I sang Amazing Grace for about 3 hours that day : understanding Indigenous Australians’ experience of seclusion

Research shows that Indigenous Australians suspicion and fear of being ‘locked up’ may influence mental health service avoidance. Given this, the aim of this study was to explore, by qualitative analysis of in depth interviews (N = 3), how three Indigenous people experienced the controversial practice of seclusion Hans-Georg Gadamer’s phenomenology guided analysis of the material, and allowed narrated experiences to be understood within their cultural and historical context. Participants viewed seclusion negatively: police involvement in psychiatric care; perceptions of being punished and powerless; occasions of extreme use of force; and lack of care were prominent themes throughout the interviews. While power imbalances inherent in seclusion are problematic for all mental health clients, the distinguishing factor in the Indigenous clients’ experience is that seclusion is continuous with the discriminatory and degrading treatment by governments, police and health services that many Indigenous people have experienced since colonisation. The participants’ experiences echoed Goffman’s (1961) findings that institutional practices act to degrade and dehumanise clients whose resulting conformity eases the work of nursing staff. While some nurses perceive that seclusion reduces clients’ agitation (Meehan, Bergen & Fjeldsoe, 2004; Wynaden et al., 2001), one must ask at what cost to clients’ dignity, humanity and basic human rights.

Governance of learning mechanisms : evidence from construction firms

The focus of knowledge management (KM) in the construction industry is moving towards capability building for value creation. The study reported by this paper is motivated by recent assertions about the genesis and evolution of knowledge management capability (KMC) in the strategic management field. It attempts to shed light on the governance of learning mechanisms that develop KMC within the context of construction firms. A questionnaire survey was administered to a sample of construction contractors operating in the very dynamic Hong Kong market to elicit opinions on the learning mechanisms and business outcomes of targeted firms. On the basis of a total of 149 usable responses, structural equation modeling (SEM) analysis identified relationships among knowledge-governance mechanisms, knowledge processes, and business performance, thereby supporting the existence of strategic learning loops. The study findings provide evidence from the construction context for capability assertions that knowledge-governance mechanisms and processes form learning mechanisms that carry out strategic learning to create value, effect performance outcomes, and ultimately drive the evolution of KMC. The findings imply that it is feasible for managing construction firms to govern learning mechanisms through managing the capability-based holistic KM system, thereby reconfiguring KMC to match needs in the dynamic market environment over time.

Psychology students’ beliefs about integrating Complementary and Alternative Therapy (CAT) into their future psychology practice

We investigated whether belief-based differences exist between students who have strong and weak intentions to integrate complementary and alternative therapy (CAT) into future psychology practice by recommending CAT or specific CAT practitioners to clients. A cross-sectional methodology was used. Psychology undergraduate students (N = 106) participated in a paper-based questionnaire design to explore their underlying beliefs related to CAT integration. The study was undertaken at a major university in Queensland, Australia. The theory of planned behaviour belief-based framework guided the study. Multivariate analyses of variance examined the influence of behavioural, normative, and control beliefs on the strong and weak intention groups. A multiple regression analysis investigated the relative importance of these belief sets for predicting intentions. We found that clear differences emerged between strong and weak intenders on behavioural and normative beliefs, but not control beliefs. Strong intenders perceived the positive outcomes of integrating CAT, such as being able to offer clients a more holistic practice and having confidence in the practitioners/practices, as more likely to occur than weak intenders, and perceived the negative outcome of compromising my professional practice as less likely. Strong in-tenders were more likely than weak intenders to perceive that a range of important referents (e.g., clients) would think they should integrate CAT. Results of the regression analysis revealed the same pattern of results in that behavioural and normative beliefs, but not control beliefs, significantly predicted intentions. The findings from this study can be used to inform policy and educational initiatives that aim to encourage CAT use in psychology practice.

We need to talk about cultural studies [Review]

A review of Graeme Turner, What’s Become of Cultural Studies (Sage, London, 2012) and Lawrence Grossberg, Cultural Studies in the Future Tense (Duke University Press, Durham, 2010).

Epistemic beliefs and beliefs about teaching practices for moral learning in the early years of school : relationships and complexities

While investment in young children is recognised as important for the development of moral values for a cohesive society, little is known about early years teaching practices that promote learning of moral values. This paper reports on observations and interviews with 11 Australian teachers, focusing on their epistemic beliefs and beliefs about teaching practices for moral education with children aged 5 to 8 years. The analysis revealed three main patterns of thinking about moral education: following others, reflecting on points of view, and informing reflection for action. These patterns suggest a relationship between epistemic beliefs and beliefs about teaching practices for moral learning which have implications for teacher professional development concerning experiences in moral education.

A picture is worth a thousand words : a cross-curricular approach to learning about visuals in STEM

Visuals are a central feature of STEM in all levels of education and many areas of employment. The wide variety of visuals that students are expected to master in STEM prevents an approach that aims to teach students about every type of visual that they may encounter. This paper proposes a pedagogy that can be applied across year levels and learning areas, allowing a school-wide, cross-curricular, approach to teaching about visual, that enhances learning in STEM and all other learning areas. Visuals are classified into six categories based on their properties, unlike traditional methods that classify visuals according to purpose. As visuals in the same category share common properties, students are able to transfer their knowledge from the familiar to unfamiliar in each category. The paper details the classification and proposes some strategies that can be can be incorporated into existing methods of teaching students about visuals in all learning areas. The approach may also assist students to see the connections between the different learning areas within and outside STEM.

