Thwarted Identity: The Missing Link Between Psychopathology and Prejudice. Prejudice and the extremist violence that arises from it are typically explained either by the psychopathology of individual perpetrators, or by their membership of extremist groups. This project will seek to reconcile these competing explanations and resolve this impasse that has obstructed progress in combating prejudice. This project develops a new framework specifying causal and reciprocal links between the novel conc ....Thwarted Identity: The Missing Link Between Psychopathology and Prejudice. Prejudice and the extremist violence that arises from it are typically explained either by the psychopathology of individual perpetrators, or by their membership of extremist groups. This project will seek to reconcile these competing explanations and resolve this impasse that has obstructed progress in combating prejudice. This project develops a new framework specifying causal and reciprocal links between the novel concept of thwarted identity, psychopathology, ideology, and prejudice. Expected outcomes are new policy solutions and novel targets for interventions to reduce prejudice and extremist violence, which will deliver significant benefit by addressing these pernicious social problems.Read moreRead less
The Cultural Evolution of Mentalising. Thinking about mental states, such as beliefs, desires and intentions, is a universally important human ability known as mentalising. This project aims to use new cross-cultural databases and computational comparative methods to study five ways that mentalising practices vary across world cultures. The findings of this research have the potential to provide the first systematic overview of how mentalising practices vary globally as well as reveal the histor ....The Cultural Evolution of Mentalising. Thinking about mental states, such as beliefs, desires and intentions, is a universally important human ability known as mentalising. This project aims to use new cross-cultural databases and computational comparative methods to study five ways that mentalising practices vary across world cultures. The findings of this research have the potential to provide the first systematic overview of how mentalising practices vary globally as well as reveal the historical and social processes that shape the diverse ways that people think about the mind. Benefits of this knowledge include a more culturally sound basis for future developments in community-focused professions such as education, community development and counselling.Read moreRead less
Informing intervention responses to violent offenders through data linkage. The project aims to capitalise on new data access capacity to improve knowledge on violent offender pathways and criminogenic needs, such as acquired brain injury, to reduce offending and re-offending. Violence is a major social and health issue nationally and internationally. While there has been substantial investment in treatment/prevention campaigns, rates of violence remain high. Using diverse linked administrative ....Informing intervention responses to violent offenders through data linkage. The project aims to capitalise on new data access capacity to improve knowledge on violent offender pathways and criminogenic needs, such as acquired brain injury, to reduce offending and re-offending. Violence is a major social and health issue nationally and internationally. While there has been substantial investment in treatment/prevention campaigns, rates of violence remain high. Using diverse linked administrative data, we will identify key risk factors and times in trajectories, as well as effective treatment/justice responses. Expected benefits include evidence-based recommendations and engagement with policymakers targeting recidivism, offender screening, treatment, and coordinated violence prevention policy and practice.Read moreRead less
Borderline Personality as Social Phenomena. Mental disorders attract social stigma and those diagnosed are widely misunderstood. This project aims to collect and analyse accounts of people living with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) - mainly women - and perspectives of social support practitioners. The intended outcome is to provide a sophisticated understanding of BPD as a social phenomenon, develop sociological evidence based on lived experiences and generate Australian digital resources ....Borderline Personality as Social Phenomena. Mental disorders attract social stigma and those diagnosed are widely misunderstood. This project aims to collect and analyse accounts of people living with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) - mainly women - and perspectives of social support practitioners. The intended outcome is to provide a sophisticated understanding of BPD as a social phenomenon, develop sociological evidence based on lived experiences and generate Australian digital resources including narratives of BPD, creative outputs and practitioner perspectives. The anticipated goal of this project is to inform policy and community responses addressing stigma and marginalisation, and the improvement of social support for those affected by BPD.Read moreRead less
Understanding Ageism in Australia. Ageism refers to stereotypes, prejudice and discrimination towards people based on their age. This project aims to generate new knowledge in relation to older Australians’ experiences of ageism by conducting a population-based survey of ageism and examining its links with mental health and wellbeing. The project will also use intensive longitudinal methods to study everyday ageism. Expected outcomes include identification of at-risk groups that can be used to i ....Understanding Ageism in Australia. Ageism refers to stereotypes, prejudice and discrimination towards people based on their age. This project aims to generate new knowledge in relation to older Australians’ experiences of ageism by conducting a population-based survey of ageism and examining its links with mental health and wellbeing. The project will also use intensive longitudinal methods to study everyday ageism. Expected outcomes include identification of at-risk groups that can be used to inform government policy responses to tackling ageism and will inform the development of interventions and education programs to reduce ageism in the community. This should provide significant benefits for social inclusion, intergenerational solidarity and economic participation Read moreRead less
