Understanding communication about advance care planning across the lifespan. This project aims to understand how people communicate about advance care planning for children, adolescents, and adults. This project expects to generate new knowledge by using leading social scientific and linguistic methods to analyse real-world advance care planning conversations and documents. Expected outcomes include detailed knowledge about challenges people encounter in these conversations and how to manage the ....Understanding communication about advance care planning across the lifespan. This project aims to understand how people communicate about advance care planning for children, adolescents, and adults. This project expects to generate new knowledge by using leading social scientific and linguistic methods to analyse real-world advance care planning conversations and documents. Expected outcomes include detailed knowledge about challenges people encounter in these conversations and how to manage these challenges. Over 170,000 Australians die each year, most from serious illness. This project should provide significant benefits to future initiatives for enhancing communication about advance care planning, especially in relation to young Australians, older Australians, and Australians with disabilities.Read moreRead less
Towards a social theory of semiotic technology: Exploring PowerPoint's design and its use in higher education and corporate settings. PowerPoint has become the dominant technology for designing and delivering presentations in many important settings and skills in the use of PowerPoint have become essential for professional and academic success. This study will investigate the use of PowerPoint in higher education and corporate settings in order to discover what these skills are and how the desig ....Towards a social theory of semiotic technology: Exploring PowerPoint's design and its use in higher education and corporate settings. PowerPoint has become the dominant technology for designing and delivering presentations in many important settings and skills in the use of PowerPoint have become essential for professional and academic success. This study will investigate the use of PowerPoint in higher education and corporate settings in order to discover what these skills are and how the design of PowerPoint supports or hinders the achievement of a range of communicative purposes. The study will provide guidelines for evaluating and improving the design and use of PowerPoint and other, similar presentation software.Read moreRead less
Enacting Reconciliation: Negotiating Meaning in Youth Justice Conferencing. 'Restorative justice' initiatives like youth justice conferencing are aimed at strengthening the social fabric by making sure the voices of victims are heard while giving offenders a genuine opportunity to 'set things right' and get back on track with their lives. More detailed research into the way participants use language and other communicative modes will help the convenors of conferences, and the trainers of conveno ....Enacting Reconciliation: Negotiating Meaning in Youth Justice Conferencing. 'Restorative justice' initiatives like youth justice conferencing are aimed at strengthening the social fabric by making sure the voices of victims are heard while giving offenders a genuine opportunity to 'set things right' and get back on track with their lives. More detailed research into the way participants use language and other communicative modes will help the convenors of conferences, and the trainers of convenors, to understand better the potential of this social healing process. This project will also add to Australia's reputation as a world-leader in the field of restorative justice.Read moreRead less
Success and failure in second language learning (SLL). Why do some people succeed in learning a second language to very high levels and others fail miserably despite the fact that both groups may have set out with similarly positive attitudes and high levels of motivation? This research project focuses on the social contexts in which second language learning takes place. It aims to provide an insider account of what it is like to be a successful or unsuccessful L2 user. It will describe the ling ....Success and failure in second language learning (SLL). Why do some people succeed in learning a second language to very high levels and others fail miserably despite the fact that both groups may have set out with similarly positive attitudes and high levels of motivation? This research project focuses on the social contexts in which second language learning takes place. It aims to provide an insider account of what it is like to be a successful or unsuccessful L2 user. It will describe the linguistic and discursive resources language learners have access to, and the ways in which such access is structured in the communities they participate in.Read moreRead less
Emotion in voice matters: Advancing a neural model of auditory emotion perception. Accurate perception of emotion in others is fundamental for positive social relationships, and speaking is the most common source of information from which a person will infer emotional intent. This project capitalises on recent advances in brain imaging technologies to develop a neural theory of vocal emotion perception that integrates research across neuro-cognitive, affective, and language disciplines. This wi ....Emotion in voice matters: Advancing a neural model of auditory emotion perception. Accurate perception of emotion in others is fundamental for positive social relationships, and speaking is the most common source of information from which a person will infer emotional intent. This project capitalises on recent advances in brain imaging technologies to develop a neural theory of vocal emotion perception that integrates research across neuro-cognitive, affective, and language disciplines. This will put Australia at the forefront of an important emerging research field 'social neuroscience', raising our international profile in this area. Findings will provide the theoretical knowledge that is currently lacking in the development of targeted remediation programs for individuals suffering from social communication problems.Read moreRead less
