Seeking inclusion : views from ‘vulnerable’ communities about reporting by the Australian news media

This conference paper reports on the findings of the 'Vulnerability and the News Media’ project about news reporting on communities that are commonly regarded as ‘vulnerable’ by virtue of their issues or circumstances. The project focuses on news reporting of Indigenous and ethnically diverse communities, as well as people affected by mental health issues, people with disabilities, and survivors of crime and traumatic events. Numerous educational initiatives have tried to improve the quality of media reports about these communities and their issues. Despite this, the project’s research with stakeholders from those communities has found that they continue to raise the same concerns that have been expressed about the news media since the 1970s. In focus group research, stakeholders from these communities expressed concern about their continuing under-representation or omission from the news media. They felt that voices, experiences, perspectives and issues from their communities rarely appeared, or if they did appear, it was in limited contexts – often in circumstances that portrayed them as vulnerable or disruptive. They also pointed to ongoing media misrepresentation, such as stereotyping, inappropriate framing, and over-reliance on ‘usual suspects’ to talk about their communities. A common theme that they voiced was their need for greater inclusiveness in the media. Participants wished that journalists would better represent the diversity of life experiences and perspectives within their communities. Stakeholders also wanted an increased in representation of their political frameworks, such as stories about the difficulties they encountered in dealing with social and bureaucratic systems, and their understandings of causes and potential solutions for issues affecting their communities.

Investigative Essentials for Journalists in Multicultural and Diverse Communities

This chapter describes how investigative journalism can uncover news that often goes unreported about personalities, problems, ways of life and pressing issues in ethnic and religious sub-communities. While investigative journalism is traditionally understood as reporting that exposes corrupt, inefficient, incompetent or other inappropriate conduct in politics and business circles, investigative reporters do far more than that. They also map human activities, landmarks, patterns and changes in the landscape, and connections across the whole of society. This type of investigative journalism can improve reporting of ethnic and religious sub-communities via identification, deep observation and analysis of trends, events, and issues that would otherwise remain hidden or obscured. The chapter includes details of techniques that investigative journalists can employ to identify interesting topics, find sources of information, analyse data and issues, and report compelling stories.

Overview of methods used in cross-cultural comparisons of menopausal symptoms and their determinants : Guidelines for Strengthening the Reporting of Menopause and Aging (STROMA) studies

This paper reviews the methods used in cross-cultural studies of menopausal symptoms with the goal of formulating recommendations to facilitate comparisons of menopausal symptoms across cultures. It provides an overview of existing approaches and serves to introduce four separate reviews of vasomotor, psychological, somatic, and sexual symptoms at midlife. Building on an earlier review of cross-cultural studies of menopause covering time periods until 2004, these reviews are based on searches of Medline, PsycINFO, CINAHL and Google Scholar for English-language articles published from 2004 to 2010 using the terms “cross cultural comparison” and “menopause.” Two major criteria were used: a study had to include more than one culture, country, or ethnic group and to have asked about actual menopausal symptom experience. We found considerable variation across studies in age ranges, symptom lists, reference period for symptom recall, variables included in multivariate analyses, and the measurement of factors (e.g., menopausal status and hormonal factors, demographic, anthropometric, mental/physical health, and lifestyle measures) that influence vasomotor, psychological, somatic and sexual symptoms. Based on these reviews, we make recommendations for future research regarding age range, symptom lists, reference/recall periods, and measurement of menopausal status. Recommendations specific to the cross-cultural study of vasomotor, psychological, somatic, and sexual symptoms are found in the four reviews that follow this introduction.

Recommendations for the reporting of foot and ankle models

Multiple marker sets and models are currently available for assessing foot and ankle kinematics in gait. Despite the presence of such a wide variety of models, the reporting of methodological designs remains inconsistent and lacks clearly defined standards. This review highlights the variability found when reporting biomechanical model parameters, methodological design, and model reliability. Further, the review clearly demonstrates the need for a consensus of what methodological considerations to report in manuscripts, which focus on the topic of foot and ankle biomechanics. We propose five minimum reporting standards, that we believe will ensure the transparency of methods and begin to allow the community to move towards standard modelling practice. The strict adherence to these standards should ultimately improve the interpretation and clinical useability of foot and ankle marker sets and their corresponding models.

