Taking Time: Work-family time pressure, time quality and healthy activities. Australian families report very high time stress. This project explores links between parental time pressure, health and wellbeing, innovatively capturing individual, family and social perspectives. Using new measures, it analyses time diary data from ten countries to discover how amount, composition and gender share of work-family time affect parents' time quality and healthy activities across different societal contex ....Taking Time: Work-family time pressure, time quality and healthy activities. Australian families report very high time stress. This project explores links between parental time pressure, health and wellbeing, innovatively capturing individual, family and social perspectives. Using new measures, it analyses time diary data from ten countries to discover how amount, composition and gender share of work-family time affect parents' time quality and healthy activities across different societal contexts. It also examines whether there are differences in outcomes by socio-economic status and family structure, in Australia and cross-nationally. The results are expected to inform policy, to promote health and wellbeing, and to encourage sustainable employment-childcare practices.Read moreRead less
Enhancing mothers' engagement with the workforce in the preschool years. Increasing the workforce participation of mothers is a key national policy agenda. This project will produce unique data that provides insights into how leave arrangements, childcare, flexibility, job characteristics and individual circumstances interact to influence mothers' workforce engagement and how this varies for different groups of mothers.
When caring ends: Understanding and supporting informal care trajectories. This project aims to advance understandings of how, why, when, and for whom caring ends, including the socio-cultural and relational factors that shape experiences before, during, and after caring. Using an innovative, multi-method sociological approach, and foregrounding carers’ voices, this project expects to generate new knowledge on the meaning and experience of care and caring. This project is significant in bringing ....When caring ends: Understanding and supporting informal care trajectories. This project aims to advance understandings of how, why, when, and for whom caring ends, including the socio-cultural and relational factors that shape experiences before, during, and after caring. Using an innovative, multi-method sociological approach, and foregrounding carers’ voices, this project expects to generate new knowledge on the meaning and experience of care and caring. This project is significant in bringing together leading researchers and key carer-focused organisations, spanning service sectors and moving across care relationships, life stages and contexts. Expected outcomes include enhanced service capacity with tangible policy and practice benefits that will enable sustainable and fulfilling informal caring experiences.Read moreRead less
How parents manage climate anxiety: coping and hoping for the whole family. This project studies how Australian parents manage climate anxiety for themselves and their families. Using mixed-methods/mixed-media approaches, it examines whether an increase in climate disasters is accelerating the spread of collective anxiety amongst families, how parents manage this anxiety for their children and partners, and if there are associated mental health burdens and gendered inequities in this management. ....How parents manage climate anxiety: coping and hoping for the whole family. This project studies how Australian parents manage climate anxiety for themselves and their families. Using mixed-methods/mixed-media approaches, it examines whether an increase in climate disasters is accelerating the spread of collective anxiety amongst families, how parents manage this anxiety for their children and partners, and if there are associated mental health burdens and gendered inequities in this management. It also looks at climate anxiety management across generations and climate histories, drawing out pessimistic/optimistic narratives about the future to enable action, resilience, and hope. It will produce an evidence base and photo-voice/documentary resources to help parents and support organisations combat climate anxiety.Read moreRead less
Impact of parents' employment on children's well-being: The influence of employment quality, time and activities with children, and parenting practices. Most Australian children now grow-up in families where both their mother and their father are employed. Using a new national dataset, this research examines how parents' working conditions are related to children's well-being. It is proposed that parents' availability, resources, and family functioning mediate between parental employment and chi ....Impact of parents' employment on children's well-being: The influence of employment quality, time and activities with children, and parenting practices. Most Australian children now grow-up in families where both their mother and their father are employed. Using a new national dataset, this research examines how parents' working conditions are related to children's well-being. It is proposed that parents' availability, resources, and family functioning mediate between parental employment and child outcomes. The Growing-Up in Australia study (available in 2005) surveys 10,000 children, combining measures of child well-being, existing validated measures of work conditions and family functioning, with a new child-focused diary that measures time and activities undertaken with children. New knowledge generated will inform future policy development.Read moreRead less
