BREAKING THE JUVENILE CRIME CYCLE: REHABILITATING HIGH RISK YOUNG OFFENDERS. Effective rehabilitation of young offenders is an urgent social need. Using mathematical modelling of longitudinal population data, we will identify predictors of recidivism, desistance, health risk behaviours, and/or progression to injecting drug use. Collaborating with NSW Department of Juvenile Justice and NSW Corrections Health Service, we will develop and trial community-based multisystemic interventions using the ....BREAKING THE JUVENILE CRIME CYCLE: REHABILITATING HIGH RISK YOUNG OFFENDERS. Effective rehabilitation of young offenders is an urgent social need. Using mathematical modelling of longitudinal population data, we will identify predictors of recidivism, desistance, health risk behaviours, and/or progression to injecting drug use. Collaborating with NSW Department of Juvenile Justice and NSW Corrections Health Service, we will develop and trial community-based multisystemic interventions using the transtheoretical model to reduce re-offending. This project will advance theoretical understanding of juvenile crime, its health and substance abuse patterns, and offence trajectories, thereby facilitating effective policies and practices to reduce recidivism, improve health and create prosocial alternatives for young Australians at risk of a criminal career.Read moreRead less
From Talking Heads to Thinking Heads: A Research Platform for Human Communication Science. In this project current Talking Head technology will be taken into the realm of a high-fidelity Thinking Head, with implications and applications for basic and applied research. Outcomes will bear on human-machine communication, telecommunications, e-commerce, and mobile phone technology; personalised aids for disabled users, the hearing impaired, the elderly, and children with learning difficulties, forei ....From Talking Heads to Thinking Heads: A Research Platform for Human Communication Science. In this project current Talking Head technology will be taken into the realm of a high-fidelity Thinking Head, with implications and applications for basic and applied research. Outcomes will bear on human-machine communication, telecommunications, e-commerce, and mobile phone technology; personalised aids for disabled users, the hearing impaired, the elderly, and children with learning difficulties, foreign language learning; and will facilitate the development of animation in new media, film, and games. In addition to output in scholarly journals, beta-versions of the Head will be made available, and public visibility for the project will be facilitated by the incorporation of high-profile installations and exhibitions.Read moreRead less
Auditory spatial perception during head movements. Orienting to stimuli frequently involves eye and head movements. This improves localisation, yet brings attendant problems (eg, blurring). These problems are well understood in vision, but not in audition, despite evidence for common neural mechanisms. We will examine auditory (and visual) localisation during head movements, showing head movements produce auditory suppression and spatial distortions (analogous to visual saccadic effects). This w ....Auditory spatial perception during head movements. Orienting to stimuli frequently involves eye and head movements. This improves localisation, yet brings attendant problems (eg, blurring). These problems are well understood in vision, but not in audition, despite evidence for common neural mechanisms. We will examine auditory (and visual) localisation during head movements, showing head movements produce auditory suppression and spatial distortions (analogous to visual saccadic effects). This will demonstrate the malleability of auditory spatial perception and the impoverished sensitivity of audition during head and self-motion. Knowledge of these distortions will inform applications such as cockpit design, where orienting to auditory signals is common, and other human/computer interfaces.
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Designing a Holistic Model of Advice to Improve Retirement Planning. We aim to improve retirement planning through the design and application of a new model integrating financial advice with career and health planning to optimise financial and psychological outcomes. We will test a multidisciplinary, holistic model of advice combining specialist knowledge in careers, health, and finances. Expected outcomes of the project include evaluating the use of a broader range of experts during retirement ....Designing a Holistic Model of Advice to Improve Retirement Planning. We aim to improve retirement planning through the design and application of a new model integrating financial advice with career and health planning to optimise financial and psychological outcomes. We will test a multidisciplinary, holistic model of advice combining specialist knowledge in careers, health, and finances. Expected outcomes of the project include evaluating the use of a broader range of experts during retirement planning and developing a model for the future training and development of financial advisers.By optimising the timing of workplace exit, we aim to decrease reliance on pensions and encourage earlier and on-going engagement in the retirement planning process. This will provide significant social and economic benefits.Read moreRead less
Lexical retrieval and reading comprehension: Binding perceptual, lexical and conceptual information in on-line reading. Reading is a complex process that involves integrating sensory information extracted from text with stored memories about word meanings, syntactic structures and general knowledge. Most reading research has focused on the processing of isolated words, but normal reading requires integration processes that are not necessary to recognise single words. This research uses tasks req ....Lexical retrieval and reading comprehension: Binding perceptual, lexical and conceptual information in on-line reading. Reading is a complex process that involves integrating sensory information extracted from text with stored memories about word meanings, syntactic structures and general knowledge. Most reading research has focused on the processing of isolated words, but normal reading requires integration processes that are not necessary to recognise single words. This research uses tasks requiring sentence comprehension and measures of eye movements during reading to investigate how readers retrieve and combine information while reading to comprehend text. It will contribute to developing more comprehensive theories of normal reading that can inform methods of teaching reading and contribute to refinement of text recognition systems.Read moreRead less
