Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Australian Interviews Australia'

His Story takes the form of a fictive but autobiographically based investigation into the child and young adult I used to be, and follows that protagonist into early adulthood. It tries to show the damage done to that character and the way in which he damaged others in turn. As Hemingway said, We are all bitched from the start and you especially have to hurt like hell before you can write seriously. More importantly, the main protagonist is somebody who became concerned with, and cognizant of the main political and social events of his day. His life is set in its social context, and reaches out to the larger issues. That is to say, the personal events of the protagonist's life are recorded alongside and set in the context of the major events taking place on the world stage. The manuscript is some sort of hybrid of novel, autobiography, and historical and social document. As Isaac Bashevis Singer said, The serious writer of our time must be deeply concerned about the problems of his generation. In order to make His Story effective in sharing my ideas and beliefs, and, of course, in order to protect the innocent and more particularly, the guilty, it is created in the colourful area that is the overlap between memory and fiction. When we tell the stories of our lives to others, and indeed, to ourselves, we prise them out of memory's fingers and transform them into fiction. To write autobiography well, as E.L. Doctorow said, you have to invent everything, even memory.

This thesis explores innovation as a means to achieving an enhanced level of sustainability in the Australian water sector. A modified Delphi study uncovered sixteen key elements centred around themes of 'community acceptance' and 'innovator effectiveness', that provide insights for immediate application within the sector to address impacts of climate change, population increases and resource scarcity. This exploratory research builds a foundational understanding of the components for change and innovation within the Australian water sector, and forms the underpinning for more specific lines of enquiry.

A significant risk area for project sponsors is managing unplanned change. Theorists of organisational behaviour have attempted to understand the circumstances of how activity change occurs on projects and have identified the significant impact that time has on activity. This current research takes the study of cognition into the real world setting of project management at a level of analysis that is viable across diverse projects and industries to study project manager regulation of unplanned change. The project managers' cognitive representation of meaningful aspects of a project (their 'cognitive schemata'), which guides activity change during the project, was investigated and the effect of feedback evaluated in order to address the central research question of what triggers change on group projects. In the present research, leading edge projects from six major Australian industries (telecommunications, banking and insurance, information technology, railway signalling, inorganic chemistry and construction) were monitored at three key points through their lifecycle to understand how feedback impacts on project activity through the project manager’s cognition leading to change. Six key categories of feedback were identified, which potentially represented the foci of project-related schemata, within a project management mental model. These were validated as important indicators for project management performance by a panel of Australia's leading experts in project management. Sixteen project managers participated in the field study, with their verbal reports being collected through structured interviews (incorporating a 'laddered' interview technique), which were developed and piloted across diverse projects for this purpose. Interview data were coded for analysis in terms of sensitivity to each of the six feedback foci and one control category, for five types of feedback and five types of change. Reliability of the content coding was checked through independent coding and found to be high. The research investigation was conducted within a schematic information processing conceptual framework developed for application within the domain of project management. Strong evidence was found that linked key schemata to the hypothesized effects of feedback. Overall, the effects were found to be general across all industries, individuals and projects. A contrasting effect was observed for one type of feedback where schemata were poorly developed in inexpert project managers, which raised the issue of measurable differences in behaviour arising from project management competency. The findings of strong relationships between the variables led to the proposed model of project manager cognition, which reveals an underlying structure in the schemata between key areas of sensitivity to feedback and unplanned change. The model is proposed as underpinning observed behaviour in this and prior research and suggests a relationship between competency and change regulation.

This thesis is based on a feminist ethnography. designed to explore how we as members of informal networks (family, social,,student/work and neighbourhood networks) can respond usefully where there is domestic violence. Here, domestic violence refers to violence against women by their intimate partners and I have filtered the various discourses which seek to explain domestic violence through the lens of a feminist ecological model. The inquiry process has been informed by a postmodem feminism. Non-foundationalist ideas about knowledge have influenced the gathering, interpretatation and representation of the research data. The ideas which emanate from the stady have been informed by the view that language, embodied and as text, plays a pivotal role in shaping how we live in the world and how we socially construct our world through interactions with others. The ways in which particular discourses govern what it is possible for us to say and do around domestic violence have been a focus for the study.

Antibiotic use drives antibiotic resistance, a global issue with significant human health and economic burden. Australia’s antibiotic consumption is above the OECD average. However, it is unclear which factors are most important for driving antibiotic use in Australian primary healthcare. This research established the most important factors influencing general practitioners to prescribe antibiotics and consumers to use antibiotics. In addition, a model was developed — the Enabling Antibiotic Eupraxis (EABE) model — to explain the drivers of antibiotic use from three perspectives: general practitioners, community pharmacists and consumers. This evidence informs the implementation of Australia’s national antimicrobial resistance strategy.

This study explored the experience of what it is to be a gay man and to live in a rural community. It sought to understand why gay men would want to live in places that are said to have a reputation for hostility towards them. The empirical data from the semi-structured interviews with twenty-one gay men living in fifteen small-town locations across New South Wales, Australia, was analysed using a qualitative method derived from phenomenology, ethnography and modified grounded theory. The distinctive findings of this thesis centre on these men???s desire and determination to stay in the bush. They chose to stay in rural locations and effectively employed a diverse range of strategies to both combat the difficulties of rural life and enhance its advantages. The bush was the place in which these men could find themselves, be themselves and also find others like themselves. The space and the isolation of the bush gave them the latitude and the scope to live gay lives. This is why they stayed. By staying, they were also able to live out both the homosexual and rural components of their personal and social identity. Building on a brief look at the Australian rural past, the conceptual framework utilises notions of ???the stranger??? and draws on resilience, agency and resistance theory to understand these men???s ability to live in an unwelcoming place. Resilience allowed these men to cope and deal with the difficulties they faced. Human agency, the individual's capacity to exert autonomy over his life, is used to restore prominence to resistance theory. Agency is the catalyst to resistance and resistance fuels an individual???s, and sometimes a collective, opposition to the dominant social forces that inhibits one???s agency. These men???s desire to live in a rural place can be understood through theoretical considerations of place, the freedom of place and queer theory. Their satisfaction with life can be theorised through the application of a concept new to theory in gay literature - thriving. This thesis documents a largely unreported aptitude and proficiency by rural gay men to live in the bush. It suggests that their close affinity with place gives them a sense of belonging that, when combined with their concept of a gay lifestyle, effectively queers the places in which they live. That gay men can live fulfilled lives in the very places they are said to have fled evokes an innovative perspective together with an appreciation of what it is to be gay in the bush.