Growing Old in a Rapidly Changing World: Living Conditions and Inequalities Amongst the Aged in China. China is set to dominate the world stage in the current millennium and ageing will present challenges to all nations. This research will benefit understanding of these issues by enriching our understanding of how older people in China cope with rapid change by documenting the factors that produce improved living conditions, including strong family and community relations. A component of the res ....Growing Old in a Rapidly Changing World: Living Conditions and Inequalities Amongst the Aged in China. China is set to dominate the world stage in the current millennium and ageing will present challenges to all nations. This research will benefit understanding of these issues by enriching our understanding of how older people in China cope with rapid change by documenting the factors that produce improved living conditions, including strong family and community relations. A component of the research will draw comparisons with Australia in order to increase the relevance of the study which will build ageing research capacity in both China and Australia.Read moreRead less
Alcohol and tobacco use among lesbian, bisexual and queer identifying women. This project aims to examine practices of alcohol and tobacco use among lesbian, bisexual and queer-identifying (LBQ) women, which are considerably higher compared to heterosexual women. By using an innovative, longitudinal qualitative approach, this project expects to generate new knowledge regarding the cultural and social forces that shape higher rates of alcohol and tobacco use among LBQ women, and to better underst ....Alcohol and tobacco use among lesbian, bisexual and queer identifying women. This project aims to examine practices of alcohol and tobacco use among lesbian, bisexual and queer-identifying (LBQ) women, which are considerably higher compared to heterosexual women. By using an innovative, longitudinal qualitative approach, this project expects to generate new knowledge regarding the cultural and social forces that shape higher rates of alcohol and tobacco use among LBQ women, and to better understand their impacts. It is anticipated that the project will enhance the capacity of health promotion and policy organisations to meet the alcohol management and smoking cessation needs of this population. Findings from this project should help to alleviate health and social inequalities experienced by LBQ women.
Read moreRead less
Socio-economic determinants and health inequalities over the life course: Australian and English comparisons. Our multidisciplinary investigation will yield Australia's first major body of knowledge on the socio-economic determinants of health and health inequalities over the life course. It will point the way towards policies that can promote health and reduce the health inequalities experienced by disadvantaged individuals and families. It will indicate how improving the health of ageing Aus ....Socio-economic determinants and health inequalities over the life course: Australian and English comparisons. Our multidisciplinary investigation will yield Australia's first major body of knowledge on the socio-economic determinants of health and health inequalities over the life course. It will point the way towards policies that can promote health and reduce the health inequalities experienced by disadvantaged individuals and families. It will indicate how improving the health of ageing Australian men and women can increase productivity and reduce needs for health services during the rapid population ageing that lies ahead. Comparisons with England will inform policy choices. We will train researchers who will play a future role in building Australia's evidence base to guide constructive policies to 2020 and beyond.Read moreRead less
Reimagining strengths approaches to drug and alcohol care for young people. This project aims to advance the conceptualisation and practical application of strengths-based approaches in the youth alcohol and drug sector. These approaches provide a promising way forward for addressing substance use and disadvantage among young people, and are widespread in the sector, but lack a strong evidence base. The project will learn from excellence in Aboriginal strengths-based models, and draw on sociolog ....Reimagining strengths approaches to drug and alcohol care for young people. This project aims to advance the conceptualisation and practical application of strengths-based approaches in the youth alcohol and drug sector. These approaches provide a promising way forward for addressing substance use and disadvantage among young people, and are widespread in the sector, but lack a strong evidence base. The project will learn from excellence in Aboriginal strengths-based models, and draw on sociological frameworks, to generate evidence on which to build more relevant responses for disadvantaged young people. This will provide significant benefit to service providers and policymakers by providing evidence about how to do strengths-based practice that is responsive to the needs of disadvantaged young people.Read moreRead less
The sociology of health data for sexuality and gender diverse people. This project aims to investigate the sociological dimensions of digital health data for sexuality and gender diverse people with complex health needs. It employs qualitative and co-design methods to engage with sexuality and gender diverse people, advocates, clinicians, decision-makers, and health data designers. The project expects to generate much-needed knowledge about the participation of sexuality and gender diverse peopl ....The sociology of health data for sexuality and gender diverse people. This project aims to investigate the sociological dimensions of digital health data for sexuality and gender diverse people with complex health needs. It employs qualitative and co-design methods to engage with sexuality and gender diverse people, advocates, clinicians, decision-makers, and health data designers. The project expects to generate much-needed knowledge about the participation of sexuality and gender diverse people in health data systems, with respect to trust, disclosure, stigma and prejudice. Expected outcomes include insight for enhancing health data systems for sexuality and gender diverse people. This project should provide significant benefits for the promotion of inclusive, safe and useful health data systems.Read moreRead less