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
National Implementation Trial Of An Evidence-informed Workplace Sitting Reduction Intervention
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$624,575.00
Summary
Long periods of sitting time are bad for health. We will conduct a three-year national trial with five workplace-health partner organizations testing a website-delivered program for reducing sitting time at work. It will be offered to over 10,000 desk-based employees. We will determine the impacts of the program as well as refinements needed for full-scale dissemination: uptake of the program, how well it can be delivered on a large scale, its impact on sitting time, and the costs involved.
MatesMonitor: Evaluating Suicide Prevention In The Construction Industry
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$628,742.00
Summary
We will evaluate a smart-phone based suicide prevention program for the construction industry called MatesMonitor. This will complement face-to-face training provided by an industry-wide suicide prevention program. MatesMonitor will provide education and awareness about suicide prevention and additional social support through regular contacts with participants. We anticipate MatesMonitor will result in improved suicide prevention literacy, and reduced suicide ideation and self harm.
Mid-Career Industry Fellowships - Grant ID: IM230100702
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$859,472.00
Summary
Optimising sleep, alertness and safety in shift work industries. This project aims to address the impaired alertness, and high risk of workplace errors and accidents that are associated with sleep loss and circadian misalignment during shift work. The project will deliver an innovative industry-driven digital technology to provide automated, customised sleep management strategies to shift workers, and will develop a framework for effective wide-scale deployment of the technology within Australia ....Optimising sleep, alertness and safety in shift work industries. This project aims to address the impaired alertness, and high risk of workplace errors and accidents that are associated with sleep loss and circadian misalignment during shift work. The project will deliver an innovative industry-driven digital technology to provide automated, customised sleep management strategies to shift workers, and will develop a framework for effective wide-scale deployment of the technology within Australian shift working organisations. The project will close the gap in resources currently available to support sleep in shift workers and will reduce the significant burdens of shift work for alertness, productivity and safety.Read moreRead less
Reducing Prolonged Workplace Sitting Time In Office Workers: A Cluster-randomised Controlled Trial
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$524,613.00
Summary
Groundbreaking Australian research shows that sitting for too long, which is routine for most office workers, contributes to overweight and to a greater risk of developing diabetes and heart disease. In over 300 desk-bound office workers, this world-first study will assess the effectiveness of an innovative workplace program aimed at reducing and breaking up sitting time. It will identify practical ways for Australian office workers to minimise unhealthy effects of sitting too much at work.
Next-gen accident prevention: a new theory and toolkit for safer systems. This project aims to address limitations associated with existing accident causation theory and methodologies. Accident prevention across high risk industries is constrained by limitations in accident theory and methodologies. As a result, reductions in injuries and fatalities in most domains are plateauing. The expected outputs of the project include a new theory of accident causation, a new proactive risk assessment meth ....Next-gen accident prevention: a new theory and toolkit for safer systems. This project aims to address limitations associated with existing accident causation theory and methodologies. Accident prevention across high risk industries is constrained by limitations in accident theory and methodologies. As a result, reductions in injuries and fatalities in most domains are plateauing. The expected outputs of the project include a new theory of accident causation, a new proactive risk assessment methodology and a new methodology for analysing accidents. This will provide organisations and researchers with a powerful framework for enhanced accident analysis and prevention activities. This will provide significant benefits, associated with reductions in accidents, injuries and fatalities.Read moreRead less
Legal risk management of adverse health outcomes and injury in the fitness industry: developing evidence-informed regulation that improves safety. This project analyses Australian laws, policies and practices designed to manage legal risks and liabilities in the fitness industry, and assesses their effectiveness in preventing adverse health outcomes, injuries, and the legal liability associated with those risks.
Protecting while they prosper? Organisational responses to whistleblowing. This project aims to examine the adequacy of organisational responses to whistleblowing (employee reporting of wrongdoing). So far, research into public-interest whistleblowing has revealed much about the incidence, significance and experience of whistleblowers. This project now extends the research to the other side of the issue — the organisations. By comparing employee and managerial experience in multiple public and p ....Protecting while they prosper? Organisational responses to whistleblowing. This project aims to examine the adequacy of organisational responses to whistleblowing (employee reporting of wrongdoing). So far, research into public-interest whistleblowing has revealed much about the incidence, significance and experience of whistleblowers. This project now extends the research to the other side of the issue — the organisations. By comparing employee and managerial experience in multiple public and private sector organisations in Australia and New Zealand, the project intends to identify the factors that influence good and bad responses across a range of institutions; provide a clearer basis for reform of policies, procedures and law; and set benchmarks for comparative research worldwide.Read moreRead less
Strengthening Health Workforce Migration to Australia and Canada. The project aims to define skilled migration trends in relation to the key fields (medicine, nursing and dentistry). Australia is one of very few countries with an explicit policy to import migrant health professionals. The project plans to assess if the goal of domestic self-sufficiency is likely to be met by 2025 and examine the risk of a ‘two tier’ health workforce developing (with conditionally registered migrants servicing pa ....Strengthening Health Workforce Migration to Australia and Canada. The project aims to define skilled migration trends in relation to the key fields (medicine, nursing and dentistry). Australia is one of very few countries with an explicit policy to import migrant health professionals. The project plans to assess if the goal of domestic self-sufficiency is likely to be met by 2025 and examine the risk of a ‘two tier’ health workforce developing (with conditionally registered migrants servicing patients in undersupplied sectors and sites). It then aims to propose changes to make the migration and health policy systems more effective and ethical in future compared to Canada (Australia’s key global competitor for skilled migrants), through evidence-based policy reform.Read moreRead less
Next generation smart lighting to improve sleep and alertness. Light has a powerful influence on our sleep and alertness. The manipulation of the amount of blue in a light source and the visual brightness of a light source are key factors, but there has been no systematic study that can guide manufacturers in the design of the ideal light source for promoting either sleep or alertness. This study will systematically examine the impact of the amount of blue light in a light source and the visual ....Next generation smart lighting to improve sleep and alertness. Light has a powerful influence on our sleep and alertness. The manipulation of the amount of blue in a light source and the visual brightness of a light source are key factors, but there has been no systematic study that can guide manufacturers in the design of the ideal light source for promoting either sleep or alertness. This study will systematically examine the impact of the amount of blue light in a light source and the visual brightness, creating a wide range of combinations that can be used to model the optimal light specifications for sleep and alertness, while maintaining visual acuity and colour discrimination. This will be the evidence base needed by the lighting industry to create the next generation of smart lighting.Read moreRead less