Personal effectiveness training for unemployed people: where to now?

Unemployment remains a major social problem in Australia. Successive governments have attempted to address the problem, in part, by funding occupational skills based training programs for the unemployed. This paper reviews the general area of occupational skills/personal effectiveness training for unemployed people, and reports on outcomes for individuals attending 'typical' courses in Australia. Also reported, are outcomes for unemployed people who attended specially devised training, based on the cognitive behavioural (e.g., Beck, 1976) and learned optimism (Seligman, 1990) intervention approaches, that was aimed at improving well-being, confidence and coping abilities. Variables assessed include individual well-being (e.g., psychological distress), confidence (e.g., self-efficacy), attitude-to-work (e.g., work-commitment); training climate; and labour market outcomes such as return-to-work. More positive outcomes were identified for unemployed people attending the specially devised programs. The authors argue that training targeted at unemployed people must be based on sound theoretical principles to produce measurable long-term benefits. Future applications of personal development programs are discussed in relation to occupational skills based training and as stand-alone programs

Use of complementary medicine products: a nationally representative cross-sectional survey of 2019 Australian adults

© Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2019. Objectives To provide a contemporary description of complementary medicine (CM) product use in Australia. Design Cross-sectional survey. Setting Online. Participants A nationally representative sample (n=2019) of the Australian adult population. Primary and secondary outcome measures Primary outcomes measures included the use and type of CM products used, and source of recommendation. Secondary measures included disclosure of CM product use to health practitioners, concomitant use of pharmaceuticals and predictors of use. Results Prevalence of CM product use was 50.3%, with the most frequently used being vitamin and mineral supplements (VMSs; 47.8%) and homoeopathic medicines the least used (6.8%). A majority of respondents using CM products were also using pharmaceutical products, and small but significant associations were found between the use of CM products and pharmaceuticals (p<0.05). Small statistically significant associations were found between use of vitamin products and disclosure of use to general practitioners (GPs; Cramer's V=0.13, p=0.004) and hospital doctors (Cramer's V=0.11, p=0.04), and between use of herbal medicines and disclosure to both GPs (Cramer's V=0.11, p=0.02) and hospital doctors (Cramer's V=0.12, p=0.03). Women, those with higher education and those with no private health insurance were more likely to use CM products (p<0.05), while those without chronic conditions were less likely to use CM products (p<0.05) (χ 2 (29)=174.70, p<0.001). Conclusions The number of Australians using CM products has remained relatively stable and substantial for nearly two decades. The majority of CM use relates to VMSs. Given the number of Australians using both CM products and pharmaceutical medicines, it is important to evaluate the potential clinical implications of such practices to ensure safe, effective and coordinated health policy and patient care

Accommodation options for elderly people

Speech presented at the Anglican Retirement Villages Jubilee Seminar, Sydney, 26 October 1984 by Adam Graycar, Director, Social Welfare Research Centre, University of New South Wales. This speech is made available under the CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/Elderly people require a wide range of supports, mostly income support, but also health services, housing support, and social services. Public resources which are allocated are substantial, yet the range of incomes, access to services and housing situation of elderly people is probably wider than for any other population category. As we look to the future in gerontological planning it will be necessary to develop in our planning, the philosophical concepts, the framework for action, the process, and the product. Accommodation policies are important starters because the product is obvious, the process is easily identifiable, the framework for action may be cumbersome, but the philosophical concepts needs a lot of working out. This comes about because of the diversity of the elderly population and the wide variety of needs, resources, problems and conditions

Employment Change in Manufacturing Australia vs New Zealand 1987-1992

It is clear that in New Zealand that most of the net job loss can be attributed to the decline in manufacturing employment. The release of the 1991 Business Activity Statistics showed that there was a total net job loss of 77,176 jobs between 1987 and 1992. Manufacturing contributed 60,649 or 78.6% of this net loss (Department of Statistics: 1992). In the light of this dramatic contraction of New Zealand's manufacturing employment in the last five years the purpose of this paper is to compare changes in manufacturing employment in the two countries against the different policy background and environments

Factors Affecting Franchise Agreement Terminations: Lessons for the Franchising Sector

The practice  of termination  of franchise   agreements  raises  significant  strategic  and  legal issues. This paper aims to provide descriptive information about franchise terminations in relation to which the appropriateness of regulatory responses can be measured. Data were collected from surveys of Australian franchisers in 1998 and 1999 to explore the nature, reasons and outcomes of franchise  agreement terminations.  A model predicting  the likelihood of terminations was developed, based on franchise system maturity, support structures provided, and level of conflict experienced. The results indicate that mature franchises were more  likely  than younger  systems  to experience franchise  terminations.  No  consistent  link was found between the amount of system support or the level of conflict and the incidence of franchise terminations. The data  lends  support  to judicial  responses  to  termination  issues which accommodate the relational aspect of  franchise  relationships  and  addresses termination issues in the context of the underlying relationship and the legitimate business expectations  of the parties