Using advertising to negatively reconstruct memories of risky and high-risk drinking amongst Australia's youth : a new intervention strategy. The NHMRC recognises alcohol-related problems as one of Australia's most serious health problems. Binge-drinking in particular is endemic amongst the population, especially youth, with such behaviour resulting in enormous economic, social and emotional costs to our nation. This study works towards reducing binge drinking amongst youth by assisting the de ....Using advertising to negatively reconstruct memories of risky and high-risk drinking amongst Australia's youth : a new intervention strategy. The NHMRC recognises alcohol-related problems as one of Australia's most serious health problems. Binge-drinking in particular is endemic amongst the population, especially youth, with such behaviour resulting in enormous economic, social and emotional costs to our nation. This study works towards reducing binge drinking amongst youth by assisting the development of more effective counter-advertising campaigns that make young people's memories of binge-drinking less enjoyable & more unpleasant. It also assists relevant advertising regulators & key decision-makers to take action to ensure that alcohol ads do not spawn primarily attractive memories of binge-drinking experiences.Read moreRead less
Social, economic and health vulnerabilities in Indonesia. This project aims to study and provide ways to overcome vulnerability in Indonesia. Half the Indonesian population is still clustered around the poverty line, contributing to their vulnerability. This project will identify vulnerable groups and why they are vulnerable. Using a common framework of the life course in eight Indonesian field sites, this project will investigate whether social networks and welfare programs reduce vulnerability ....Social, economic and health vulnerabilities in Indonesia. This project aims to study and provide ways to overcome vulnerability in Indonesia. Half the Indonesian population is still clustered around the poverty line, contributing to their vulnerability. This project will identify vulnerable groups and why they are vulnerable. Using a common framework of the life course in eight Indonesian field sites, this project will investigate whether social networks and welfare programs reduce vulnerability, and pinpoint strategies for reducing vulnerabilities in the future. The project expects to show how vulnerable citizens in Indonesia can be made more secure, helping to build a more stable and prosperous region.Read moreRead less
Uncovering the processes underlying human category learning. There is a pervasive belief that complex tasks can somehow be learned via a 'smart' implicit or procedural learning mechanism, which operates independently of memory and attention. This idea has important implications for our understanding of cognition. If true, there seems little point in providing explicit instruction in such tasks, and efforts to do so are, at best, wasted time and, at worst, detrimental to the learning process. Th ....Uncovering the processes underlying human category learning. There is a pervasive belief that complex tasks can somehow be learned via a 'smart' implicit or procedural learning mechanism, which operates independently of memory and attention. This idea has important implications for our understanding of cognition. If true, there seems little point in providing explicit instruction in such tasks, and efforts to do so are, at best, wasted time and, at worst, detrimental to the learning process. This project will provide much-needed scrutiny of this idea and will help not only to re-orient our understanding of how we deal with complex information, but will also highlight issues about data interpretation that are fundamental for the research and wider communities.Read moreRead less
Binding in working memory. Cross-modal binding?the integration of verbal and spatial features of events?is central to human cognition. However, it has been neglected in the study of working memory, where the dominant theoretical framework includes separate subsystems for the retention of verbal and spatial information. Using novel paradigms involving the concurrent auditory presentation of verbal and spatial information, the proposed research is directed at discovering (1) the fundamental chara ....Binding in working memory. Cross-modal binding?the integration of verbal and spatial features of events?is central to human cognition. However, it has been neglected in the study of working memory, where the dominant theoretical framework includes separate subsystems for the retention of verbal and spatial information. Using novel paradigms involving the concurrent auditory presentation of verbal and spatial information, the proposed research is directed at discovering (1) the fundamental characteristics of binding, and (2) the extent to which benchmark effects previously identified with a particular modality are ?inherited? by the other modality under conditions conducive to binding. Outcomes of the research will provide important constraints on the development of theories of working memory. In addition, the research will develop paradigms that have potentially important applications to clinical psychology, where diverse forms of psychopathology have been linked to deficits in binding.Read moreRead less