In Australia, the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS; Cox, Holden & Sagovsky, 1987) has been increasingly used to screen for antenatal depression prior to its evaluation on a sample of Australian pregnant women. Also, the identification of predictors associated with antenatal depression has been neglected relative to the research focus on postpartum depression. An aim of the study was to evaluate the antenatal screening properties of the EPDS against diagnoses of major depression with the Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview (MINI; Sheehan eta!., 1998). The aims were also to develop predictive models of risk factors associated with antenatal depression as measured by: (a) diagnosis of major depression (MINI); (b) depressive symptoms (EPDS 2: 9); (c) depression false positive results (EPDS 2:9, but no MINI diagnosis of major depression); and (d) depression level (EPDS total score) in the antenatal and early postnatal period. The study was prospective in design, with 200 women enrolled from Western Australia's largest public maternity hospital. An EPDS 2: 12 was identified to be optimum for the clinical screening of major depression at 32 weeks of pregnancy. The results from the different regression analyses showed that the strongest predictors of antenatal depression were: depression earlier in pregnancy, anxiety, stress, daily hassles, expectations of support, personality traits, and history variables. The findings were in support of routine screening for depression and anxiety during pregnancy, the effects of stress on mood, and the lesser importance of antenatal compared to postnatal variables in accounting for postpartum depression level.

Given that the basic functions of parliamentary Question Time are to provide information and to hold the Government accountable for its actions, the possibility of evasion occurring in such a context is of crucial importance. Evasion (equivocation) has been identified as a matter of concern in political interviews, but no systematic study has been undertaken in the context of parliamentary discourse, notably Question Time, anywhere in the world. This study applies and adapts Harris's (1991) coding framework on various types of responses, Bull and Mayer's (1993) typology of non-replies and Clayman's (2001) work on how politicians 'resist' answering questions, all of which are based on political news interviews, to the study of evasion in Australia's House of Representatives' Question Time. A comprehensive, unified framework for the analysis of evasion is described, a decision flow-chart for the framework is provided, and an illustrative example of the applied framework is given based on Australia's Federal House of Representatives' Question Time. Put simply, the study was undertaken to determine if evasion occurred, how frequently it occurred and how it occurred. It involved the classification of responses as 'answers' (direct or indirect), 'intermediate responses' (such as pointing out incorrect information in the question), and 'evasions' based on specific criteria. Responses which were considered evasions were further analysed to determine the levels of evasion, whether they were covert or overt in nature and the types of 'agenda shifts' that occurred, if any. The thesis also involved a discourse-analytical study of other factors that appear to facilitate Ministerial evasion in Australia's House of Representatives, including the Speaker's performance and the use of 'Dorothy Dixers'. The research data was sourced from Question Time transcripts from the House of Representatives Hansard for the months of February and March 2003, dealing only with questions and responses on the topic of Iraq. In those months there were 87 questions on the topic of Iraq, representing more than two thirds of all questions on Iraq for the whole of 2003. Of these 87 questions, the majority (48) came from the Opposition party, through its leader. The balance (39) was asked by Government MPs. Analysis of the question/answer discourse for all 87 questions revealed that every question asked by Government members was answered compared to only 8 of the 48 Opposition questions. Of the 40 remaining Opposition questions, 21 were given intermediate responses and 19 were evaded outright. The fact that the overwhelming majority (83%) of Opposition questions were not answered together with other findings such as instances of partiality on the part of the Speaker; the use of 'friendly', prearranged questions by Government MPs; and the 'hostile' nature of questions asked by Opposition MPs casts serious doubt on the effectiveness of Question Time as a means of ensuring the Government is held accountable for its actions. The study provides empirical evidence that evasion does occur in Australia's House of Representatives' Question Time.

This PhD research explores ways of adapting to the reportedly common creative, financial, and psychological challenges facing jazz musicians developing and operating in the late 2010s, an era in which the context surrounding jazz music is rapidly evolving. Motivated by the problem of resolving my own creative inertia and personal wellbeing dysfunctions, born of grappling with these issues as an Australian freelance bassist, this study investigates the theory that often-unquestioned assumptions underpinning practice are sedimented socially and that those based on historic, hegemonic, or habitual practices may no longer be universally appropriate. In doing so, it contributes to a growing and necessary dialogue about the ‘why’ and ‘how’ of practice. With the aim of restructuring a more personally productive, sustainable, and meaningful approach to musicking, the primary research question asks: How can revising the musical and extra-musical assumptions of my jazz practice improve its processes and facilitate the generation of new creative work? The idiosyncratic and multifaceted methodology developed to investigate this question is itself an essential component of the research and a useful addition to research in the field. To uncover and revise tacit assumptions, the employed practice-led research methodology combines a suite of methods familiar to jazz practice and borrowed from qualitative research traditions with iterative creative cycles and several additional complementary theoretical concepts. The linchpin of this research strategy is a series of ten semi-structured interviews with bassists of a similar demographic (Sam Anning, Alex Boneham, Tom Botting, Anna Butterss, Karl Dunnicliff, David Groves, Noel Mason, Linda May Han Oh, Adam Spiegl, and Georgia Weber), which illuminate characteristics of contemporary practice and have provoked widespread changes to my own approach. The theorising and testing of revised strategies led to new personal clarity about the purpose and imperatives of practice, enriched my musical understanding, provided insight into factors influencing self-doubt, established a revised compositional framework, and ultimately facilitated the creation of the studio album Phantoms (Nick Abbey, 2019). Treating these developments as a case study, the research extends the particulars of my practice to present transferrable implications for other practitioners and identifies avenues for future research; for instance, it questions assumptions around ‘freelance jazz musicianship’ in the ‘precarious gig economy’ and highlights the importance of ‘self-efficacy’ as a theoretical construct for jazz musicians. The research’s overarching recommendations are that practice assumptions be routinely elucidated and assessed; practitioners and practitioner-researchers strive towards a more uplifting and pluralistic climate of practice; and contemporary, holistic, and socially minded research continues to increase in prevalence.

The significance of a link between organisational culture and organisational performance has long been recognised in both mainstream management literature as well as in the construction management literature. Within the construction research domain, the impact of culture and organisation on project performance is becoming an increasingly important topic for the establishment of sound partnering or alliancing, or to what has been referred to increasingly in recent years as relational contracting, in the overall approach to project management. However, studies of the efficacy of alliancing or partnering have so far produced mixed results. The present study concerns two public sector organisations in Australia, where the interrelationships between organisational culture and structure, commitment and national culture were investigated. The methodology was triangulated; with a detailed questionnaire survey undertaken with both organisations, and with subsequent interviews and case studies carried out for validation. Multivariate statistical techniques were utilised to investigate complex relationships between variables. The research reports the perceptions of professional personnel in the public sector organisations, and some mismatches found between organisational structuring and organisational culture. Key issues affecting project performance, and the set of project team characteristics enhancing the development of a collaborative project culture, were found to include continuous commitment from all levels, right mix of people, formal and informal communication, continuous facilitation, education and training in the universities, institutions and industry. The combined outcomes of the research provided a framework of fundamental elements for successful relational contracting.