Understanding the long term impact of childhood emotional abuse. This project will generate new knowledge about the social dimensions of childhood emotional abuse. Experiences of childhood emotional abuse are extremely common, with many affected individuals going on to face long term health problems, social marginalisation, intergenerational family violence and re-victimisation. This project will investigate how different social contexts influence childhood emotional abuse itself and the interco ....Understanding the long term impact of childhood emotional abuse. This project will generate new knowledge about the social dimensions of childhood emotional abuse. Experiences of childhood emotional abuse are extremely common, with many affected individuals going on to face long term health problems, social marginalisation, intergenerational family violence and re-victimisation. This project will investigate how different social contexts influence childhood emotional abuse itself and the interconnected problems flowing from it that often persist over the life course. The findings of this project will increase the evidence base and inform the future development of policy and practice that aims to prevent the intergenerational transmission of violence and abuse, and improve health and social outcomes. Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE240101219
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$413,847.00
Summary
Uncovering epistemic injustice in Australian clinical psychology. This project aims to understand how clinical psychologists privilege Western forms of knowing in ways that have the potential to harm people from refugee and culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds. This is significant because a lack of understanding of diverse forms of knoweldge can lead to harmful or coercive interventions. The expected outcomes will be new knowledge about exclusionary practices in psychology an ....Uncovering epistemic injustice in Australian clinical psychology. This project aims to understand how clinical psychologists privilege Western forms of knowing in ways that have the potential to harm people from refugee and culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds. This is significant because a lack of understanding of diverse forms of knoweldge can lead to harmful or coercive interventions. The expected outcomes will be new knowledge about exclusionary practices in psychology and the design of educational tools to build capacity among clinical psychologists to notice and prevent exclusion. This should have significant benefits such as increasing inclusion for CALD people in Australian mental health services and preventing misunderstandings which can lead to coercive interventions. Read moreRead less
Emotions and Employee Turnover: New Methods for Complex Dynamic Systems. This project aims to vastly improve the data-analytic capabilities of social and health researchers, while increasing knowledge about emotion dynamics and their link to employee turnover. By drawing on and advancing methods from ecology and applied physics, this project plans to investigate the role that individual emotions play in employee turnover with new quantitative methods for characterising and testing causality in c ....Emotions and Employee Turnover: New Methods for Complex Dynamic Systems. This project aims to vastly improve the data-analytic capabilities of social and health researchers, while increasing knowledge about emotion dynamics and their link to employee turnover. By drawing on and advancing methods from ecology and applied physics, this project plans to investigate the role that individual emotions play in employee turnover with new quantitative methods for characterising and testing causality in complex dynamic systems. The expected outcomes include an improved capacity for researchers, managers, and policy makers to understand complex organisational, economic, and health systems. This will provide immediate societal benefits by informing the development and deployment of targeted interventions in such systems.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE210100912
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$450,488.00
Summary
Improving Girls’ Body Image via Social Media. Social media platforms are starting to realise their social responsibilities and are looking for ways to reduce harm to their users. This project aims to evaluate the effectiveness and feasibility of specific social media content and activities for improving adolescent girls’ body image. This project expects to generate new knowledge in the area of social media and body image by developing a novel theoretical model and an evidence base for effective ....Improving Girls’ Body Image via Social Media. Social media platforms are starting to realise their social responsibilities and are looking for ways to reduce harm to their users. This project aims to evaluate the effectiveness and feasibility of specific social media content and activities for improving adolescent girls’ body image. This project expects to generate new knowledge in the area of social media and body image by developing a novel theoretical model and an evidence base for effective positive social media activities for body image. Body image concerns are a global public health issue with a devastating impact on key aspects of people’s lives. This project has the potential to inform the development of new ways to harness social media to support mental health and wellbeing.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE240100535
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$410,000.00
Summary
Workplace mental health: Aligning employer incentives with societal benefit. The workplace is an underutilised platform to improve mental health. This is a particularly urgent problem for the healthcare workforce. This project aims to investigate ways to encourage employers to create mentally healthy workplaces. By pioneering use of economic methods, this project expects to generate much-needed knowledge on conflicting incentives that are hindering employer action. Expected outcomes include evid ....Workplace mental health: Aligning employer incentives with societal benefit. The workplace is an underutilised platform to improve mental health. This is a particularly urgent problem for the healthcare workforce. This project aims to investigate ways to encourage employers to create mentally healthy workplaces. By pioneering use of economic methods, this project expects to generate much-needed knowledge on conflicting incentives that are hindering employer action. Expected outcomes include evidence on how potential policy reforms would affect employers' behaviour, and how they see value for money of workplace mental health initiatives. By informing successful policy change, the project should improve employee wellbeing and increase productivity, which will benefit employers, employees, and society.Read moreRead less