Entrepreneurship education in non-business schools : best practice for Australian contexts of knowledge and innovation communities (Final Report)

In the current era of global economic instability, business and industry have already identified a widening gap between graduate skills and employability. An important element of this is the lack of entrepreneurial skills in graduates. This Teaching Fellowship investigated two sides of a story about entrepreneurial skills and their teaching. Senior players in the innovation commercialisation industry, a high profile entrepreneurial sector, were surveyed to gauge their needs and experiences of graduates they employ. International contexts of entrepreneurship education were investigated to explore how their teaching programs impart the skills of entrepreneurship. Such knowledge is an essential for the design of education programs that can deliver the entrepreneurial skills deemed important by industry for future sustainability. Two programs of entrepreneurship education are being implemented at QUT that draw on the best practice exemplars investigated during this Fellowship. The QUT Innovation Space (QIS) focuses on capturing the innovation and creativity of students, staff and others. The QIS is a physical and virtual meeting and networking space; a connected community enhancing the engagement of participants. The Q_Hatchery is still embryonic; but it is intended to be an innovation community that brings together nascent entrepreneurial businesses to collaborate, train and support each other. There is a niche between concept product and business incubator where an experiential learning environment for otherwise isolated ‘garage-at-home’ businesses could improve success rates. The QIS and the Q_Hatchery serve as living research laboratories to trial the concepts emerging from the skills survey. The survey of skills requirements of the innovation commercialisation industry has produced a large and high quality data set still being explored. Work experience as an employability factor has already emerged as an industry requirement that provides employee maturity. Exploratory factor analysis of the skills topics surveyed has led to a process-based conceptual model for teaching and learning higher-order entrepreneurial skills. Two foundational skills domains (Knowledge, Awareness) are proposed as prerequisites which allow individuals with a suite of early stage entrepreneurial and behavioural skills (Pre-leadership) to further leverage their careers into a leadership role in industry with development of skills around higher order elements of entrepreneurship, management in new business ventures and progressing winning technologies to market. The next stage of the analysis is to test the proposed model through structured equation modelling. Another factor that emerged quickly from the survey analysis broadens the generic concept of team skills currently voiced in Australian policy documents discussing the employability agenda. While there was recognition of the role of sharing, creating and using knowledge in a team-based interdisciplinary context, the adoption and adaptation of behaviours and attitudes of other team members of different disciplinary backgrounds (interprofessionalism) featured as an issue. Most undergraduates are taught and undertake teamwork in silos and, thus, seldom experience a true real-world interdisciplinary environment. Enhancing the entrepreneurial capacity of Australian industry is essential for the economic health of the country and can only be achieved by addressing the lack of entrepreneurial skills in graduates from the higher education system. This Fellowship has attempted to address this deficiency by identifying the skills requirements and providing frameworks for their teaching.

Does the protection of vulnerable children require a system of mandatory reporting of abuse and neglect? [An issues paper for the New Zealand Government Green Paper for vulnerable children]

In this Issues Paper, I raise some key points relevant for any government which is considering its child protection and family welfare policy. In particular, I will raise questions about whether a form of legislative reporting duty is required, and if so, what consequences this has for child protection. The context of child maltreatment - and each form of maltreatment: physical abuse, sexual abuse, psychological or emotional abuse, and neglect - is extremely complex, and the overarching question of how to deal with these phenomena involve challenging normative, economic and practical questions. There are no easy or perfect solutions. Nor, often, is there the amount and quality of evidence available on which public policy approaches should be devised. However, from the best evidence about the history of this context, from research conducted in this field, and from the best evidence available about the nature, incidence and effects of different subtypes of maltreatment, some observations can be made which may help to inform deliberations. I outline 10 key issues related to mandatory reporting legislation while being mindful of the New Zealand context. My view, based on both research evidence and a concern to protect and promote children’s interests, and society’s interests, is that reporting laws in some form are necessary and can contribute substantially to child protection and enhancing family and community health and wellbeing. However, they are only one necessary part of a sound child protection system, being a method of tertiary and secondary prevention, and primary prevention efforts must also be prioritised. Moreover, it is essential that if a legislative reporting duty is enacted, it must be designed carefully and implemented soundly, and it must be integrated within a properly resourced child protection and family welfare system.

The emergence of emotions and religious sentiments during the September 11 disaster

Analyzing emotional states under duress or during heightened, life-and-death situations is extremely difficult, especially given the inability of laboratory experiments to replicate the environment and given the inherent biases of post event surveys. This is where natural experiments, such as the pager communications from September 11th can provide the kind of natural experiment emotion researchers have been seeking. We demonstrate that positive and pro-social communications are the first to emerge followed by the slower and lower negative communications. Religious sentiment is the last to emerge, as individual attempt to make sense of event. Additionally we provide a methodological discussion about the preparation and analysis of such natural experiments (the pager message content) and show the importance of using multiple methods to extract the broadest possible understanding.