The significance of a link between organisational culture and organisational performance has long been recognised in both mainstream management literature as well as in the construction management literature. Within the construction research domain, the impact of culture and organisation on project performance is becoming an increasingly important topic for the establishment of sound partnering or alliancing, or to what has been referred to increasingly in recent years as relational contracting, in the overall approach to project management. However, studies of the efficacy of alliancing or partnering have so far produced mixed results. The present study concerns two public sector organisations in Australia, where the interrelationships between organisational culture and structure, commitment and national culture were investigated. The methodology was triangulated; with a detailed questionnaire survey undertaken with both organisations, and with subsequent interviews and case studies carried out for validation. Multivariate statistical techniques were utilised to investigate complex relationships between variables. The research reports the perceptions of professional personnel in the public sector organisations, and some mismatches found between organisational structuring and organisational culture. Key issues affecting project performance, and the set of project team characteristics enhancing the development of a collaborative project culture, were found to include continuous commitment from all levels, right mix of people, formal and informal communication, continuous facilitation, education and training in the universities, institutions and industry. The combined outcomes of the research provided a framework of fundamental elements for successful relational contracting.

This practice-led PhD project consists of two parts. The first is an exegesis documenting how a fiction writer can enter a dialogue with the oral history project in Australia. I identify two philosophical mandates of the oral history project in Australia that have shaped my creative practice: an emphasis on the analysis of the interviewee’s subjective experience as a means of understanding the past, and the desire to engage a wide audience in order to promote empathy towards the subject. The discussion around fiction in the oral history project is in its infancy. In order to deepen the debate, I draw on the more mature discussion in ethnographic fiction. I rely on literary theorists Steven Greenblatt, Dorrit Cohn and Gerard Genette to develop a clear understanding of the distinct narrative qualities of fiction, in order to explore how fiction can re-present and explore an interviewee’s subjective experience, and engage a wide readership. I document my own methodology for producing a work of fiction that is enriched by oral history methodology and theory, and responds to the mandates of the project. I demonstrate the means by which fiction and the oral history project can enter a dialogue in the truest sense of the word: a two-way conversation that enriches and augments practice in both fields. The second part of the PhD is a novel, set in Brisbane and based on oral history interviews and archival material I gathered over the course of the project. The novel centres on Brisbane artist Evelyn, who has been given an impossible task: a derelict old house is about to be demolished, and she must capture its history in a sculpture that will be built on the site. Evelyn struggles to come up with ideas and create the sculpture, realising that she has no way to discover who inhabited the house. What follows is a series of stories, each set in a different era in Brisbane’s history, which take the reader backwards through the house’s history. Hidden Objects is a novel about the impossibility of grasping the past and the powerful pull of storytelling. The novel is an experiment in a hybrid form and is accompanied by an appendix that identifies the historically accurate sources informing the fiction. The decisions about the aesthetics of the novel were a direct result of my engagement with the mandates of the oral history project in Australia. The novel was shortlisted in the 2012 Queensland Literary Awards, unpublished manuscript category.

One of the problems faced by researchers of intimacy is that there is no widely shared understanding of how intimacy is defined. Although various definitions agree that intimacy is an experience associated with positive emotions, a smaller number of definitions suggest that intimacy can also be experienced in situations involving relationship conflict and abuse that do not involve positive emotions. Using Kegan’s (1982) constructive-developmental theory of the evolving self, I argue that the diverse experiences described in these various definitions share a common source – the self. In offering an understanding of the self as evolving in predictable ways that are shared across human experience, a constructive-developmental approach also offers a means by which these diverse definitions can unified and understood in relation to one another as different expressions of intimacy. Through qualitative analyses I examine the experiences of 12 men to identify how these men understood and experienced intimacy. Interviews with these men were analysed using a postqualitative lens, and by applying Kegan’s (1982) constructive developmental stages. Lahey, Souvaine, Kegan, Goodman and Felix’s (2011) Subject Object Interview protocol was used to determine each man’s evolution of self as portrayed in the interview, that is, his current means of constructing meaning. It was identified that these men’s understandings of intimacy were diverse, as had been identified more generally in intimacy research. Further, these understandings could be organised in ways that demonstrated an increasing development of intrapersonal and interpersonal complexity. In terms of men’s experiences of intimacy, analysis revealed that social expectations, expressed through roles and relationship ideals, constrained some experiences of intimacy, often in relation to other men, but facilitated others, often in relation to women. In addition, some men’s experiences revealed ways in which unexpected and life-threatening events created temporary and permanent shifts in ways that men were able to experience intimacy with both men and women. These findings suggest that a constructive-developmental approach, utilising the concept of subjectivity, provides useful ways in which to examine intimacy, both in terms of how intimacy is understood and in terms of how it is experienced. In addition, these findings suggest that the ways in which men’s experiences of intimacy are limited are also due to factors that reach beyond individual capacities, desires or understandings, pointing to the social construction of intimate experiences. This thesis provides insights regarding the ways in which social expectations create capacities for intimacy, but only in particular ways. In addition, this thesis identifies how social expectations regarding the portrayal of male roles in Australia have had limiting effects on men’s experience of intimacy, particularly in their friendships with other males. In proposing a new definition and model of intimacy, this thesis also offers some important contributions to an understanding of intimacy. Placing the self at the centre of an understanding of intimacy provides a means to unify diverse experiences and contexts of intimacy involving both positive and negative emotions. In addition, a focus on the self as evolving enables a developmental understanding of intimacy, constructed in qualitatively different ways across the lifespan. This thesis also offers important contributions to an understanding of men’s experiences of intimacy, particularly with other men, by identifying that intra-personal, interpersonal and social factors contribute to the ways in which men’s intimate experiences are constrained. These contributions also have important implications for public health and education, which need to be addressed through changes to the messages communicated to men about themselves and about relationships. At an individual level, these contributions have important implications in relation to therapeutic work involving men and men’s relationships with men and with women. In addition, an understanding of the self as the source of differences in intimacy provides new ways in which to understand the difficulties created in relationships, as a result of those differences. As well as offering insights, this thesis identifies some specific areas for future research in order to extend these insights and examine them across a wider range of men’s experiences.