Training for Adaptability: The role of errors, exceptions and rules of thumb. This project involving collaboration among three fire services across two states and two universities aims to develop theoretical and evidenced-based error and exceptions training in the prediction of fire behaviour among novices and experts. The project will advance significantly our understanding of ways of adapting knowledge and updating and improving rules of thumb for complex decision-making. An innovative new cri ....Training for Adaptability: The role of errors, exceptions and rules of thumb. This project involving collaboration among three fire services across two states and two universities aims to develop theoretical and evidenced-based error and exceptions training in the prediction of fire behaviour among novices and experts. The project will advance significantly our understanding of ways of adapting knowledge and updating and improving rules of thumb for complex decision-making. An innovative new critical incident recording system will be developed that identifies the cognitive determinants of errors. Tightly controlled laboratory studies will be combined with field studies leading to improved theoretical understanding as well as practical outcomes for the fire services.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE150100667
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$328,000.00
Summary
How “known unknowns” become known: How do people encode unpredictability? As Donald Rumsfeld noted, there are 'known unknowns’. That is to say, people are seemingly capable of learning that some things cannot be reliably predicted. This learning underpins decisions from the trivial (whether to pack a jacket) to the life-defining (whom to marry). An aberrant form of this learning may also underlie mental health disorders. Yet the mechanisms of such learning have been largely overlooked by cogniti ....How “known unknowns” become known: How do people encode unpredictability? As Donald Rumsfeld noted, there are 'known unknowns’. That is to say, people are seemingly capable of learning that some things cannot be reliably predicted. This learning underpins decisions from the trivial (whether to pack a jacket) to the life-defining (whom to marry). An aberrant form of this learning may also underlie mental health disorders. Yet the mechanisms of such learning have been largely overlooked by cognitive scientists and thus are poorly understood. The project, which is based on significant pilot data, aims to examine when and how people learn about unpredictability, and what the cognitive, memorial, neural and affective consequences of this learning are.Read moreRead less
Improving Productivity in Emergency Service Personnel. Emergency service personnel experience marked levels of lost productivity, absenteeism, early retirements, and compensation claims as a result of stress reactions. This project aims to improve productivity and reduce compensation costs in emergency service organisations by evaluating a program that reduces stress reactions and increases cognitive functioning in police, firefighters, and paramedics in NSW. An individual program will be admini ....Improving Productivity in Emergency Service Personnel. Emergency service personnel experience marked levels of lost productivity, absenteeism, early retirements, and compensation claims as a result of stress reactions. This project aims to improve productivity and reduce compensation costs in emergency service organisations by evaluating a program that reduces stress reactions and increases cognitive functioning in police, firefighters, and paramedics in NSW. An individual program will be administered to 120 emergency service personnel who have difficulty maintaining their work duties because of stress reactions. Expected outcomes will be reduction in absenteeism, improved productivity, and reduced costs to insurers.
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Celebrate. Remember. Fight Back. Episodic Volunteering for Non-Profits. This project seeks to improve the policy and practice of volunteer involvement in the non-profit sector. Non-profit organisations rely on volunteers, and their capacity to deliver vital community services is threatened by the decrease in long-term, continuous volunteering and increase in episodic (short-term, flexible) volunteering. The interdisciplinary project aims to use mixed methods (qualitative interviews and quantitat ....Celebrate. Remember. Fight Back. Episodic Volunteering for Non-Profits. This project seeks to improve the policy and practice of volunteer involvement in the non-profit sector. Non-profit organisations rely on volunteers, and their capacity to deliver vital community services is threatened by the decrease in long-term, continuous volunteering and increase in episodic (short-term, flexible) volunteering. The interdisciplinary project aims to use mixed methods (qualitative interviews and quantitative surveys) and multiple perspectives (volunteers and staff who manage them) to develop an episodic volunteering definition; to explore the economic and social impact of episodic volunteering, and to develop a theoretical model of volunteer retention. The findings are intended to provide an evidence base and recommendations for non-profit sector policy and practice.Read moreRead less
Social cognitive change in late adulthood. This project aims to develop and test a model of how normal adult ageing affects the ability to perceive and interpret social cues, a critical predictor of social competency and well-being, and identify the most important determinants of any age-related changes. This project predicts that older adults who have the greatest difficulties perceiving and interpreting social cues will also have the poorest social function and well-being, so better understand ....Social cognitive change in late adulthood. This project aims to develop and test a model of how normal adult ageing affects the ability to perceive and interpret social cues, a critical predictor of social competency and well-being, and identify the most important determinants of any age-related changes. This project predicts that older adults who have the greatest difficulties perceiving and interpreting social cues will also have the poorest social function and well-being, so better understanding the mechanistic factors that drive resilience and risk for these difficulties is expected to have direct and important implications for Australia’s growing older adult community.Read moreRead less