Toward a Better Future for this Generation and the Next...

The Oak Foundation commissioned Promundo-US to review and assess Oak's overall strategy in relation to its goal of engaging men and boys in the elimination of sexual abuse of children and comment more specifically on possible priorities and directions for work with respect to its objective that: Men and boys will have greater opportunities to engage positively in children's lives and to protect them from sexual abuse This report is the result of this assessment. The report is based on an extensive desk review of published research and program and policy evaluations, as well as the 'grey' literature on work with men and boys on child sexual abuse and other forms of intimate violence in the lives of children. Out of this review, a total of 35 key informants across a range of targeted sectors both internationally and within Oak's priority regions were identified and interviewed in person or over the phone, using a semi-structured interview tool. These key informant phone interviews gathered detailed information on both experiences and lessons from current thinking, policy and practice as well as on opportunities and priorities for future grant-making

Examining the health and well-being of Fly-in Fly-out workers and their partners: a multi-method approach

The Research employed multi-method designs to examine the health and associated work productivity loss cost in FIFO workers and their partners in Australia. This work demonstrates that psychological distress, alcohol intake, sleep problems and overweight/obesity are recurrent and ongoing concerns among many FIFO workers and their partners, and their important impact on productivity loss, and provides evidence of important daily variability in potentially modifiable aspects of FIFO work that could be targeted in future intervention

Anglicare Australia rental affordability snapshot 2015

This report surveys private rental housing available across Australia; and tests its suitability – the cost and size – for different low income household types: couples, single parents and children, young people, pensioners, job seekers and people on the minimum wage. This time members of the Anglicare Australia network surveyed over 65,600 properties on a weekend in early April, and once again there were almost no dwellings that were affordable for people on the lowest incomes, such as Newstart and Youth Allowance, as the attached media release and report testify. The report itself also provides a breakdown of regional and metropolitan totals and a number of location based mini-reports, which are prepared by participating Anglicare network members. The survey also includes an analysis of the impact of housing unaffordability, the consequences of living with housing stress, and Anglicare Australia’s key recommendations to resolve the problem. In essence, we are calling for secure and affordable housing for people living on low incomes being made a priority. It requires a national plan that involves governments, industry and the community sector working together

How do childhood ADHD and stress relate to adult wellbeing and educational attainment? A data science investigation using the 1970 British Cohort Study

