature review provides an overview of the theoretical and empirical research in several disciplines on the relation between ageing and subjective well-being, i.e., how subjective well-being evolves across the lifespan. Because of the different methodologies, data sets and samples used, comparison among disciplines and studies is difficult. However, extant studies do show either a U-shaped, inverted U-shaped or linear relation between ageing and subjective well-being.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
Perceptions of fortune and misfortune in older South African households: social assistance and the ‘Good Life’
- Moller, Valerie, Radloff, Sarah E
- Authors: Moller, Valerie , Radloff, Sarah E
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67165 , vital:29043 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-012-0026-8
- Description: publisher version , It is commonly assumed that better living standards will boost subjective well-being. The post-apartheid South African government subscribes to this idea; its social policies aim to provide ‘a better life for all’. Since the coming of democracy in 1994, the state has built over 3 million houses and supplied electricity and clean water to poor households. By 2009, an estimated 43 % of households were beneficiaries of social grants. The question is whether this investment in services and social assistance translates into higher well-being of citizens. It is argued that older people’s experience of positive change in their life circumstances can be taken as a litmus test of progress in society. The paper reports results of a sample survey conducted in 2009 that inquired into the living circumstances and well-being of 1,000 older low-income households in two provinces linked by a labour migration route. Older households were defined as ones with a member 55 years and older. The sample was drawn among three approximately equal-sized subgroups: Rural black households in the former ‘homelands’ of the Eastern Cape Province, and black and coloured households in Cape Town in the Western Cape Province. The majority of the households in the survey had been interviewed in an earlier survey conducted in late 2002. Both material and non-material changes had occurred in the household situation over the 6-year period between 2002 and 2009. Access to housing and infrastructure had improved but financial difficulties and debts continued to plague many of the surveyed households. Rural black households appeared to be worst off among the three categories of older households with the lowest level of living; coloured households best situated with the highest level of living. Urban black households, many of whom were immigrants to Cape Town, appeared to have experienced the greatest fluctuations in their material circumstances between 2002 and 2009 and a mix of fortune and misfortune. Results indicated that social grants, which provided a modicum of financial security and peace of mind, made the crucial difference between fortune and misfortune for vulnerable households. Securing a social pension and other grants appeared to be the main route to good fortune for the rural households in the study. Households in Cape Town required wage income in addition to grant income to get by in the city. This mix of income sources diluted urban households’ dependence on social assistance. Regression model results suggest that income and financial security play a significantly more important role in boosting the well-being of low-income older households than access to services. Pooling of income, a common practice in pensioner households, contributed significantly to household satisfaction.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: Moller, Valerie , Radloff, Sarah E
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67165 , vital:29043 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-012-0026-8
- Description: publisher version , It is commonly assumed that better living standards will boost subjective well-being. The post-apartheid South African government subscribes to this idea; its social policies aim to provide ‘a better life for all’. Since the coming of democracy in 1994, the state has built over 3 million houses and supplied electricity and clean water to poor households. By 2009, an estimated 43 % of households were beneficiaries of social grants. The question is whether this investment in services and social assistance translates into higher well-being of citizens. It is argued that older people’s experience of positive change in their life circumstances can be taken as a litmus test of progress in society. The paper reports results of a sample survey conducted in 2009 that inquired into the living circumstances and well-being of 1,000 older low-income households in two provinces linked by a labour migration route. Older households were defined as ones with a member 55 years and older. The sample was drawn among three approximately equal-sized subgroups: Rural black households in the former ‘homelands’ of the Eastern Cape Province, and black and coloured households in Cape Town in the Western Cape Province. The majority of the households in the survey had been interviewed in an earlier survey conducted in late 2002. Both material and non-material changes had occurred in the household situation over the 6-year period between 2002 and 2009. Access to housing and infrastructure had improved but financial difficulties and debts continued to plague many of the surveyed households. Rural black households appeared to be worst off among the three categories of older households with the lowest level of living; coloured households best situated with the highest level of living. Urban black households, many of whom were immigrants to Cape Town, appeared to have experienced the greatest fluctuations in their material circumstances between 2002 and 2009 and a mix of fortune and misfortune. Results indicated that social grants, which provided a modicum of financial security and peace of mind, made the crucial difference between fortune and misfortune for vulnerable households. Securing a social pension and other grants appeared to be the main route to good fortune for the rural households in the study. Households in Cape Town required wage income in addition to grant income to get by in the city. This mix of income sources diluted urban households’ dependence on social assistance. Regression model results suggest that income and financial security play a significantly more important role in boosting the well-being of low-income older households than access to services. Pooling of income, a common practice in pensioner households, contributed significantly to household satisfaction.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
