Melbourne School of Population and Global Health - Research Publications
Permanent URI for this collection
Search Results
1 - 10 of 20
-
ItemSuicide Prevention Research Priorities: Final Report(Centre for Mental Health, University of Melbourne, and Suicide Prevention Australia, 2022)Background and aim: Suicide continues to be a major public health challenge in Australia with significant individual, community, and societal impacts. Targeted and timely research efforts are essential to effectively address this challenge in a rapidly changing world. Building on our earlier research priority setting exercise conducted in 2017, the present project aimed to inform future priorities in Australian suicide prevention research and identify shifts in research emphasis over time. Method: We examined current research priorities in Australian suicide prevention research by reviewing grants and fellowships funded and peer-reviewed journal articles published during 2017-2022, which were categorised according to an existing classification framework. We also surveyed key stakeholders with a known interest in suicide prevention research as to where future research emphasis should be placed and categorised their responses according to the same framework. Replicating the methodology from our earlier exercise, enabled us to contrast current and future research priorities and identify any shifts in research emphasis over time. Key findings: Overall research investment and publication output in Australian suicide prevention research has increased significantly in 2017-2022, with 393 journal articles published and 110 grants and fellowships funded to the tune of $45.1m. This represents more than a quadrupling of total research funding over a 5-year period and a 50% increase in annual publication output compared to our earlier exercise conducted over a 7.5-year period in 2010-2017. Recent research funding efforts are starting to manifest key changes in the types of research called for by stakeholders, while the associated evidence base is yet to fully materialise in publications. Notably, intervention studies (43%) emerged as the most frequently funded study type, while epidemiological research continued to dominate in published articles (59%). Mirroring stakeholder identified priorities, recent grants and publications reflected a relative shift in emphasis away from suicide and a greater focus on suicide attempts. Young people continued to be the most commonly researched target group. While digital and online settings featured strongly in research funding, stakeholders prioritised research in community settings. Four percent of articles and one quarter of grants noted the inclusion of people with lived experience or co-design. Conclusions: The recent boost in national research funding for suicide prevention is encouraging and commensurate with the significant scale of the task ahead to develop the evidence base and more effective solutions to address the persistent public health challenge of suicide in Australia. Research funding efforts are driving key changes in research emphasis called for by stakeholders, including a stronger emphasis on intervention research. While publications are also showing some positive signs, the required evidence base on effective interventions, protective factors, and social determinants is yet to fully materialise in this literature to support practice. To effectively address suicide in Australia in the future, it will therefore be important to maintain the overall thrust and direction of national research investment, coupled with a stronger emphasis on research translation. The present findings suggest that key priority areas for future suicide prevention research should address suicide attempts, protective factors, social determinants, community settings, and interventions, and focus on strengthening effective research translation into practice.
-
ItemA socio-ecological exploration of adolescent violence in the home and young people with disability: The perceptions of mothers and practitioners(Australia's National Research Organisation for Women's Safety, 2022)An emerging body of research into adolescent violence in the home (AVITH) has signalled concerns about the disproportionate rates of young people with disability receiving family violence services and legal responses to violence at home (Campbell et al., 2020). However, research about AVITH has typically collapsed disability into binaries with children labelled as “disabled” or “not disabled”. Existing research often implies disability has a causal link to the use of violence and no attention is paid to the specific behaviours or the social and interactional context in which these behaviours arise. This project aims to begin filling this evidence gap. The publication signals the project’s second and final report. It shares findings from exploratory qualitative research to generate new knowledge about the intersections between AVITH and young people with disability. The intention is to begin to lay the foundations for sustained and nuanced dialogue about the issues and experiences of young people with disability and AVITH. The research team ran in-depth semi-structured interviews with mothers who had experienced AVITH and practitioners with direct experience working with young people with disability and AVITH. All participants were from metropolitan and regional areas of Victoria, Australia. Initial plans to speak with young people with disability themselves were reconsidered in response to Covid-19 lockdowns across Victoria. The research team acknowledges that the voices of young people remain missing from this field and will pursue avenues to centre their lived experiences in future research projects. The study found that current responses to AVITH tend to rely on models designed to address domestic and family violence (DFV). These models often understand the use of violence as an attempt to have power and control over another person. However, this did not always reflect mothers’ experiences. While many mothers and families had prior experiences of DFV and found the impacts of AVITH comparable, they perceived that young people with disability were using violence to control themselves rather than exert control over others. While mothers noted “pockets of good practice”, the study also identified wide multi-sectoral failures to effectively respond to the needs of children and young people with disability who use violence and their families. The study is part of a larger body of work funded by ANROWS focused on the experiences and impacts of domestic and family violence (DFV). Other projects include work on the DFV experiences of children with disability, the connections between DFV and mental health issues among children, the connections between adverse childhood experiences (ACES) and sexually harmful behaviours and offences among boys and young men, and strengthening service responses for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and women.