The United Nations declared 2005 to 2014 to be the Decade of Education for Sustainable Development. This agenda is being implemented enthusiastically in university facilities management and operations, and while research in sustainability is increasingly common, tertiary curriculum has not experienced a similar push. This thesis undertakes to explore the expressions of sustainability in the academic activities of universities, and to determine what sort of change (if any) is appropriate. It also seeks to mediate what has become a polarised debate between idealists and pragmatists around the implementation of EFS. Two key features of the work are: 1) the investigation of sustainability in the aggregate student experience, rather than individual subjects; and 2) returning to first principles to avoid a normative stance a priori.¶ A range of methods is employed adaptively through the process of this alternately broad and deep exploratory study, including: participant observation, interviews, content analysis, questionnaires, social network analysis, bibliometrics, and data clustering. A systemic approach to Canadian and Australian case work captures the diversity of institutional roles and academic motivations at play in adaptation to the EFS agenda.¶ A stasis exists between the literature around higher education curriculum for sustainability and its implementation. The problem is exacerbated by the lack of pedagogical training in most university academics. A long-standing utilitarian sectoral culture and an increasingly job-focused student market further challenge such public-good concepts as sustainability in the academy. Four simple ideas sit at the heart of 35 years of environmental and sustainability education literature, despite changes in jargon: liberal education and broad foundations; interdisciplinarity in problem-solving; cosmopolitan philosophies; and civic action. Relevant disciplinary content includes biology, environmental science, policy, philosophy, human society, economics, and culture. Most of these elements are rare in the Australian sector, which instead offers science and technology-focused environmental programs with flexible requirements. A transition to the human realm is evident in programs targeting sustainability.¶ Curriculum cannot be viewed in isolation, however, as it concerns only one of a university’s many constituencies, and one facet of academic staff scholarship. For example, even in higher education sectors more sympathetic to a diversity of university niches and curricular models, like Canada’s, sustainability offerings operate at a tension from low-cost and low-effort teaching models. So-called ‘umbrella’ networking structures on cross-cutting topics must walk a careful line to be comprehensive yet non-competitive. They present great opportunities for sustainability teaching but are almost uniformly research-focused. A distinct sense emerges that the erosion of the collective identity and activities of academe has weakened the ability of universities to respond to new information and challenges in anything but corporate, isomorphic ways.¶ Two detailed Australian cases of research, research training and curriculum development activities around sustainability paint a rich picture of the agenda. The intractability of fragmentation between disciplines is evident, even in so-called interdisciplinary units. Problem-based topics often do not have an established social network or committee structure, and priorities can differ by budget unit. Disciplines provide identity, peers and cohesive research directions that can be compelling for individual academics. The most fascinating pattern that arises during the mapping of research co-authorship and co-supervisory relationships around sustainability is the bi-directional orientation: academics collaborate outside their departmental home on papers, but within that home to mentor research students. This combination unifies two contrasting theories of social capital transmission – those preferring dense and sparse networks, respectively – and may be ideal. Students then receive consistent messages while gaining access to the largest (non-redundant) set of human and technical resources via their supervisors’ personal networks. This hypothesis should be explored further: if supported, it would have major impacts on the rhetoric around collaboration in interdisciplinary units in particular.¶ Curriculum design processes in utilitarian universities are subject to the same fallibilities in adapting to sustainability as other institutions and the wider society. Change is motivated and moderated by financial imperatives and the scale of thought is often coincident with budgets. Engagement processes are often incomplete or undemocratic, hampered by inadequate leadership and shifting membership. Group learning via research, experimentation or vigorous debate is surprisingly rare. Finally, ad-hoc or project-based academic teams are rarely mandated to tackle the causes of problems, some of which can be intractable, and are limited to treating the symptoms. Incremental pragmatism may be a necessary element to university adaptation for EFS.¶ A number of recommendations are offered to improve interdisciplinarity and university values more generally. Individual academics should: offer additive alternatives to metrics and incentive schemes that maintain existing functions; act on common ground to rebuild a community of scholars; wield to the fullest the freedom in the classroom, and the opportunity to reflect, that university teaching allows; and, continue to debate ideas with passion and rigour, avoiding ‘academic correctness’. University management can contribute by: establishing a clear academic identity for the university beyond ‘excellence’, and supporting firm foundations for students based on that particular vision; taking a proactive view of course review and development and facilitating experimentation in those settings; intentionally fostering interdisciplinary units differently to disciplinary ones; and, establishing and recognising equivalence across a range of successful academic career archetypes.¶ This methodologically innovative work also suggests opportunities for extending the research, including: refining and testing the sustainability canon developed here; better understanding collaborative behaviour and the impact of various models of supervisory teams on student career paths; and, finding better ways of defining, modelling and evaluating interdisciplinary scholarship. Sustainability is likeliest to emerge from a healthy and independent tertiary sector, than one operating as an overt policy instrument.