South African quality of life trends over three decades, 1980–2010
- Authors: Moller, Valerie
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67145 , vital:29040 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-012-0120-y
- Description: publisher version , The South African Quality of Life Trends study has tracked the subjective well-being of South Africans in ten waves from 1983 to 2010. The paper presents the SAQoL trendline of life satisfaction, happiness and perceptions of life getting better or worse against the backdrop of the transition from apartheid to democracy. Subjective well-being peaked in the month following the first open elections in April 1994 when black and white South Africans were equally satisfied and happy at levels found in other democratic societies. But post-election euphoria was short-lived and levels of well-being dropped the following year and racial inequalities in evaluations of life re-emerged. The tenth and latest wave in the study was conducted a few months after South Africa’s successful hosting of the Soccer World Cup. In 2010, the proportions of all South Africans expressing satisfaction, happiness and optimism was among the highest since the coming of democracy—just over half stated they were satisfied, close on two-thirds were happy, and half felt life was getting better. Nonetheless, while the standard of living has increased for a minority of formerly disadvantaged South Africans and a small black middle class has emerged, there are still huge disparities in both material and subjective well-being. In 1997 and 2010, South Africans were asked what would make them happier in future. In 2010, the majority of citizens still hoped for basic necessities, income and employment, to enhance their quality of life.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: Moller, Valerie
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67145 , vital:29040 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-012-0120-y
- Description: publisher version , The South African Quality of Life Trends study has tracked the subjective well-being of South Africans in ten waves from 1983 to 2010. The paper presents the SAQoL trendline of life satisfaction, happiness and perceptions of life getting better or worse against the backdrop of the transition from apartheid to democracy. Subjective well-being peaked in the month following the first open elections in April 1994 when black and white South Africans were equally satisfied and happy at levels found in other democratic societies. But post-election euphoria was short-lived and levels of well-being dropped the following year and racial inequalities in evaluations of life re-emerged. The tenth and latest wave in the study was conducted a few months after South Africa’s successful hosting of the Soccer World Cup. In 2010, the proportions of all South Africans expressing satisfaction, happiness and optimism was among the highest since the coming of democracy—just over half stated they were satisfied, close on two-thirds were happy, and half felt life was getting better. Nonetheless, while the standard of living has increased for a minority of formerly disadvantaged South Africans and a small black middle class has emerged, there are still huge disparities in both material and subjective well-being. In 1997 and 2010, South Africans were asked what would make them happier in future. In 2010, the majority of citizens still hoped for basic necessities, income and employment, to enhance their quality of life.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
Valerie Møller: a pioneer in South African Quality of Life Research
- Authors: Moller, Valerie
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67205 , vital:29059 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s11482-013-9249-3
- Description: publisher version , Professor Valerie Møller is Professor Emeritus of Quality of Life Studies at Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa. Before that she was director of the Institute of Social and Economic Research at Rhodes University (1998–2006) and headed the Quality of Life Research Unit at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, South Africa, in the 1990s. She completed her primary school education in North Carolina, USA, and her secondary and tertiary education in Zürich, Switzerland. She earned Lic. Phil and DPhil degrees from the University of Zürich, majoring in sociology. She has lived and worked in Southern Africa since 1972. Together with the late Professor Lawrence Schlemmer she developed the first survey instruments to measure objective and subjective well-being among South Africans from all walks of life. The South African Quality of Life Trends Study has tracked happiness and life satisfaction from apartheid to the transition to democracy (1983–2012).
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: Moller, Valerie
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67205 , vital:29059 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s11482-013-9249-3
- Description: publisher version , Professor Valerie Møller is Professor Emeritus of Quality of Life Studies at Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa. Before that she was director of the Institute of Social and Economic Research at Rhodes University (1998–2006) and headed the Quality of Life Research Unit at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, South Africa, in the 1990s. She completed her primary school education in North Carolina, USA, and her secondary and tertiary education in Zürich, Switzerland. She earned Lic. Phil and DPhil degrees from the University of Zürich, majoring in sociology. She has lived and worked in Southern Africa since 1972. Together with the late Professor Lawrence Schlemmer she developed the first survey instruments to measure objective and subjective well-being among South Africans from all walks of life. The South African Quality of Life Trends Study has tracked happiness and life satisfaction from apartheid to the transition to democracy (1983–2012).