Entrepreneurship education in non-business schools : best practice for Australian contexts of knowledge and innovation communities (Final Report)

In the current era of global economic instability, business and industry have already identified a widening gap between graduate skills and employability. An important element of this is the lack of entrepreneurial skills in graduates. This Teaching Fellowship investigated two sides of a story about entrepreneurial skills and their teaching. Senior players in the innovation commercialisation industry, a high profile entrepreneurial sector, were surveyed to gauge their needs and experiences of graduates they employ. International contexts of entrepreneurship education were investigated to explore how their teaching programs impart the skills of entrepreneurship. Such knowledge is an essential for the design of education programs that can deliver the entrepreneurial skills deemed important by industry for future sustainability. Two programs of entrepreneurship education are being implemented at QUT that draw on the best practice exemplars investigated during this Fellowship. The QUT Innovation Space (QIS) focuses on capturing the innovation and creativity of students, staff and others. The QIS is a physical and virtual meeting and networking space; a connected community enhancing the engagement of participants. The Q_Hatchery is still embryonic; but it is intended to be an innovation community that brings together nascent entrepreneurial businesses to collaborate, train and support each other. There is a niche between concept product and business incubator where an experiential learning environment for otherwise isolated ‘garage-at-home’ businesses could improve success rates. The QIS and the Q_Hatchery serve as living research laboratories to trial the concepts emerging from the skills survey. The survey of skills requirements of the innovation commercialisation industry has produced a large and high quality data set still being explored. Work experience as an employability factor has already emerged as an industry requirement that provides employee maturity. Exploratory factor analysis of the skills topics surveyed has led to a process-based conceptual model for teaching and learning higher-order entrepreneurial skills. Two foundational skills domains (Knowledge, Awareness) are proposed as prerequisites which allow individuals with a suite of early stage entrepreneurial and behavioural skills (Pre-leadership) to further leverage their careers into a leadership role in industry with development of skills around higher order elements of entrepreneurship, management in new business ventures and progressing winning technologies to market. The next stage of the analysis is to test the proposed model through structured equation modelling. Another factor that emerged quickly from the survey analysis broadens the generic concept of team skills currently voiced in Australian policy documents discussing the employability agenda. While there was recognition of the role of sharing, creating and using knowledge in a team-based interdisciplinary context, the adoption and adaptation of behaviours and attitudes of other team members of different disciplinary backgrounds (interprofessionalism) featured as an issue. Most undergraduates are taught and undertake teamwork in silos and, thus, seldom experience a true real-world interdisciplinary environment. Enhancing the entrepreneurial capacity of Australian industry is essential for the economic health of the country and can only be achieved by addressing the lack of entrepreneurial skills in graduates from the higher education system. This Fellowship has attempted to address this deficiency by identifying the skills requirements and providing frameworks for their teaching.

Under-reporting of road crashes in Pakistan and the role of fate

Objective: Comprehensive, accurate information about road crashes and related trauma is a prerequisite for identification and control of risk factors as well as for identifying faults within the broader road safety system. Quality data and appropriate crash investigation are critical in reducing the road toll that is rapidly growing in much of the developing world, including Pakistan. This qualitative research explored the involvement of social and cultural factors (in particular, fatalism) in risky road use in Pakistan. The findings highlight a significant issue, previously unreported in the road safety literature, namely, the link between fatalistic beliefs and inaccurate reporting of road crashes. Method: Thirty interviews (one-to one) were conducted by the first author with police officers, drivers, policy makers and religious orators in three Pakistani cities. Findings: Evidence emerged of a strong link between fatalism and the under-reporting of road crashes. In many cases, crashes and related road trauma appear to go unreported because a crash is considered to be one’s fate and, therefore, beyond personal control. Fate was also implicated in the practice of reconciliation between parties after a crash without police involvement and the seeking and granting of pardon for a road death. Conclusions: These issues represent additional factors that can contribute to under-reporting of crashes and associated trauma. Together, they highlight complications involved in establishing the true cost of road trauma in a country such as Pakistan and the difficulties faced when attempting to promote scientifically-based road safety information to counteract faith-based beliefs.

