Socio-demographic and work setting correlates of poor mental health in a population sample of working Victorians: application in evidence-based intervention priority setting

Interventions to promote mental health in the workplace are rapidly gaining acceptability as a means to prevent, screen, treat and effectively manage the growing disease burden of depression and anxiety among working people. The objective of this study was to identify socio-demographic and work setting correlates of poor mental health to consider alongside other evidence in priority setting for workplace mental health promotion (MHP). Multiple logistic regression was used to model the probability of poor mental health (SF-12) in relation to socio-demographic (gender, age, education, marital status and occupational skill level) and employment factors (workplace size and type, industrial sector, employment arrangement and working hours) in a population-based cross-sectional survey of 1051 working Victorians. As a result, poor mental health was (21% prevalence overall) higher in working females than in males and decreased with increasing age. Only one employment factor was significant in demographically adjusted multivariate analyses, showing an increase in the odds of poor mental health with increasing working hours. It is concluded that based on the prevalence of poor mental health, Victorian work settings with high proportions of younger workers, and younger working women in particular, should be prioritized for workplace MHP. Thus, together with other research demonstrating particularly poor psychosocial working conditions for young working women, sectors with an over-representation of this group (e.g. service sector) could be prioritized for workplace MHP alongside young and blue-collar males (also a priority due to low mental healthcare service use).

Australian Unity Wellbeing Index survey 30.0 : The wellbeing of Australians – social media, personal achievement, and work : Report

The Australian Unity Wellbeing Index monitors the subjective wellbeing of the Australian population. Our first survey was conducted in April 2001 and this report concerns the 30th survey, undertaken in August 2013. Our previous survey had been conducted four months earlier in April. This intervening period corresponded to the 6th year of the Labor Government, elected in November 2007. Shortly after data collection, on 7th September, an election took place at which Labor lost to the Liberal Party Coalition.
The share market had been stable for a couple of years, at a level well below its peak before the financial crisis. However, unemployment remained at about 5% and for those people with jobs, many were better-off financially due to cuts in interest rates, and so, in mortgage repayments.
Each survey involves a telephone interview with a new sample of 2,000 Australians, selected to represent the geographic distribution of the national population. These surveys comprise the Personal Wellbeing Index, which measures people’s satisfaction with their own lives, and the National Wellbeing Index, which measures how satisfied people are with life in Australia. Other items include a standard set of demographic questions and other survey-specific questions. The specific topics for Survey 30 are social media, personal achievement, and work conditions.

Reflections on learning, life and work : completing doctoral studies in mid and later life and career

Book review of : Reflections on learning, life and work: Completing doctoral studies in mid and later life and career, by Maureen Ryan

Education and work in service of the nation: Canadian and Australian girls' fiction, 1908-1921

This chapter compares early twentieth-century Australian novels by Ethel Turner, Mary Grant Bruce, and Lilian Turner to Canadian novels by Nellie McClung and L.M. Montgomery to demonstrate important differences in attitudes towards education and work. Girls’ fiction in these white settler colonies has many similarities, containing strong ideals related to domesticity, education, employment, and femininity. In the Canadian fiction, attitudes towards women’s higher education and employement are generally much more positive. Although both Australian and Canadian girls’ fiction typically conclude with marriage, Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables and Nellie McClung’s Pearlie Watson are offered the opportunity to pursue higher education and use this education to teach others. In contrast, Lilian Turner’s Paradise and the Perrys, Ethel Turner’s Fair Ines, and Mary Grant Bruce’s ’Possum emphasise the importance of domesticity while also showing how girls sought to earn income without leaving home. Through our comparison of these Canadian and Australian novels, all published between 1908 and 1921, we demonstrate how the different feminine ideals embodied through these heroines are inevitably intertwined with the needs of the nation

Use of motivational interviewing to improve return-to-work and work-related outcomes: a review

Work-based return-to-work (RTW) interventions can help to reduce the duration and cost of work disability, and in turn, prevent the negative effects of long-term sickness absence. However, there are a number of complex cognitive, affective and behavioural factors that can impact an individual's confidence, motivation and willingness to RTW that need to be addressed to facilitate effective outcomes. This literature review investigates evidence for the use of motivational interviewing (MI) for improving return-to-work (RTW) and employment outcomes. Whilst evidence for the efficacy of MI in clinical settings to motivate health behaviour change is strong, more research is needed to determine whether MI can be usefully applied to improve RTW and other work-related outcomes. © 2014 The Author(s).

Geographical dimensions of imagined futures: post school participation in education and work in peri-urban and regional Australia

This paper discusses preliminary findings from a sub-set of empirical data collected for a recent NCVER study that explored the geographic dimensions of social exclusion in four locations in Victoria and South Australia with lower than average post school education participation. Set against the policy context of the Bradley Review (2008) and the drive to increase the post-school participation of young people from low socio-economic status neighbourhoods, this qualitative research study, responding to identified gaps in the literature, sought a nuanced understanding of how young people make decisions about their post-school pathways. Drawing on Appadurai’s (2004) concept ‘horizons of aspiration’ the paper explores the aspirations of two young people formed from, and within, their particular rural ‘neighborhoods’. The paper reveals how their post-school education and work choices, imagined futures and conceptions of a ‘good life’, have topographic and gendered influences that are important considerations for policy makers.

Suggestion of an inverse relationship between perception of occupational risks and work-related injuries

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

The influence of study schedules and work on the sleep-wake cycle of college students

College students usually exhibit an irregular sleep-wake cycle characterized by great phase delays on weekends and short sleep length on weekdays. As the temporal organization of social activities is an important synchronizer of human biological rhythms, we investigated the role played by study's schedules and work on the sleep-wake cycle. Three groups of female college students were investigated: (1) no-job morning group, (2) no-job evening group, (3) job evening group. The volunteers answered a sleep questionnaire in the classroom. The effects of day of the week and group on the sleep schedules and sleep length were analyzed by a two way ANOVA for repeated measures. The three groups showed delays in the wake up time on weekends. No-job evening and morning groups also delayed bedtime, but the job evening group slept at the same time on weekdays as on weekends. Sleep length increased on weekends for morning group and job evening group, whereas the no-job evening group maintained the amount of sleep from weekdays to weekends. This survey showed that the tendency of phase delay on weekends was differently expressed according to study's schedules and work.

Reseña y perspectivas acerca del rol y programa de trabajo del Comité de Desarrollo y Cooperación del Caribe (CDCC) = Review and perspectives on the role and work programme of the Caribbean Development and Co-operation Committee (CDCC) = Revue et perspectives du rôle et du programme de travail du Comité de Développement et de Coopération des Caraïbes (CDCC)

Evalua y examina nuevas perspectivas en relacion al rol y programa de trabajo del CDCC.

Juventud y trabajo en América Latina = Youth and work in Latin America

Incluye Bibliografía