Finding out about children's meaning making through drawing together

When I was seven I worked on a science project about caterpillars and moths. I was completely immersed in this project, fascinated by caterpillar body markings, the rhythmical, semi-circular pattern caterpillars adopt to eat leaves, their spiral construction of the chrysalis, and their transformation into moths or butterflies. I demonstrated my fascination, my research and study through carefully executed and detailed drawings. I could read and write well, but I wasn’t as interested in writing and produced a half-page summary to support my visual work.

Decision-making about hormone replacement therapy by women in England and Scotland

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to explore women's decision-making about the balance of risks and benefits of taking hormone replacement therapy (HRT) based on the latest evidence from the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) trial of combined HRT. METHODS: Women aged 50-69 years, who were eligible for the Women's International Study of long Duration Oestrogen after Menopause (WISDOM) trial, were invited to participate in one of eight focus groups. Participants were asked to discuss their views about taking HRT based on the latest international evidence. RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS: Eighty-two women participated overall. Qualitative content analysis was applied to the discussion transcripts. Women regarded the decisions they make about taking HRT as highly personal, and, for women currently taking HRT, the overwhelming reason for continuation was perceived improvement in quality of life regardless of either the risks or the benefits in the longer term.

Chinese teaching English as a foreign language (TEFL) academics' perceptions about research in a transitional culture

Research capacity building has become a prominent theme in higher education institutions in China and across the world. However, Chinese Teaching English as a Foreign Language academics' research output has been quite limited. In order to build their research capacity, it is necessary to understand their perceptions about research. This case study presents the perceptions about research of six Chinese Teaching English as a Foreign Language academics in a context of growing institutional demands for research. One-on-one interviews of 35-60 minutes' duration were conducted with these academics from an institution in north China. Thematic analysis of the transcribed interviews indicated that the Chinese Teaching English as a Foreign Language academics held positive perceptions about the teaching-research nexus. However, the value of research to them seemed to be limited to teaching and career advancement. They also expressed varied concerns about the institutional research requirements. The findings suggested several implications for the institution's administrators to further enhance academics' research capacity building.