Diabetes mellitus and the risk of depressive and anxiety disorders in Australian women: A longitudinal study

Background Longitudinal studies examining the risk of depressive and anxiety disorders associated with diabetes are limited. This study examined the association between diabetes and the risk of depressive and anxiety disorders in Australian women using longitudinal data. Methods Datawere froma sample of women who were part of anAustralian pregnancy and birth cohort study. Data comprised self-reported diabetes mellitus and the subsequent reporting of depressive and anxiety disorders. Mood disorders were assessed according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fourth edition, obtained from participants using Composite International Diagnostic Interview (CIDI)-Auto (WHO WMH-CIDI CAPI, version 21.1.3). Multiple regression models with adjustment for important covariates were used. Results Women with diabetes had a higher lifetime prevalence of any depressive and/or anxiety disorder than women without diabetes. About 3 in 10 women with diabetes experienced a lifetime event of any depressive disorder, while 1 in 2 women with diabetes experienced a lifetime event of any anxiety disorder. In prospective analyses, diabetes was only significantly associated with a 30-day episode of any anxiety disorder (odds ratio [OR] 1.53, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.09–2.15). In the case of lifetime disorders, diabetes was significantly associated with any depressive disorder (OR 1.37, 95% CI 1.03–1.84), major depressive disorder (OR 1.36, 95% CI 1.01–1.85), and posttraumatic stress disorder (OR 1.42, 95% CI 1.01–2.02). Conclusions The findings suggest that the presence of diabetes is a significant risk factor for women experiencing current anxiety disorders. However, in the case of depression, the association with diabetes only held for women who had experienced past episodes, there was no association with current depression. This suggests that the evidence is not strong enough to support a direct effect of diabetes as a cause of mood disorders.

Conceptualising, evaluating and reporting social resilience in vulnerable regional and remote communities facing climate change in tropical Queensland : marine and tropical sciences research facility transition project final report