Background: Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is a childhood and adult disorder characterised by nonnormative inattentive, impulsive, and hyperactive behaviour. Over time the condition has become increasingly medicalised, and whilst it is estimated to affect 5-7% of schoolchildren internationally (Sayal et al., 2018), only 1.6% are diagnosed with ADHD in the UK (NHS Digital, 2018). Reviews report that childhood ADHD leads to poor adult outcomes in all areas of life (e.g. Costello & Maughan, 2015; Erskine et al., 2016). Although about 50% of ADHD children function well as adults, knowledge is limited about psychosocial factors in outcomes, (Costello & Maughan, 2015) such as those related to stress. State regulation theory, (Sanders, 1983; Sergeant, 2000) was the basis for an investigation using data from the age 0, 5, 10, 34, and 42 sweeps of the 1970 British Cohort Study (BCS70; Centre for Longitudinal Studies: UCL/IoE, 2019). Stress and protective factors were operationalised as stressful life events, chronic stressors, self-esteem, and locus of control. The following questions were examined : 1) What robust measures of DSM-5 ADHD can be retrospectively measured and validated? 2) What is the relationship between childhood ADHD and stress? 3) What is the effect of childhood ADHD on adult a) subjective wellbeing, and b) educational attainment, the latter as a proxy for SES and objective wellbeing? Method: Innovative data science methods were applied, including: 1) A data mining framework (Kurgan & Musilek, 2006) to derive new constructs in old data; 2) Robust linear and logistic regression models (e.g. MLR, FIML; Muthen & Muthen, 2017); 3) Zero-inflated mixture modelling (Wall et al., 2015) to estimate an ADHD severity score; 4) Machine learning (vselect; Lindsey & Sheather, 2010) to aid selection of an optimal set of covariates for quasi-experimental matching; and 5) Coarsened Exact Matching (CEM; Iacus et al., 2014) to derive a weighted matched sample of ADHD children and similar controls. Key findings: A DSM-5 ADHD subgroup and subtypes were retrospectively derived and validated using age 10 BCS70 data (N=11,426; nADHD=594, 5.2% prevalence, 30% girls, 46% inattentive subtype). Overall prevalence aligned with epidemiology estimates, but the relatively high percentages of ADHD girls and inattentive cases enabled rare new insights for these groups. The distribution of the ADHD severity score (N=11,426, M=0.06, SD=0.91) supported dimensionality of the construct. Stressful life events, chronic stressors, self-esteem and locus of control significantly predicted DSM-5 ADHD symptomatology and explained 19.5% of the ADHD severity score at age 10 (N=11,426), supporting State Regulation Theory at the psychosocial construct level. Quasi-experimental methods were employed to create a pruned longitudinal sample of ADHD and control cohort members matched on evidence-based confounds (N=6,207). Regression models on this sample did not support a significant effect of childhood ADHD on adult outcomes, contrary to prevailing evidence from mostly clinical samples matched on fewer confounds. Matching confounds used were sex, father’s education, depressed mother, mother smoked during pregnancy, childhood wheezing, and low standard home. Replication and refinement are needed, but the finding suggests future experimental studies should consider stratifying samples on these factors, and that ADHD per se may not drive poor outcomes. In the matched sample (N=6,207), age 10 maths scores (boys and girls), externalising problems, and engagement in leisure activity (girls only), were significant factors predicting a continuous composite measure of adult subjective wellbeing. Parent education, age 10 maths, reading (boys and girls), locus of control, and authoritarian child-rearing views (girls only), were significant childhood factors predicting a dichotomous academic qualification measure of adult educational attainment, as a proxy for SES/objective wellbeing. All effect sizes were small . In a longitudinal ADHD subsample (n=369), age 10 chronic stressors, externalising problems, and reading significantly predicted adult subjective wellbeing, explaining 7.1% of variance (boys and girls). Father’s education and age 10 reading significantly predicted adult educational attainment. The effects of chronic stressors and reading, and the higher proportion of girls and inattentive ADHD cases in the sample provide novel insights which should be translatable into teacher training and practice. Findings are applicable internationally, subject to demographic generalisability parameters.ESRC Advanced Quantitative Methods Studentship, Hughes Hall Scholarshi

Towards AI-governance in psychosocial care: A systematic literature review analysis

With increased digitalization and e-government services, Artificial Intelligence (AI) gained momentum. This paper focuses on AI-governance in Child Social Care field, exploring how aspects of individual, family/community factors are embedded in organizational level, especially when dealing with children resilience and wellbeing. A three-level based review has been conducted. In the first part we explored the interlink between individual factors associated to either resilience or wellbeing are connected to community and governance level where a new conceptual model is provided. In the second phase, we conducted an in-depth systematic literature review using PRISMA review protocol where new categorizations of identified literature with respect to individual, family and community levels in child social care field were suggested, while in the third phase, a review of relevant AI-initiatives in Europe and USA was performed. Finally, a comprehensive discussion of the literature review outcomes was carried out and a new updated conceptual model was provided.© 2023 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of Prof JinHyo Joseph Yun. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Fly-in / fly-out working arrangements: Employee perceptions of work and personal impacts