The role of emotion and social cognition in communication disorders. Social neuroscience is a rapidly emerging field that has identified the frontal systems of the brain as critical to social cognition, i.e. the ability to process specifically social information. Communication disorders also arising from frontal lobe damage are directly relevant to this field but have been ignored to date. This project represents cutting edge research putting Australia at the forefront in this endeavour. Not ....The role of emotion and social cognition in communication disorders. Social neuroscience is a rapidly emerging field that has identified the frontal systems of the brain as critical to social cognition, i.e. the ability to process specifically social information. Communication disorders also arising from frontal lobe damage are directly relevant to this field but have been ignored to date. This project represents cutting edge research putting Australia at the forefront in this endeavour. Not only is this research theoretically important but it is directly relevant to clinical management and remediation of the thousands of people in Australia who suffer brain injury annually and who suffer psychosocial disorders as a result. Read moreRead less
Group orbits in garmonic analysis and ergodic theory. Researchers from many areas need a type of mathematical analysis which involves the behaviour of a system - which may be a set of data points - under repeated application of some operation or group of operations. The structures arising from this kind of process are known as group orbits. The project gives information about their nature. Two major types of orbits are considered, coming from actions of discrete groups on measure spaces, and fro ....Group orbits in garmonic analysis and ergodic theory. Researchers from many areas need a type of mathematical analysis which involves the behaviour of a system - which may be a set of data points - under repeated application of some operation or group of operations. The structures arising from this kind of process are known as group orbits. The project gives information about their nature. Two major types of orbits are considered, coming from actions of discrete groups on measure spaces, and from smooth actions of Lie groups on manifolds, where powerful geometric methods are available. The project will yield new understandings of entropy, and new approaches to Fourier analysis.Read moreRead less
Symmetries in analysis. Technical research is like an iceberg. The 10% you see in applications is supported by 90% hidden, long-term, sometimes abstruse or theoretical-sounding work. The area of mathematical analysis has, for over 200 years, proved its worth as part of the unseen 90%, giving us such important tools as Fourier analysis, statistical mechanics and quantum mechanics. Australia is known as a world leader in mathematical analysis, and it is important for the country to maintain that e ....Symmetries in analysis. Technical research is like an iceberg. The 10% you see in applications is supported by 90% hidden, long-term, sometimes abstruse or theoretical-sounding work. The area of mathematical analysis has, for over 200 years, proved its worth as part of the unseen 90%, giving us such important tools as Fourier analysis, statistical mechanics and quantum mechanics. Australia is known as a world leader in mathematical analysis, and it is important for the country to maintain that edge in a number of key disciplines, so we can continue to participate in global technological advance. The project has an international focus which will enable that to happen. It will also provide training for the next generation of mathematicians. Read moreRead less
Dynamical systems: theory and practice. Mathematical science has proven a crucial platform for science and technology: it may have a long lead-time to application but its impacts are more profound than glamorous technical developments. Australia has an economic imperative to maintain investment in fundamental mathematics. Dynamical systems underpin a wide range of applications in physics, engineering, information science, finance and economics. This project will improve our capacity to model sy ....Dynamical systems: theory and practice. Mathematical science has proven a crucial platform for science and technology: it may have a long lead-time to application but its impacts are more profound than glamorous technical developments. Australia has an economic imperative to maintain investment in fundamental mathematics. Dynamical systems underpin a wide range of applications in physics, engineering, information science, finance and economics. This project will improve our capacity to model systems and to study their evolution, giving us better predictive power. It will keep Australia in the forefront of international research, providing a basis of expertise not otherwise available to Australian researchers and industry. Read moreRead less
Non-commutative analysis and differential calculus. This project is in an area of central mathematical importance and will lead to important scientific advances that will keep Australia at the forefront internationally in this field of research. There is an emphasis on international networking and we will collaborate with leading researchers in USA and France.