The role of retrieval cues when remembering over the short term. This project has two principal benefits: A basic scientific outcome concerning the development of a cue-driven memory model and an applied outcome that can inform the design of language learning tools. A core assumption proposed to explain short-term memory performance is that an event's salience affects its memorability. To date however, this salience dimension has escaped experimental vigour. This project examines the conditions ....The role of retrieval cues when remembering over the short term. This project has two principal benefits: A basic scientific outcome concerning the development of a cue-driven memory model and an applied outcome that can inform the design of language learning tools. A core assumption proposed to explain short-term memory performance is that an event's salience affects its memorability. To date however, this salience dimension has escaped experimental vigour. This project examines the conditions under which some events are perceived to be more salient than others. In addition, by determining when, and which cues are more salient, the project can inform future design of language learning tools (e.g., interactive memory games). Read moreRead less
Memory And Time. What could be simpler than remembering a few items, such as the digits in a phone number, for a brief time in the right order? Notwithstanding its simplicity, this serial recall task is essential for sophisticated human abilities such as vocabulary acquisition. This project investigates whether chronological time is a causal variable in short-term memory, as some?but by no means all?theorists assume. Experiments will manipulate time between items at study and retrieval using nov ....Memory And Time. What could be simpler than remembering a few items, such as the digits in a phone number, for a brief time in the right order? Notwithstanding its simplicity, this serial recall task is essential for sophisticated human abilities such as vocabulary acquisition. This project investigates whether chronological time is a causal variable in short-term memory, as some?but by no means all?theorists assume. Experiments will manipulate time between items at study and retrieval using novel techniques, and thus observe the effect of time on memory. Computational models of psychological time will be developed to better predict memory performance.Read moreRead less
Roads to the Future: Infrastructure and the New Development in Africa. This project aims to conduct a comparative analysis of new road schemes in East Africa and the Western Indian Ocean (a region which sits at the intersection of several major global transport and development corridors), in order to understand their economic, socio-political, cultural and public health effects. As global road-building accelerates at an unprecedented rate, especially in the developing world, there is an urgent n ....Roads to the Future: Infrastructure and the New Development in Africa. This project aims to conduct a comparative analysis of new road schemes in East Africa and the Western Indian Ocean (a region which sits at the intersection of several major global transport and development corridors), in order to understand their economic, socio-political, cultural and public health effects. As global road-building accelerates at an unprecedented rate, especially in the developing world, there is an urgent need for new models for understanding roads' potential economic benefits, as well as their risks, including their environmental risks. This project is benefitting citizens, NGOs, donors and governments, by generating new knowledge about how we have in the past, do at present, and should in the future, engage with roads.Read moreRead less
Promoting scientific literacy of secondary science students through studying socioscientific issues and argumentation. This project will develop a model of professional development and effective classroom strategies to improve 12-16 year old school students' decision-making about socioscientific issues. Key outcomes will be improved scientific literacy and willingness by young people to use scientific evidence when making personal and community decisions.
Remaking the poor: poor people's responses to donors' market citizenship programs in Southeast Asia. Contemporary international aid attempts to help the poor participate in the market economy, with highly variable results. Often poor beneficiaries appear not to co-operate with these programs. This study investigates the factors driving the responses of poor people to donors' poverty reduction programs, to offer new models for donor interventions.
Categorization and Working Memory: Bridging two Pillars of Cognition. Categorization is a fundamental cognitive skill that underlies much expert behavior, including medical diagnosis. A given task often gives rise to widely divergent strategies across individuals, and flawed strategies have been implicated in prediction errors of experts (e.g., bush fire fighters). This project seeks to identify the underlying variables that determine an individual's strategy acquisition by relating working memo ....Categorization and Working Memory: Bridging two Pillars of Cognition. Categorization is a fundamental cognitive skill that underlies much expert behavior, including medical diagnosis. A given task often gives rise to widely divergent strategies across individuals, and flawed strategies have been implicated in prediction errors of experts (e.g., bush fire fighters). This project seeks to identify the underlying variables that determine an individual's strategy acquisition by relating working memory performance to categorization. Working memory is a core cognitive construct that is quite well understood, but its relationship to category learning has so far remained unexplored. Being able to predict the development of categorization strategies can help maximize expert performance.Read moreRead less