-
Item
-
Item
-
Item
-
ItemNo Preview AvailableEndline evaluation final report: Women's Action for Voice and Empowerment (WAVE)(International Women's Development Agency, 2020)
-
ItemNo Preview AvailableIndependent evaluation of supported digital mental health services: Phase 2 final report.(Centre for Mental Health, University of Melbourne, 2022)
-
ItemToward a socio-ecological understanding of adolescent violence in the home by young people with disability: a conceptual review(Australia's National Research Organisation for Women's Safety (ANROWS), 2022)Adolescent violence in the home (AVITH) describes a range of violent, abusive and intimidating behaviours used by young people against family members, most commonly parents and siblings. It is increasingly recognised as a critical issue of concern for many families in Australia.
-
ItemSexual and reproductive health and gender-based violence in Samoa: A review of policy and legislation(UNFPA, 2022)In 2015, the United Nations set an ambitious agenda of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to address poverty, injustice, and environmental destruction. Through the SDGs, nations committed to gender equality and health and notably established universal access to sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) as a global target. Additionally, and relatedly, the SDGs include a specific target to ‘eliminate all forms of violence against women and girls in public and private spheres, including trafficking and sexual and other types of exploitation’ (UN General Assembly, 2015). While laws and policies alone cannot achieve these targets, scholars and practitioners agree that an enabling legal and policy environment continues to play an important role in advancing SRHR and eliminating gender-based violence (GBV). Review of the policy and legal landscape for realising SRHR and preventing and responding to GBV is a high priority for the Pacific region. Governments in the Pacific have committed to international and regional strategies to address SRHR and GBV, but there is a need to analyse existing national legislative and regulatory frameworks to identify the ways policy and legislation may work to support SRHR and prevent GBV, or conversely may undermine appropriate services and responses. This report summarises findings from the in-depth content analysis of national legislation, policies and peer reviewed literature relevant to SRH and GBV in Samoa. Content was mapped across key domains and corresponding indicators for the SDGs and other international frameworks, conventions and commitments. The report synthesises the policy and legislative environment for SRHR and prevention of GBV in Samoa, providing new evidence to underpin legislative and policy reform in the country.
-
ItemSexual and reproductive health and gender-based violence in Tonga: A review of policy and legislation(UNFPA, 2022)In 2015, the United Nations set an ambitious agenda of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to address poverty, injustice, and environmental destruction. Through the SDGs, nations committed to gender equality and health and notably established universal access to sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) as a global target. Additionally, and relatedly, the SDGs include a specific target to ‘eliminate all forms of violence against women and girls in public and private spheres, including trafficking and sexual and other types of exploitation’ (UN General Assembly, 2015). While laws and policies alone cannot achieve these targets, scholars and practitioners agree that an enabling legal and policy environment continues to play an important role in advancing SRHR and eliminating gender-based violence (GBV). Review of the policy and legal landscape for realising SRHR and preventing and responding to GBV is a high priority for the Pacific region. Governments in the Pacific have committed to international and regional strategies to address SRHR and GBV, but there is a need to analyse existing national legislative and regulatory frameworks to identify the ways policy and legislation may work to support SRHR and prevent GBV, or conversely may undermine appropriate services and responses. This report summarises findings from the in-depth content analysis of national legislation, policies and peer reviewed literature relevant to SRH and GBV in the Kingdom of Tonga. Content was mapped across key domains and corresponding indicators for the SDGs and other international frameworks, conventions and commitments. The report synthesises the policy and legislative environment for SRHR and prevention of GBV in Tonga, providing new evidence to underpin legislative and policy reform in the country.