Doctor of Philosophy
Aim and significance: The aim of this research was to explore the phenomenon of Australian nursing home care from the perspective of those who provide and receive it. Its focus is on the processes of ‘quality care’ provision and the meanings and evaluations that care providers attach to their work. In other words, its purpose was to shed light on the practices based on a conceptualisation of care that is entwined with the mechanisms of ‘care’ production and identity creation, or what actually happens in the daily life of the complex social phenomenon that is a nursing home. A related aim was to add to understandings of clinical nursing competence and develop tools that will assist nurses to conceptualise and implement positive change in this setting. Background: The provision of care to our elderly has become a major concern with the ageing of the world population. This is occurring in the context of decline in the capacity of families to take on the responsibility of elder care, and of increasing commercialisation of medical care. Governments have responded by shifting their responsibilities from direct care provision to become auditors of the business of care provision that is supported by public funding. However poor care delivery has largely been hidden from the public gaze. Governments present themselves as having systems in place, creating the illusion of rational control; in reality, like the market economy, there is a ‘black box’ of unknown factors driven by human impulse. The aim of this study was to open up the black box of ‘quality care’ to direct observation, drawing insights from the literature on organisational culture and with a focus on the frontline worker and the construct of quality assurance. Specific research objectives were to: • Document the beliefs and attitudes of care providers towards elderly people in general and the needs of nursing home residents in particular • Elicit the range of meanings and evaluations that care providers attach to their work • Describe their constructions of ‘care’ and ‘quality of care’ and the organisational factors they believe to impact (positively and negatively) on their ability to provide it. • Through in-depth understanding of a particular setting, generate grounded theoretical insights into the phenomenon of quality of residential care that are more widely applicable Method: The study adopted a paradigmatic bricoleur approach, seeking to develop connections between a diverse range of methodologies. These included combinative ethnography, phenomenology, hermeneutics and traditional grounded theory. Conceptual insights were drawn from organisational studies, psychosocial nursing and coping theory. The research site was an Australian for-profit suburban nursing home. The student investigator conducted more than 500 hours of participant observation, recording extensive field notes which were analysed through the perspective of a hermeneutic middle way horizon that directed an augmented constant comparison traditional grounded theory approach. Additional data were collected through formal indepth interviews with six key stakeholders. Interviews were tape recorded, transcribed in full and analysed to reveal themes that were brought within a hermeneutic circle that spiralled recursively from the whole to the part and back to the whole. Findings: Eight key interrelated factors in the production of care within the nursing home were identified: internal and external accountability (the accreditation system); economic considerations; management and training; advocacy; characteristic of residents; care providers’ working conditions and environmental stressors; organisational culture; and the work/care styles of individual care providers. I have categorised the latter into two main types: ‘tortoises’ and ‘hares’. This typology is then used to generate a process-driven schematic diagram that tracks a hypothetical novice care provider through the process of learning how to produce ‘care’. Specifically, I found that nursing home ‘care’ is the outcome of a complex social process involving the interplay between resident, relative, care provider, proprietor, quality assessors and government within the phenomenon of the nursing home. Such care, indeed the phenomenon of the nursing home itself, is not a stable, controllable entity but is in a constant state of flux – what I refer to as a moral ecology. In their everyday practice, care providers devise a construction of ‘quality care’ that is more clearly grounded in their own worldviews and the development of the own identity than in the formal quality assurance system of standards, guidelines and evaluations. Conclusion: Understanding the ‘black box’ of processes that produce care is the key to identifying courses of action that will improve care outcomes. The study findings also question the validity, assumptions and significance of the accreditation system, which only identifies some of the component variables, disregarding both the complexity within the ‘black box’ and failing to acknowledge that the quality of care outcomes is overwhelmingly dependent on individual care providers.

Plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) are one new technology which offers promise for transport sustainability and improving energy efficiency. Global enthusiasm for PEVs has spurred broad-reaching interest, but for jurisdictions where PEV policies are absent, as in Australia, consumer adoption continues to be low. Research into the barriers of adoption for PEVs often identifies cost and lack of infrastructure as key barriers, but consumer's purchase experience plays a pivotal role in technology adoption. This research will help the PEV industry and governments to understand how critical the consumer purchase experience is to overall market success.

My thesis describes a two-year study carried out during the introduction of the International Baccalaureate Diploma (IBD) alongside the local Higher School Certificate (HSC) at a school in New South Wales, Australia. The study examined the intended, implemented and achieved science curricula to provide a formative evaluation that could be used by the school to improve students’ experience and achievement, and a summative evaluation that could be used to inform other schools considering the implementation of the IBD alongside a local curriculum.My research represents one of only a few studies that compare the IBD with another programme, and the only study, to date, in Australia. It is also one of the only studies that compare senior science programmes in any country. Methodologically, my study supports previous research that has successfully combined the collection of quantitative and qualitative data in a mixed-method approach.Keeves’ (2004) model was used to provide a framework to help to describe the curricula in terms of the antecedents and context in which they are embedded. A modified version of Halls’ (1971) model was used to compare the aims, objectives and content of each of the curriculum. Gilbert’s (2004) model, adapted from the Australian Council of Education Research (2001) model, was used to compare the skills required by each of the science programmes. To discern the depth and breadth of the science courses examination questions were compared and contrasted.To examine the implemented curriculum, the views and experiences of the teachers and students participating on each of the programmes (IBD and HSC) were sought. Data related to the views of the participating teachers were gathered using in-depth interviews, observations and anecdotal evidence. To examine the students’ experience of science in each programme, their perceptions of the learning environment were assessed using the Science Laboratory Environment Instrument (SLEI). Focus group interviews with students enrolled on each of the science programmes were used to triangulate, embellish and clarify the questionnaire results.To examine the achieved curriculum, data were collected using the Multiple Intelligences Checklist for Adults and Senior Secondary Students (MICA), a purpose designed attitude instrument and students’ University Admissions Index score. Finally, a questionnaire was used to examine whether students enrolled in the IBD and HSC programmes felt that the Year 10 science programme had adequately prepared them for their senior science course.The results indicated that the IBD provided a more traditional, mathematically based science course with rigorous, mainly external assessment, whereas the HSC provided a broader, more historically and socially based science course. Concerns were raised by both the IBD and HSC teachers with respect to the content-laden requirements of both of the programmes. IBD teachers raised issues related to the resources available and the need for adequate professional development. Students’ views of the learning environment indicated that those in the IBD course generally had more positive views than their HSC counterparts. In terms of the achieved curriculum, the results indicated that there were some differences between the two programmes, with IBD students attaining a higher University Admissions Index score and indicating an increased likelihood of selecting a science-related career than their HSC counterparts. Finally, the results indicate that there are issues related to the Year 10 science programme (designed to suit the needs of the HSC programme) that may need to be addressed to better prepare students embarking on the IBD programme.

This thesis examines the construction of ?Chineseness? by Australian-born Chinese through their interactions with mainstream ?white? society and Chinese diasporic communities in Australia. It represents an interdisciplinary study based on qualitative research and critical analysis of forty-three in-depth interviews with Australian-born Chinese whose families have resided in Australia for three generations or more. Diasporic narratives, fraught with contentions over belonging and difference, often lead to ambiguous ramifications of identity formation. While the notion of hybridity problematises the unsettling boundaries of identities, there is still a continuing perception that ethnic identification decreases over successive generations, resulting in assimilation. However, contrary to this assumption, this study shows that subsequent generations also encounter complicated experiences involving both feelings of cultural ambivalence and enrichment. While the rewriting of identity takes place against the varying circumstances of resettlement, the experiences and transitions across the respondents? life course concurrently inscribes Chineseness onto their lives in diverse ways. Furthermore, Chineseness is continually (re)constructed through decentered connections with an imaginary homeland. Consequently, despite generational longevity, strong affinities with Australian society and longstanding national identities grounded in Australian culture, Chineseness is still a significant part of their identity, whether they willingly choose to associate with it or not. The focus on revaluating the concept of Chineseness and elucidating the sense of identity of sequential generations has important ramifications for the development of a more informed theoretical model for understanding the long-term effects of migration, especially on the process of identity formation and feelings of home and belonging.