During the resources boom in Western Australia, the remoteness and nature of work contracts led to an increase in the use of fly-in fly-out (FIFO) working arrangements. The associated compressed work periods, alternating patterns of residence, and the harsh worksite living conditions were compensated for by high wages. The combination of these factors led to controversy around whether employees were committed to their employers (Walford, 2012), if their working arrangements conflicted with family arrangements, and the impact on their mental health (Education and Health Standing Committee, 2015). This thesis explored the impact of FIFO working arrangements on workers in each of these areas using correlations and path analyses. The resources boom (circa 2012) provided the opportunity to survey FIFO workers (n = 980; 75.6% male) across Australia by a cross-sectional online or paper survey. A convenience sample was recruited through multiple methods including social media, radio, and snowballing. Affective commitment and normative commitment were strongly predicted by perceptions of organisational support. Preference for a different roster had a small but significant impact on employees’ intent to leave their jobs. Employees’ preference for a different roster was positively associated with their perceptions of work-family conflict (WFC), which was also positively associated with poorer mental health outcomes. When work and personal factors were combined, preference for another roster was related to higher WFC and subsequently many organisational and individual outcomes, while high continuance commitment was related to poorer mental health outcomes. The implications of the findings of this thesis are that organisations should focus on enabling choice of roster as well as improving perceived support in order to increase affective commitment and reduce turnover intent and perceptions of WFC, which is likely to lead to better mental health outcomes for their employees

Influences on Pregnancy: An Exploration of Maternal Discrimination, an Alternative Model of Prenatal Care and Health Information Online

In the United States metrics of perinatal health lag far behind peer countries and is characterized by stark disparities. The studies that make up this dissertation seek to elucidate factors influencing perinatal health. The first and second chapters provide an introduction and extensive review of the literature of factors contributing to perinatal health with specific focus on discrimination and perinatal health; group prenatal care and digital pregnancy health information. The third chapter introduces the methodology to be used by each of the following studies. Subsequent chapters are formatted as individual manuscripts, each presenting background, methodology, results, and discussion. The fourth chapter (Manuscript 1) sought to explore pregnant persons intersectional experience of discrimination and the association with adverse perinatal health outcomes. This study was a secondary analysis of data collected in a randomized controlled trial of pregnant persons at a single practice (CRADLE study). Latent class analysis was used to identify distinct subgroups of discrimination experience based on patterns of response to Everyday Discrimination Scale items and between subgroup differences in rate of adverse perinatal health outcomes examined utilizing a BCH three-step approach. Four discrimination subgroups were identified among racial and ethnic groups. The general discrimination latent class was associated with elevated risk of postpartum depression symptoms (among Black and White participants) and low infant birthweight (among White participants) relative to the no discrimination latent class. No significant subgroup differences were observed among Hispanic participants. Findings demonstrate the importance of intersectional discrimination exposure in shaping perinatal health. The fifth chapter (Manuscript 2) applied a concurrent mixed methods approach in the examination of patient characteristics associated with group prenatal care and the exploration of patient experiences in group compared to individual prenatal care. This study was a secondary analysis of data collected in the CRADLE study, as well as patient interviews collected in a coordinated process evaluation. The association of patient sociodemographic, psychosocial and health characteristics with group prenatal care session attendance were examined using zero-inflated poison regression models. Thematic analysis of patient interviews was conducted. Varied patient characteristics were found to be associated with session attendance. Group prenatal care was identified to offer alternative opportunities for education, engagement, and peer support. Findings offer insight into model modifications, recruitment, and retention strategies. The sixth chapter (Manuscript 3) utilized topic modeling to describe topics of discussion in online pregnancy forums. Data was gathered from three active online pregnancy forums for a one-year period. Discussion threads were processed, converted to a document term matrix and Latent Dirichlet Allocation performed. Forty-six percent of threads were determined to be health related. The largest health-related topic categories included fertility, planning for delivery, miscarriage and pregnancy symptoms. Findings offer insight into dominant health related topics being discussed among online peer communities, potentially reflecting unmet information needs during pregnancy

Groups and communities at risk of domestic and family violence: a review and evaluation of domestic and family violence prevention and early intervention services focusing on at-risk groups and communities

A review and evaluation of domestic and family violence prevention and early intervention services focusing on at-risk groups and communities. Summary This report sets out the findings of research into domestic and family violence (DFV) prevention initiatives focused on groups and communities identified as being at greater risk of experiencing DFV and/or having difficulty accessing support services. These groups include Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women, women from Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Communities (CALD), people who identify as Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transsexual, Intersex and Queer (GLBTIQ), young women and women in regional, rural and remote (non-urban) communitie