Study aims, research questions and hypotheses

Specific Aim 1: To conduct formative research to describe South African young women’s meanings of hope.

To explore young women’s conceptualizations of hope, the research questions focused on three main topics, including 1) the meanings of hope, 2) the characteristics of hopeful young women, and 3) the relationships of hope with young women’s future.

Meanings of hope

• RQ1.2: What does hope mean to young women?

• RQ1.3: What are the different elements of hope that women describe?

• RQ1.4: How do young women perceive their friends’ and peers’ thoughts on hope?

Identifying hopeful young women

• RQ1.5: What facilitates a young woman to be hopeless or hopeful?

• RQ1.6: What are the identifying characteristics of someone who is hopeful or hopeless? • RQ1.7: What are the experiences of young women who are hopeful or hopeless?

Hope and young women’s future

• RQ1.8: What role does hope play in the lives of young women?

• RQ1.9: How do young women’s hopes affect their thoughts on their future? • RQ1.10: How do young women envision their lives will be like in their future? • RQ1.11: What are the important things that young women want in their future? • RQ1.12: What are young women’s goals for their future?

Specific Aim 2: To develop and validate a scale that reliably measures the construct of hope in a sample of young women in rural South Africa.

In developing the scale, four research questions guided the data collection. The second research question (RQ 2.2) is exploratory, and therefore does not include hypotheses. I provide an explanation for the choice of validation variables for the fourth research question (RQ 2.4) in Chapter 6.

• RQ2.1: What are the domains that measure hope?

o Hypothesis: Hope is a multi-dimensional construct in the lives of young women. Three independent domains of the construct of hope form the basis for the new measure: personal motivation, future aspirations, and influence of others.

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o Hypothesis: The three domains of hope will be significantly correlated with one another.

• RQ2.2: What domains and accompanying items capture the breadth of the construct of hope?

• RQ2.3: How reliable is the new measure of hope?

o Hypothesis: Each subscale of the hope measure will provide adequate internal consistency (Cronbach’s α > 0.65).

• RQ2.4: What is the relationship between hope and other variables that establish the validity of the hope construct?

o Hypothesis: The relationship between the hope measure and other indicators previously shown to be associated significantly with hope in other settings will be statistically significant and in a direction and magnitude consistent with assessing construct validity (Table 4.1). At least 60% (5 out of 9) of the predicted relationships should occur in the sample for the hope scale to show acceptable construct validity.

Table 4.1. Construct validity of the new hope measure by hypothesizing the magnitude and direction of its relationship with other measures

Associated Variable Predicted direction Predicted magnitude Socio-demographic variables

Grade in school Positive Small to moderate

Mental health variables

Anxiety Negative Moderate

Depression Negative Moderate

Social support variable

Family support for school Positive Small to moderate Life stressors variables

Loss of one or both parents Negative Moderate

Household move in last year Negative Small to moderate Behavioral risk variables

Condom self-efficacy Positive Small to moderate

Ever been pregnant Negative Small to moderate

Specific Aim 3: To empirically test the relationship between South African young women’s risk environment and hope, between hope and sexual risk behaviors, and whether hope mediates the relationship between the risk environment and sexual risk behaviors.

In examining whether hope mediates the effect of the household risk environment on young women’s sexual risk behaviors, five research questions guided the analysis.

• RQ3.1: Are the characteristics of how the young women’s household is structured, i.e., the household demographic characteristics, associated with the young women’s hope?

o Hypothesis: As the size of the number of people living together in the household with the young woman increases, the likelihood of having high hope decreases. o Hypothesis: Increases to the number of youth living in the young woman’s

household will decrease the likelihood of high hope.

o Hypothesis: As the number of youth enrolled in school in the household increases, young women’s likelihood of high hope increases.

o Hypothesis: As the percent of school-aged youth in the household who are enrolled in school increases, young women’s likelihood of high hope increases. o Hypothesis: Young women living in a household that is headed by a female

compared to a male will be less likely to have high hope.

o Hypothesis: Young women living in a household together with at least one biological parent will be more likely to have high hope compared to young women not living with a biological parent.

o Hypothesis: As the percentage of females living in the household increases, the likelihood of young women having high hope decreases.

o Hypothesis: Increases to the average household age will increase the likelihood that young women report high hope.

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o Hypothesis – As the household’s consumption of food and non-food items per capita increases, young women’s likelihood of reporting high hope will increase. o Hypothesis – Young women living in a household with higher levels of education

for the head of household will be more likely to have high hope compared to households with lower levels of head of household education.

o Hypothesis - Young women living in a household with food security will be more likely to report high hope compared to young women living in a household with food insecurity.

• RQ3.3: What elements of the household risk environment, including household

demographics and household SES, are related to young women’s sexual risk behaviors? o Household demographic characteristics that suggest a less adverse risk

environment for young women – including smaller household size, fewer youth, greater number of youth in school, a greater percentage of youth enrolled in school, male-headed households, biological parent living in household, a lower percentage of females living in the household, and an older average household age – will be associated with a greater likelihood of young women having high hope.

o Households with a higher SES – more household consumption, greater head of household education, and having food security – will be associated with a greater likelihood of young women having high hope.

• RQ3.4: To what extent is young women’s hope related to their sexual risk behaviors? o Hypothesis: Young women with high hope compared to low hope will be less

likely to have had a sexual debut.

o Hypothesis: Sexually active young women with high hope compared to low hope will be more likely to have used a condom with their most recent sexual partner.

o Hypothesis: Sexually active young women with high hope compared to low hope will be less likely to report an early sexual debut before the age of 15 years. Mediated effect of hope

• RQ3.4: To what extent does young women’s hope mediate the relationship between the household risk environment and young women’s sexual risk behaviors?

o Hypothesis: Young women with household demographic characteristics that suggest a less adverse risk environment will report a higher frequency of high hope, and in turn will be less likely to engage in sexual risk behaviors. o Hypothesis: Young women living in household with higher SES will be more

likely to report high hope, and in turn will be less likely to engage in sexual risk behaviors.