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
What are the best and worst times in the lives of South African township dwellers? A content analysis of the self-defined end-anchors for Bernheim’s ACSA scale of subjective well-being
- Authors: Moller, Valerie , Theuns, P
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67155 , vital:29042 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-012-0073-1
- Description: publisher version , Bernheim’s ACSA, a less conventional measure of subjective well-being originally developed for use in a clinical setting, was applied to a sample of black South African township dwellers (n = 1,020) in the Eastern Cape Province. The Anamnestic Comparative Self Assessment is an experiential self-anchoring scale with concrete anchors (Bernheim in Psychologie médicale 15:1625–1626, 1983). Respondents described the ‘best’ and ‘worst’ periods experienced in their lives in their own words and rated their current life situation within these two extremes that served as the end-anchors of an 11-point rating scale, ACSA. The ACSA score was significantly positively correlated with conventional measures of subjective well-being. The study examined in detail the content of the ACSA anchors, the best and worst periods of respondents’ lives, classified by domain, to gain insights into reference comparisons applied in quality-of-life evaluation in a developing country setting. As was the case in earlier ACSA studies, most domains that served as reference standards were related to the self and family life. However, material living standards, represented by the domains of income, financial security and housing also featured prominently as personal anchors—a reflection of life goals in post-apartheid South Africa. Age, gender, education and self-reported health were associated with the choice of select anchors. The discussion provides pointers for future applications of ACSA in large sample surveys using a pre-coded multiple-choice format for anchor descriptions. It is concluded that the content of ACSA anchors corresponds closely to contemporary definitions of the good life among ordinary South Africans.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: Moller, Valerie , Theuns, P
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67155 , vital:29042 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-012-0073-1
- Description: publisher version , Bernheim’s ACSA, a less conventional measure of subjective well-being originally developed for use in a clinical setting, was applied to a sample of black South African township dwellers (n = 1,020) in the Eastern Cape Province. The Anamnestic Comparative Self Assessment is an experiential self-anchoring scale with concrete anchors (Bernheim in Psychologie médicale 15:1625–1626, 1983). Respondents described the ‘best’ and ‘worst’ periods experienced in their lives in their own words and rated their current life situation within these two extremes that served as the end-anchors of an 11-point rating scale, ACSA. The ACSA score was significantly positively correlated with conventional measures of subjective well-being. The study examined in detail the content of the ACSA anchors, the best and worst periods of respondents’ lives, classified by domain, to gain insights into reference comparisons applied in quality-of-life evaluation in a developing country setting. As was the case in earlier ACSA studies, most domains that served as reference standards were related to the self and family life. However, material living standards, represented by the domains of income, financial security and housing also featured prominently as personal anchors—a reflection of life goals in post-apartheid South Africa. Age, gender, education and self-reported health were associated with the choice of select anchors. The discussion provides pointers for future applications of ACSA in large sample surveys using a pre-coded multiple-choice format for anchor descriptions. It is concluded that the content of ACSA anchors corresponds closely to contemporary definitions of the good life among ordinary South Africans.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
‘Growing’ social protection in developing countries: lessons from Brazil and South Africa
- Barrientos, Armando, Moller, Valerie, Saboia, Joao, Lloyd-Sherlock, Peter, Mase, Julia
- Authors: Barrientos, Armando , Moller, Valerie , Saboia, Joao , Lloyd-Sherlock, Peter , Mase, Julia
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67195 , vital:29058 , https://doi.org/10.1080/0376835X.2013.756098
- Description: publisher version , The rapid expansion of social protection in the South provides a rich diversity of experiences and lessons on how best to reduce poverty and ultimately eradicate it. Knowledge on how best to ‘grow’ social assistance, understood as long-term institutions responsible for reducing and preventing poverty, is at a premium. This article examines the expansion of social assistance in Brazil and South Africa, two of the middle income countries widely perceived to have advanced furthest in ‘growing’ social protection. It examines three aspects: the primacy of politics in explaining the expansion of social protection and assistance, the tensions between path-dependence and innovation in terms of institutions and practices, and the poverty and inequality outcomes of social assistance expansion. The article concludes by drawing the main lessons for other developing countries.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: Barrientos, Armando , Moller, Valerie , Saboia, Joao , Lloyd-Sherlock, Peter , Mase, Julia
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67195 , vital:29058 , https://doi.org/10.1080/0376835X.2013.756098
- Description: publisher version , The rapid expansion of social protection in the South provides a rich diversity of experiences and lessons on how best to reduce poverty and ultimately eradicate it. Knowledge on how best to ‘grow’ social assistance, understood as long-term institutions responsible for reducing and preventing poverty, is at a premium. This article examines the expansion of social assistance in Brazil and South Africa, two of the middle income countries widely perceived to have advanced furthest in ‘growing’ social protection. It examines three aspects: the primacy of politics in explaining the expansion of social protection and assistance, the tensions between path-dependence and innovation in terms of institutions and practices, and the poverty and inequality outcomes of social assistance expansion. The article concludes by drawing the main lessons for other developing countries.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
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