Binocular rivalry and visuospatial ability in individuals with schizophrenia

Visual abnormalities, both at the sensory input and the higher interpretive levels, have been associated with many of the symptoms of schizophrenia. Individuals with schizophrenia typically experience distortions of sensory perception, resulting in perceptual hallucinations and delusions that are related to the observed visual deficits. Disorganised speech, thinking and behaviour are commonly experienced by sufferers of the disorder, and have also been attributed to perceptual disturbances associated with anomalies in visual processing. Compounding these issues are marked deficits in cognitive functioning that are observed in approximately 80% of those with schizophrenia. Cognitive impairments associated with schizophrenia include: difficulty with concentration and memory (i.e. working, visual and verbal), an impaired ability to process complex information, response inhibition and deficits in speed of processing, visual and verbal learning. Deficits in sustained attention or vigilance, poor executive functioning such as poor reasoning, problem solving, and social cognition, are all influenced by impaired visual processing. These symptoms impact on the internal perceptual world of those with schizophrenia, and hamper their ability to navigate their external environment. Visual processing abnormalities in schizophrenia are likely to worsen personal, social and occupational functioning. Binocular rivalry provides a unique opportunity to investigate the processes involved in visual awareness and visual perception. Binocular rivalry is the alternation of perceptual images that occurs when conflicting visual stimuli are presented to each eye in the same retinal location. The observer perceives the opposing images in an alternating fashion, despite the sensory input to each eye remaining constant. Binocular rivalry tasks have been developed to investigate specific parts of the visual system. The research presented in this Thesis provides an explorative investigation into binocular rivalry in schizophrenia, using the method of Pettigrew and Miller (1998) and comparing individuals with schizophrenia to healthy controls. This method allows manipulations to the spatial and temporal frequency, luminance contrast and chromaticity of the visual stimuli. Manipulations to the rival stimuli affect the rate of binocular rivalry alternations and the time spent perceiving each image (dominance duration). Binocular rivalry rate and dominance durations provide useful measures to investigate aspects of visual neural processing that lead to the perceptual disturbances and cognitive dysfunction attributed to schizophrenia. However, despite this promise the binocular rivalry phenomenon has not been extensively explored in schizophrenia to date. Following a review of the literature, the research in this Thesis examined individual variation in binocular rivalry. The initial study (Chapter 2) explored the effect of systematically altering the properties of the stimuli (i.e. spatial and temporal frequency, luminance contrast and chromaticity) on binocular rivalry rate and dominance durations in healthy individuals (n=20). The findings showed that altering the stimuli with respect to temporal frequency and luminance contrast significantly affected rate. This is significant as processing of temporal frequency and luminance contrast have consistently been demonstrated to be abnormal in schizophrenia. The current research then explored binocular rivalry in schizophrenia. The primary research question was, "Are binocular rivalry rates and dominance durations recorded in participants with schizophrenia different to those of the controls?" In this second study binocular rivalry data that were collected using low- and highstrength binocular rivalry were compared to alternations recorded during a monocular rivalry task, the Necker Cube task to replicate and advance the work of Miller et al., (2003). Participants with schizophrenia (n=20) recorded fewer alternations (i.e. slower alternation rates) than control participants (n=20) on both binocular rivalry tasks, however no difference was observed between the groups on the Necker cube task. Magnocellular and parvocellular visual pathways, thought to be abnormal in schizophrenia, were also investigated in binocular rivalry. The binocular rivalry stimuli used in this third study (Chapter 4) were altered to bias the task for one of these two pathways. Participants with schizophrenia recorded slower binocular rivalry rates than controls in both binocular rivalry tasks. Using a ‘within subject design’, binocular rivalry data were compared to data collected from a backwardmasking task widely accepted to bias both these pathways. Based on these data, a model of binocular rivalry, based on the magnocellular and parvocellular pathways that contribute to the dorsal and ventral visual streams, was developed. Binocular rivalry rates were compared with performance on the Benton’s Judgment of Line Orientation task, in individuals with schizophrenia compared to healthy controls (Chapter 5). The Benton’s Judgment of Line Orientation task is widely accepted to be processed within the right cerebral hemisphere, making it an appropriate task to investigate the role of the cerebral hemispheres in binocular rivalry, and to investigate the inter-hemispheric switching hypothesis of binocular rivalry proposed by Pettigrew and Miller (1998, 2003). The data were suggestive of intra-hemispheric rather than an inter-hemispheric visual processing in binocular rivalry. Neurotransmitter involvement in binocular rivalry, backward masking and Judgment of Line Orientation in schizophrenia were investigated using a genetic indicator of dopamine receptor distribution and functioning; the presence of the Taq1 allele of the dopamine D2 receptor (DRD2) receptor gene. This final study (Chapter 6) explored whether the presence of the Taq1 allele of the DRD2 receptor gene, and thus, by inference the distribution of dopamine receptors and dopamine function, accounted for the large individual variation in binocular rivalry. The presence of the Taq1 allele was associated with slower binocular rivalry rates or poorer performance in the backward masking and Judgment of Line Orientation tasks seen in the group with schizophrenia. This Thesis has contributed to what is known about binocular rivalry in schizophrenia. Consistently slower binocular rivalry rates were observed in participants with schizophrenia, indicating abnormally-slow visual processing in this group. These data support previous studies reporting visual processing abnormalities in schizophrenia and suggest that a slow binocular rivalry rate is not a feature specific to bipolar disorder, but may be a feature of disorders with psychotic features generally. The contributions of the magnocellular or dorsal pathways and parvocellular or ventral pathways to binocular rivalry, and therefore to perceptual awareness, were investigated. The data presented supported the view that the magnocellular system initiates perceptual awareness of an image and the parvocellular system maintains the perception of the image, making it available to higher level processing occurring within the cortical hemispheres. Abnormal magnocellular and parvocellular processing may both contribute to perceptual disturbances that ultimately contribute to the cognitive dysfunction associated with schizophrenia. An alternative model of binocular rivalry based on these observations was proposed.

Let's talk about failures : why was the game for children not a success?

A significant proportion of research in the field of human-computer interaction has been devoted to game design. Yet, a multitude of good ideas and enthusiastic game design initiatives exist, where the games never see the light of day. Unfortunately, the causes of these failures remain often unexplored and unpublished. The challenges faced by researchers and practitioners are particularly complex when designing games for special target groups, such as children, or for a serious purpose. The HCI community would benefit from a discussion on these issues in order to avoid researchers and practitioners to repeat mistakes. We want to learn from projects that started with a promising idea, but failed or faced severe challenges. This workshop will be the first at CHI focusing on 'failed game projects'. In particular, workshop participants are encouraged to discuss issues that typically received little attention in publications and hereby contribute to the discussion on failures in the design, development and evaluation of games for and or with children. As a result, the community will benefit from these insights and lessons-learned, which will enhance the design of future (serious) games with/for children.

Modelling bluetooth and fusing with loops

The invited presentation was delivered at Queensland Department of Main Roads, Brisbane Australia, 17th June 2013

Knowledge is not power, but it’s a start : what young people know about their rights and obligations in employment

Scholarship addressing the employment concerns of school age workers has identified a number of areas of vulnerability. Prominent among these is that young workers have insufficient knowledge of their rights in employment, yet the extent of this knowledge has not previously been quantified. This study explores areas of strength and deficit in awareness of employment rights and obligations in a sample of 892 young people in Australian high schools. The findings demonstrate that, despite part-time work being a majority experience for school students, young Australians know relatively little of their employment rights. The conclusions underscore the need for education strategies that inform young people prior to and in the very early stages of their working lives.