The Centre will enhance Australian clinical immunisation research and training, focussing upon clinical questions with translatable outcomes not easily addressed by industry. Optimal immunisation and interventions to maximise uptake of existing and new vaccines in high risk patient groups, such as children with cancer, immigrants, children with chronic diseases and adolescents will be studied. New vaccine trials, innovative use of existing vaccines, systematic collection of vaccine failure data, ....The Centre will enhance Australian clinical immunisation research and training, focussing upon clinical questions with translatable outcomes not easily addressed by industry. Optimal immunisation and interventions to maximise uptake of existing and new vaccines in high risk patient groups, such as children with cancer, immigrants, children with chronic diseases and adolescents will be studied. New vaccine trials, innovative use of existing vaccines, systematic collection of vaccine failure data, and targeted epidemiology and disease modelling vaccine preventable disease will also allow a broad program of research, enabling training and mentoring of young clinical nurse and physician researchers. Collaborations with existing national immunisation, infectious diseases and research institutions will allow maximal effectiveness of clinical studies.Read moreRead less
Parental Supply Of Alcohol To Children: Associations With Early Adult Health – “binge” Drinking, Alcohol-related Harms, Aggression, And Alcohol Use Disorders
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$1,143,477.00
Summary
We will investigate of the impacts of parental supply of alcohol between 13-18 years, on early adult alcohol use (19-23 years). We will follow an existing cohort of ~1,810 parent-child dyads, and assess the development of alcohol use, disorders, harms and aggression. We will investigate the impacts of: parental supply of sips vs drinks; supervised vs unsupervised supply; and modifying effects of contexts of supply and mediators (such as peer, child factors, etc.) controlling for confounders.
A Scalable Intervention For Increasing Vigorous Physical Activity Among Older Adolescents: The ‘ Burn To Learn ’ Cluster RCT
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$636,912.00
Summary
Physical inactivity has been described as a global pandemic and only 15% of Australian adolescents are sufficiently active. The pressure to perform in major school assessments drives many older adolescents to sacrifice physical activity to maximise academic performance. Our team has designed a time-efficient solution to increase physical activity in senior high school students using high intensity interval training which will be evaluated using a cluster randomised controlled trial.
The RADAR Project: Identifying Early Warning Signals On The Pathways To Alcohol Use Disorder
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$884,321.00
Summary
The transition from alcohol initiation to an alcohol use disorder is a crucial yet under-studied research area. The current project will characterise the natural history of alcohol use disorder and identify modifiable factors that increase or decrease the likelihood of developing an alcohol use disorder once alcohol use begins. This information will guide prevention of, and early intervention for, this disabling disorder.
Scalability Of The Transform-Us! Program To Promote Children's Physical Activity And Reduce Prolonged Sitting In Victorian Primary Schools
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$549,823.00
Summary
Transform-Us! is an innovative primary school program that has been found to substantially increase children’s physical activity levels, reduce sitting time and benefit health. With simple changes to the school and classroom environments and teaching practices (eg, standing lessons) we will work with partners in the education and health systems to translate this program across Victorian primary schools to determine the real-world implementation and impact of this program over 5 years.
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
Social buffering of fear inhibition in adolescent rats. Adolescence is an important time when individuals learn to manage stress-related emotions like fear. Peers can help, or hinder, individuals to regulate fear. This project aims to understand how, when, and for whom social buffering of fear regulation occurs during adolescence. It uses a behavioural, pharmacological, and neural approach to explore these issues. The project aims to close the gap in understanding of how social companions affect ....Social buffering of fear inhibition in adolescent rats. Adolescence is an important time when individuals learn to manage stress-related emotions like fear. Peers can help, or hinder, individuals to regulate fear. This project aims to understand how, when, and for whom social buffering of fear regulation occurs during adolescence. It uses a behavioural, pharmacological, and neural approach to explore these issues. The project aims to close the gap in understanding of how social companions affect basic learning and memory processes in an understudied population of adolescents. The expected outcomes of this project include a richer knowledge of how peers shape emotional regulation during development, which will ultimately inform social-based approaches for improving emotion regulation in youth.
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Examining The Metabolic And Cognitive Deficits Caused By Insulin Resistance In The Ventral Striatum
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$400,372.00
Summary
Brain insulin resistance is thought to cause metabolic and cognitive deficits, but the underlying neural mechanisms remain elusive. This project addresses this gap in our knowledge by examining how brain insulin resistance disrupts the metabolic regulation of food intake and the cognitive control of actions. The outcomes will provide new insights in disorders characterised by brain insulin resistance such as obesity and dementia.
(When) should organisations employ over/underqualified individuals? The aim of the project is to better understand how employee qualifications (ie the extent to which an employee is qualified for the job they hold) influences their voluntary turnover decisions and job performance. Demand and supply in the labour market are frequently out of sync; around half of Australian employees have a level of qualification that does not match the position in which they are currently working. The project aim ....(When) should organisations employ over/underqualified individuals? The aim of the project is to better understand how employee qualifications (ie the extent to which an employee is qualified for the job they hold) influences their voluntary turnover decisions and job performance. Demand and supply in the labour market are frequently out of sync; around half of Australian employees have a level of qualification that does not match the position in which they are currently working. The project aims to establish under what conditions organisations and employees can get the performance benefits from employee qualifications while avoiding fast rates of voluntary turnover. The goal of the project is to develop insights about how to make full use of the benefits of qualifications while avoiding the pitfalls. Insights from this research may be of potential benefit to both workers and to employing organisations.Read moreRead less