The impact of the hotel industry on the world environment has been widespread. It is a major industry that consumes a significant amount of natural resources and energy in the course of providing hospitality for its guests. For a hotel manager, developing policies and strategies for environmental sustainability can be challenging in the first instance, but actually implementing these policies is often even more difficult because managers of these businesses have to concurrently manage and align social, economic and environmental outcomes; the three dimensions that comprise sustainable performance (Epstein & Buhovac, 2014). As hotel management are at the forefront of implementing environmentally sustainable policies and practices (ESPPs), the focus of this research has been on the Australian hotel industry and its managers’ perspectives on ESPPs and the influence of their stakeholders. Applying stakeholder theory has contributed to an understanding of how organisations, including hotels, behave, especially in a rapidly changing and dynamic business climate where environmental issues are becoming increasingly prominent. There is an inherent need to explore and connect the positive links that exist between stakeholder interests. However, there is also an opportunity to expand the scope of stakeholder theory to offer a broader purpose in creating equal value for all stakeholders and the benefit of society and the environment. This focus requires a shift from short-term economic benefits to the broader benefits to society and the environment. A two-phase process was undertaken in order to obtain data on environmental sustainability in Australian hotels and to engage with the research questions. The first phase of the research entailed a review of hotel websites in order to gain a preliminary understanding of the scope and extent of ESPPs adopted by hotels. The second phase involved the conduct of in-depth, face-to-face interviews with selected hotel managers identified in the first phase of the preliminary investigation as having an influence on hotel policies and procedures. This research found that independent and Australian chain affiliated hotels investigated in this study do not have formal environmental policies, either at a corporate or individual hotel level. This is in contrast to international chain affiliated hotels which do have formal policies on environmental sustainability. However, these policies are developed and formulated overseas at a corporate office level and passed down to individual hotels in Australia to be implemented. Major barriers to environmental sustainability are time, financial resources, a lack of suitable enablement resources and stakeholder owners and shareholders of hotels. The major drivers for environmental sustainability are the support of owners and shareholders, financial benefits, marketing leverage, guest preferences and environmental awareness. The major stakeholders influencing ESPPs of hotels are their owners and shareholders, their head or corporate office, senior management and hotel guests. Owners and shareholders have the most significant influence on policies and practices as they have a financial interest in the hotel and simply put, they are in business to make a profit. The current focus areas for environmental sustainability are water management, energy and recycling. Hotels intend to address them with increased prominence moving forward. The research responses demonstrate a need for more innovative approaches if the hotel industry is to make a significant contribution to environmental sustainability. Analysing the focus areas of environmentally sustainable practices in the future, other than discussion on building sustainable hotels from the ground up, suggests that little thought has been given to other innovative and sustainable practices that can be implemented. Establishing commitment to the notion of environmental sustainability is the principal step a hotel organisation or independent hotel should embark upon in order to establish a statement of purpose or policy relating to environmental sustainability. Hotel managers working at a property level should be involved with formulation of ESPPs. Their involvement in the creation of policy makes it easier to implement environmentally sustainable practices as they will have developed a better understanding of the foundation of environmental policies. This benefits all stakeholders as well as the environment. Developing and strengthening the relationship amongst stakeholders is one of the most significant forces that can drive successful environmental initiatives and practices.

High-performance athletes are known to be at risk of adverse physical and mental health outcomes related to the extreme performance demands they face. Australian high-performance sport has traditionally been reactive to the healthcare needs of athletes who present having experienced compromised health, whether that be in the form of an illness, an injury, or a mental health challenge. Recently, there has been a move toward implementing limited health promotion approaches addressing identified health risks in the current athlete/sport environment. At present, there is no theoretical framework to help those working with this highly selective group to promote the development and maintenance of optimal holistic health. Moreover, the early and ongoing development of optimal holistic athlete health has not commonly been viewed as a performance requirement within sporting organisations. This research aimed to understand health and its determinants for Australian high-performance athletes from the perspective of a representative sample of expert health practitioners who currently work or have recently worked in high-performance sports healthcare. Determinants of health are factors that influence how likely we are to stay healthy or become ill/ injured. Understanding these determinants will help researchers and practitioners develop a theoretical health promotion framework that may be applied broadly across Australian high-performance sport. This study used a mixed-methods approach, including a Delphi survey and subsequent semi-structured one-to-one qualitative interviews to derive a consensus on athlete health determinants and the factors which influence these. The purpose of the qualitative interviews was to explore, more deeply, the experiences, beliefs and thinking behind participant responses to the questions posed in the Delphi survey, to add both nuance and context to those responses. The Delphi survey was conducted at two time points over a period of three months. Descriptive statistical analysis of the Delphi survey results demonstrated that there was general recognition of the relevance of the World Health Organisation definition of health and its determinants to the health of high-performance athletes, a finding that is not usually evident in the literature, nor reflected in the provision of health services to this population cohort. Thematic analysis of the Delphi survey data, using a socio-ecological theoretical lens, revealed a need to consider a broader range of influences on athlete health than those that relate specifically to participation in high-performance sport. These include geographic isolation, access to appropriate health services, ethnicity, and socio- economic status. The interview findings revealed that there is a need to apply additional consideration to factors that can be categorized as social determinants of health in healthcare planning for, and management of, Australian high-performance athletes. This study's findings will help form a theoretical framework for Australian high-performance athlete health. Specifically, this framework would address the need for sporting organisations to create and provide health-promoting environments for their athletes and to support athletes in developing their capacity to manage better the impact of the health stressors to which they are exposed, as identified by the high-performance healthcare experts surveyed in this study.