Regional and remote communities in tropical Queensland are among Australia’s most vulnerable in the face of climate change. At the same time, these socially and economically vulnerable regions house some of Australia’s most significant biodiversity values. Past approaches to terrestrial biodiversity management have focused on tackling biophysical interventions through the use of biophysical knowledge. An equally important focus should be placed on building regional-scale community resilience if some of the worst biodiversity impacts of climate change are to be avoided or mitigated. Despite its critical need, more systemic or holistic approaches to natural resource management have been rarely trialed and tested in a structured way. Currently, most strategic interventions in improving regional community resilience are ad hoc, not theory-based and short term. Past planning approaches have not been durable, nor have they been well informed by clear indicators. Research into indicators for community resilience has been poorly integrated within adaptive planning and management cycles. This project has aimed to resolve this problem by: * Reviewing the community and social resilience and adaptive planning literature to reconceptualise an improved framework for applying community resilience concepts; * Harvesting and extending work undertaken in MTSRF Phase 1 to identifying the learnings emerging from past MTSRF research; * Distilling these findings to identify new theoretical and practical approaches to the application of community resilience in natural resource use and management; * Reconsidering the potential interplay between a region’s biophysical and social planning processes, with a focus on exploring spatial tools to communicate climate change risk and its consequent environmental, economic and social impacts, and; * Trialling new approaches to indicator development and adaptive planning to improve community resilience, using a sub-regional pilot in the Wet Tropics. In doing so, we also looked at ways to improve the use and application of relevant spatial information. Our theoretical review drew upon the community development, psychology and emergency management literature to better frame the concept of community resilience relative to aligned concepts of social resilience, vulnerability and adaptive capacity. Firstly, we consider community resilience as a concept that can be considered at a range of scales (e.g. regional, locality, communities of interest, etc.). We also consider that overall resilience at higher scales will be influenced by resilience levels at lesser scales (inclusive of the resilience of constituent institutions, families and individuals). We illustrate that, at any scale, resilience and vulnerability are not necessarily polar opposites, and that some understanding of vulnerability is important in determining resilience. We position social resilience (a concept focused on the social characteristics of communities and individuals) as an important attribute of community resilience, but one that needs to be considered alongside economic, natural resource, capacity-based and governance attributes. The findings from the review of theory and MTSRF Phase 1 projects were synthesized and refined by the wider project team. Five predominant themes were distilled from this literature, research review and an expert analysis. They include the findings that: 1. Indicators have most value within an integrated and adaptive planning context, requiring an active co-research relationship between community resilience planners, managers and researchers if real change is to be secured; 2. Indicators of community resilience form the basis for planning for social assets and the resilience of social assets is directly related the longer term resilience of natural assets. This encourages and indeed requires the explicit development and integration of social planning within a broader natural resource planning and management framework; 3. Past indicator research and application has not provided a broad picture of the key attributes of community resilience and there have been many attempts to elicit lists of “perfect” indicators that may never be useful within the time and resource limitations of real world regional planning and management. We consider that modeling resilience for proactive planning and prediction purposes requires the consideration of simple but integrated clusters of attributes; 4. Depending on time and resources available for planning and management, the combined use of well suited indicators and/or other lesser “lines of evidence” is more flexible than the pursuit of perfect indicators, and that; 5. Index-based, collaborative and participatory approaches need to be applied to the development, refinement and reporting of indicators over longer time frames. We trialed the practical application of these concepts via the establishment of a collaborative regional alliance of planners and managers involved in the development of climate change adaptation strategies across tropical Queensland (the Gulf, Wet Tropics, Cape York and Torres Strait sub-regions). A focus on the Wet Tropics as a pilot sub-region enabled other Far North Queensland sub-region’s to participate and explore the potential extension of this approach. The pilot activities included: * Further exploring ways to innovatively communicate the region’s likely climate change scenarios and possible environmental, economic and social impacts. We particularly looked at using spatial tools to overlay climate change risks to geographic communities and social vulnerabilities within those communities; * Developing a cohesive first pass of a State of the Region-style approach to reporting community resilience, inclusive of regional economic viability, community vitality, capacitybased and governance attributes. This framework integrated a literature review, expert (academic and community) and alliance-based contributions; and * Early consideration of critical strategies that need to be included in unfolding regional planning activities with Far North Queensland. The pilot assessment finds that rural, indigenous and some urban populations in the Wet Tropics are highly vulnerable and sensitive to climate change and may require substantial support to adapt and become more resilient. This assessment finds that under current conditions (i.e. if significant adaptation actions are not taken) the Wet Tropics as a whole may be seriously impacted by the most significant features of climate change and extreme climatic events. Without early and substantive action, this could result in declining social and economic wellbeing and natural resource health. Of the four attributes we consider important to understanding community resilience, the Wet Tropics region is particularly vulnerable in two areas; specifically its economic vitality and knowledge, aspirations and capacity. The third and fourth attributes, community vitality and institutional governance are relatively resilient but are vulnerable in some key respects. In regard to all four of these attributes, however, there is some emerging capacity to manage the possible shocks that may be associated with the impacts of climate change and extreme climatic events. This capacity needs to be carefully fostered and further developed to achieve broader community resilience outcomes. There is an immediate need to build individual, household, community and sectoral resilience across all four attribute groups to enable populations and communities in the Wet Tropics region to adapt in the face of climate change. Preliminary strategies of importance to improve regional community resilience have been identified. These emerging strategies also have been integrated into the emerging Regional Development Australia Roadmap, and this will ensure that effective implementation will be progressed and coordinated. They will also inform emerging strategy development to secure implementation of the FNQ 2031 Regional Plan. Of most significance in our view, this project has taken a co-research approach from the outset with explicit and direct importance and influence within the region’s formal planning and management arrangements. As such, the research: * Now forms the foundations of the first attempt at “Social Asset” planning within the Wet Tropics Regional NRM Plan review; * Is assisting Local government at regional scale to consider aspects of climate change adaptation in emerging planning scheme/community planning processes; * Has partnered the State government (via the Department of Infrastructure and Planning and Regional Managers Coordination Network Chair) in progressing the Climate Change adaptation agenda set down within the FNQ 2031 Regional Plan; * Is informing new approaches to report on community resilience within the GBRMPA Outlook reporting framework; and * Now forms the foundation for the region’s wider climate change adaptation priorities in the Regional Roadmap developed by Regional Development Australia. Through the auspices of Regional Development Australia, the outcomes of the research will now inform emerging negotiations concerning a wider package of climate change adaptation priorities with State and Federal governments. Next stage research priorities are also being developed to enable an ongoing alliance between researchers and the region’s climate change response.

Child protection training for professionals to improve reporting of child abuse and neglect (Protocol)

Child abuse and neglect results in significant costs for children and communities. As a core public health strategy, diverse professional groups are required by law and policy in many jurisdictions to report suspected cases. Numerous different training initiatives appear to have been developed and implemented for professionals but there is little evidence regarding the precise training components and mechanisms that improve reporting of child abuse and neglect both generally, for specific professions, and for distinct types of child abuse and neglect. To enhance reporting practice, designers of training programmes require detailed information about what programme features will offer greatest benefit. A systematic review which identifies the effectiveness of different training approaches will advance the evidence base and develop a clearer understanding of optimal training content and methods. In addition, it will provide policymakers with a means by which to assess whether current training interventions are congruent with what is demonstrated to be effective. It will also inform future research, public policy, and professional practice in this field.