The era of globalisation presented opportunities for China corporations to expand to overseas markets. After the execution of the China-Australia Free Trade Agreement in 2015, there is a considerable interest for Chinese corporations to invest and expand to Australia. Notwithstanding the favourable legal and political environment to support the expansion of Chinese corporations, including China based banks to Australian market; one potential hindrance to such expansion plan is the cultural differences between both countries. This dissertation aims to research on the potential issues arising from the cultural differences faced by China banks in their expansion plan to overseas market in particularly Australia and also how resolve such differences OCAI scores indicate that banks in mainland China scored higher for hierarchy culture (50.11) compared to overseas banks (30.11) which indicate that China banks’ structure are designed to maintain the stability and control of the banks by higher management. Interview conducted with nineteen (19) respondents indicates that there are contrasting views by the respondents on whether cultural differences play an important role in human resource management for banks. For client facing role, some respondents view that cultural similarity could be an advantage when dealing with clients but some consider ability and knowledge to be more important. Notwithstanding this, cultural differences are definitely an important aspect for human resource management for banks expanding to overseas market with different culture. It is recommended that bank management to employ a mixture of team with both Chinese and Australian cultural background to cater to different clientele and also staffs to headquarter office.
A era da globalização ofereceu oportunidades às multinacionais Chinesas de se expandirem para os mercados estrangeiros.Após a implementação do Acordo de Comércio Livre entre a China e Australia em 2015,há um considerável interesse das multinacionais Chinesas investirem e expandirem-se na Austrália. Não obstante o contexto legal e politico favorável à expansão das multinacionais Chinesas,incluindo a banca Chinesa operando no mercado Australiano, as diferenças culturais, entre os dois paises poderão constituir um obstaculo a essa expansão. Esta dissertação procura investigar em que medida os problemas potenciais resultantes das diferenças culturais que os bancos Chineses poderão enfrentar no decurso do seu plano de expansão para mercados internacionais e particularmente para a Austrália e tambem como dar resposta a tais diferenças Os resultados do questionário OCAI indicam que os bancos na China Continental tem valores mais elevados na cultura hierárquica (50.11) o que sugere qua as estruturas dos bancos da China são desenhadas para garantir a estabilidade e o control pela direção de topo. Entrevistas a dezanove (19) inquiridos sugerem queestes têm perspectivas contrastantes no que se refere à importância do papel das diferenças culturais na gestão dos recursos humanos dos bancos. No que se refere às relaçoes com os clientes alguns dos inquiridos consideram que a semelhança cultural pode ser uma vantagem mas outros consideram mais importantes as capacidades e o conhecimento. Apesar disso as diferenças culturais são em ultima análise um aspecto importante na gestão dos recursos humanos nos bancos em expansão para um Mercado exterior com uma diferente cultura. Recomenda-se que a gestão dos bancos empregue equipas mixtas com culturas tanto Chinesas como Australianas tanto para lidarem com diferentes clientelas como nas equipas da direção de topo.

My placement as a Master of Philosophy in Applied Epidemiology (MAE) scholar was with the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS); later based at the National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health (NCEPH). In meeting my Masters requirements I conducted an epidemiology project using mixed methods entitled ‘A community perspective of Burdekin rot’ - based on the anecdotal reports of ‘Burdekin rot’ and the perceived higher incidence of cancer (and death) in the Burdekin community. Analysis of cancer incidence and geographic level analysis of Queensland Cancer Registry data was conducted for the period 2003-2012 to ascertain whether cancer rates and mortality rates vary between the Aboriginal and Torres Strait peoples and the general population within each Statistical Division (SD) of Queensland. Qualitative interviews were conducted to understand the experiences of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples living in the Burdekin region in terms of cancer diagnosis, treatment and treatment outcomes. I conducted a cross sectional study and analysis of the 2010 Australian Capital Territory (ACT) Inmate Health Survey to determine if contact (phone and visits) was associated with lower levels of psychological distress. Comparisons of proportions between a range of exposure variables and the outcome variable of psychological distress were conducted to further examine any association between mild to severe psychological distress. Further, as a team member within NCEPH in collaboration with Qld Health I assisted in an outbreak investigation primarily with undertaking hypothesis generating questionnaires for an outbreak of Salmonella Saintpaul cases in Qld. Case information was provided by Qld Health including case pathology reports. My role in the outbreak included case interviews, data analysis comparing current data to Qld S. Saintpaul data 2006-2014 and preparing a brief for OzFoodNet in terms of a possible multi-jurisdictional outbreak of S. Saintpaul. My final project to meet study requirements was the evaluation of the Queensland Cancer Registry specifically concerning the completeness of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander status data. A teaching component of the MAE program core competency was fulfilled via a group teaching session on measurement bias to the 2015 MAE cohort. Also, developing and conducting a Lesson from the Field (LFF) component on cultural awareness and appropriate community engagement and partnership when conducting research with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

Set within an attachment theory developmental perspective, the thesis explored attachment to God as a psychological construct, both theoretical and as experienced within individual Christians’ relationships with God. The dual focus of the interview process, conducted between 31 predominantly Australian born individuals, was to identify 1/ whether individual Christians experienced God functioning as an activity as an attachment figure, and 2/ whether aspects of their relationship with God were able to be identified as attachment experiences. Three types of analyses were conducted. Findings suggested that the ‘attachment to God’ construct was more complex than previously understood, suggestive of an underlying developmental progression. Findings are discussed in relation to debates concerning ‘implicit’ versus ‘explicit’ features of attachment to God, and developmental features including ‘correspondence’ and ‘compensatory’ hypotheses.
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Selection of trainees for surgical training is widely acknowledged to be both complex and important. Doctors embarking on surgical careers expend considerable time and resources in training, as do those responsible for facilitating their learning. The aim of surgical training is to prepare surgeons to be competent, effective, ethical practitioners in unsupervised clinical practice as consultant surgeons (Carroll, Kennedy, Traynor & Gallagher, 2009; Elfenbein, Sippel, McDonald, Watson, Scarborough & Migaly, 2015). The aim of selection must be to admit those who are most likely to succeed in surgical training and beyond. Admitting candidates who are inadequately suited to surgical training can result in trainees who unduly struggle or are unable to satisfy training requirements, and may ultimately jeopardise patient safety. In contrast, not accepting candidates who are well-suited to surgical training may be unfair to both candidates and communities that miss out on skillful surgeons. These aspects are among those that make selection to surgical training an extremely ‘highstakes’ activity. Those responsible for selection grapple with assessing candidates’ current skills and attributes, and with ascertaining their likely future performance. Limitations of, and tensions between interacting elements—human agency, requirement specifications, instruments, processes, influences—in selection to surgical training, mean that the long-term outcomes of selection can never be assured. This study identifies principal elements in selection to surgical training, discusses influences on, and interrelationships between the elements, and reviews connections between selection and surgical training assessments. This study has appraised the current instruments used for selection into the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons’ (RACS) General Surgery (GS) training program in Australia and New Zealand, to establish their effectiveness in predicting trainees’ performance in assessments during the first two years of training. Data were considered for selection and assessment items for trainees for three yearly cohorts, selected in 2008, 2009, and 2010. The study compared the performance of trainees in three selection instruments—a structured CV, a structured referee report, and a multi-station interview—to their performance in three examinations and three work-based assessments. Firstly, Pearson product-moment correlations were calculated to examine the extent of relationships within each set of variables to determine intra-relationships of the selection items, of the examination items, and of the work-based assessment items. Secondly, Pearson productmoment correlations were conducted to determine degrees of association between selection items and performance in each of the subsequent assessment items. Thirdly, multiple regression analysis was conducted to determine the extent to which trainees’ scores in the selection items (independent variables) predicted scores in each of the assessments during training (dependent variables). The model fit and strength was assessed using the analysis of variance (ANOVA) step within the regression analysis. The relative strength of the associations between dependent variables and the independent variables were assessed using regression coefficients. The findings of this study have shown that performance in RACS GS selection partially predicts performance in assessments during training. In general, candidates’ performance varied across each of the selection items, performance in all examinations was highly consistent and performance in major end of term work-based assessments was also consistent. Most correlations between performance in selection and performance in assessments during training were positive, with the exception that performance in the CV was usually inversely correlated with subsequent assessments. The referee reports and total selection scores were predictive of performance in the major end of term work-based assessments. This study reviewed many factors that affect selection processes and outcomes. Several of these—such as the role of procedural justice, identification of desired attributes of trainees, and the validity, reliability, fairness, and acceptability of selection instruments and protocols— implicitly framed RACS GS selection. However, to maximise the effectiveness of selection instruments and protocols, these and other relevant influences could be explicitly defined for the local context. The findings regarding the predictive capacity of the selection instruments— particularly for the referee reports and the interviews—differ from some other studies, but highlight that the implementation and content of selection instruments are key aspects affecting their performance. Combining scores from multiple instruments reduces the influence of any individual selection instrument. Overall, with the possible exception of the CV, the study has shown that the RACS GS selection tools are performing moderately well. However, the RACS GS selection instruments and processes could be modified to maximise their effectiveness and new, emerging selection activities could be considered.

The United Nations declared 2005 to 2014 to be the Decade of Education for Sustainable Development. This agenda is being implemented enthusiastically in university facilities management and operations, and while research in sustainability is increasingly common, tertiary curriculum has not experienced a similar push. This thesis undertakes to explore the expressions of sustainability in the academic activities of universities, and to determine what sort of change (if any) is appropriate. It also seeks to mediate what has become a polarised debate between idealists and pragmatists around the implementation of EFS. Two key features of the work are: 1) the investigation of sustainability in the aggregate student experience, rather than individual subjects; and 2) returning to first principles to avoid a normative stance a priori. ¶ A range of methods is employed adaptively through the process of this alternately broad and deep exploratory study. A systemic approach to Canadian and Australian case work captures the diversity of institutional roles and academic motivations at play in adaptation to the EFS agenda. ¶ ...

Background: Childhood obesity is a global phenomenon and public health problem. It is a chronic health condition associated with a body composition of excessive fat impacting on a child’s physical and social development. Public health initiatives addressing childhood obesity have had little success in reducing the prevalence of obesity or of returning children to a ‘normal’ BMI. Clinical guidelines recommend that health professionals from primary, secondary and tertiary settings should manage paediatric obesity. However, little is known about the current landscape of childhood obesity management: who is involved, what approaches are used, or what the main enablers or barriers to effective management are. Research has focused on the perceptions and practices of Australian general practitioners, but little is known about the experiences of other health professionals who manage childhood obesity. The purpose of the study was to explore and describe how Australian health professionals and parents experience and perceive childhood obesity management. The aim was to access information that related particularly to facilitators and barriers of management. Methods: Interpretative phenomenological analysis was used as an approach to examine and describe factors that influenced the ways in which health professionals and parents experienced and perceived the phenomenon of childhood obesity management. Semi- structured interviews were undertaken with health professionals and parents. The research comprised two studies. Study 1 involved health professionals from private practice, weight-management clinics, hospital and community services in three Australian states. Participants were dietitians, paediatricians, psychologists, physiotherapists and endocrinologists. Study 2 presents four case studies of parents who had attended a paediatric weight management clinic. Findings: Health professionals described childhood obesity as a body size that put children at risk of poor health outcomes; the psychological impacts were particularly of concern. They discussed their perceptions of their role in diagnosis, assessment and treatment; and shared their experiences of carrying out these roles. Each perceived role was described in the context of barriers that presented both internal and external to the clinical management setting. This included a paucity of services to refer children with obesity, insufficient resources to support treatment and their inadequate knowledge/training to engage families and effectively implement prescribed changes to health behaviours. Furthermore, health professionals believed changes made during clinical interventions were unsustainable because of the impact of the wider environment, particularly ease of access to calorie-dense foods, sedentary activities and family circumstances. The implications of the obstacles health professionals faced in treating childhood obesity were evident in parents’ interviews. Parents reported: difficulties accessing services due to limited availability and work hours; problems getting the whole family to attend sessions; resistance from other family members, including the children themselves. They believed health professionals played an integral role in gaining the entire family’s support. Parents wanted better strategies that would help their family more readily accept changes; however, they also acknowledged ensuring every meal for children was healthy was difficult due to the impact of an obesogenic environment. Ultimately, parents felt more in control of their family environment but were not confident these changes could be sustained, particularly when children were out of their direct care. Conclusion: Childhood obesity management may benefit from a systems approach. This includes having a health infrastructure and training that supports the practices of health professionals so that optimal management can be achieved. Additionally, policies that address the environmental and social determinants of childhood obesity are required to support sustainable behaviour change initiated by clinical management.

Australia’s ageing population is contributing to an increased demand for residential aged care services (RACS). At the same time, these services are increasingly providing care for older adults with long-standing mental disorders (e.g., major depression, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia spectrum disorders) and life-limiting physical illnesses requiring palliative care. These older adults have multiple care requirements, including cognitive, behavioural and palliative care needs. However, RACS care staff are often ill- equipped to care for them. The aims of this study were to: (i) examine the experience of RACS staff caring for residents with mental-palliative comorbidity, and (ii) identify their initial and ongoing education and support needs. An interpretative phenomenological analysis approach was used, incorporating semi-structured interviews. A purposive sample of 12 RACS staff participated in semi-structured interviews. The study identified several strategies to enhance mental-palliative care in RACS. The overarching theme was conceptualised as Adopting a person-centred approach to care. This was supported by five main themes: Understanding each person, Complexities in assessing and managing pain, Preventing and responding to behaviours of concern, Organisational provision for staff development and wellbeing promotion and Engaging in interdisciplinary collaboration. These findings may contribute to a greater understanding of the experience of RACS staff caring for residents with mental-palliative comorbidity and highlight areas for improvement in the education and support of staff caring for this cohort.