Digital Commons Network^™

Manufacturing On The Move? Beyond The High Dollar In The Debate About Making Things In Australia - The Case Of The Australian Surfboard Industry - Ausccer Discussion Paper No. 2012/2, Andrew Warren, Chris Gibson

Faculty of Science - Papers (Archive)

In October 2011 surfboard manufacturer BASE abruptly closed its factory on the Gold Coast resulting in the direct loss of 50 jobs. A few days later, nearby D’Arcy Surfboards also announced it was shedding workers and downsizing from a state-of-the art purpose built factory into a backyard workshop. Each business exported surfboards internationally and employed some of Australia’s best known surfboard-makers. The troubles facing these workshops added to those brewing at the very same in Australia’s steel, aluminium, automotive and garment industries. With renewed public debate and media commentary on the future of manufacturing, we now face a crisis in …

Aged Care It In Australia-The Past, Present And Future, Ping Yu

Faculty of Informatics - Papers (Archive)

This paper reviews the development of aged care IT innovations in Australia in the past decade. It starts with a brief description of the establishment of the Aged Care eConnect project by the Commonwealth Department of Health and Ageing to promote aged care IT. This is followed by a snapshot of the aged care associations' and research groups' promotional activities. The roles of government, industry peak bodies, aged care providers, aged care IT application providers and researchers for the diffusion of aged care IT innovations are analysed.

Is The Rising Cost Of Education Uniform Across All Of Australia's Capital Cities?, Abbas Valadkhani, Shima Hassan Zadeh Forughi, Amir Arjomandi

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This paper compares and contrasts the aggregate cost of education in Australia with the cost of education in each of its eight capital cities surveyed in the Consumer Price Index. It appears that education is becoming a relatively more expensive item among Australian households with rising substantial differences across various geographical areas. Over the last three decades on average the Australian economy witnessed an overall annual inflation rate of 4.2 per cent, whereas the growth of education cost was 7.3 per cent per annum. It is interesting to note that the rising cost of education was not the same across …

Newspaper Coverage Of Water Issues In Australia, Anna Hurlimann, Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

The media has been found to have an impact on public debate, public opinion, and public policy agendas. Public debate, and public opinion about water conservation and water supply management projects matter because they can influence specific outcomes. For example, public opinion can potentially lead to positive behaviour, like increased water conservation, or potentially negative behaviours such as public opposition to developments such as dams or water recycling plants, which may be necessary under changing climatic conditions. It is therefore critical to understand how the media reports on water-related topics. Results from a content analysis of 1253 newspaper articles published …

Are Parents' Working Patterns Associated With Their Child's Sleep? An Analysis Of Dual-Parent Families In Australia, Christopher A. Magee, Peter Caputi, Don C. Iverson

Faculty of Health and Behavioural Sciences - Papers (Archive)

Insufficient sleep in children predicts emotional and behavioral problems, poorer school performance, and health problems. Child sleep durations have declined in recent decades, suggesting a need to identify and understand predictors of short sleep. The present study investigated whether aspects of parental employment (i.e. parental work hours, and non-standard work hours) were associated with sleep in children. Data collected from 2477 children aged 6–7 years as part of the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children were used in this paper. Child sleep duration, bedtimes, and wake times were determined from parent self-report using time-use diaries. Parents completed a survey assessing their …

Ferdinand Hochstetter In Australia, 1858-1859, Michael K. Organ

Senior Deputy Vice-Chancellor and Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Education) - Papers

The visit to Australia in 1858 of the Austrian Imperial Frigate Novara was part of a flag-waving exercise by the Austrian Habsburg monarchy, though it acquired added significance due to the inclusion on board of a scientific contingent comprising Ferdinand Hochstetter (geologist); Georg Frauenfeld and Johann Zelebor (zoologists); Eduard Schwarz and Anton Jelinek (botanists); Karl Scherzer (historiographer, ethnographer and economist); and Joseph Selleny (artist). Members of the crew, including Commodore Bernhard von WullerstorfUrbair and Lt. Robert Muller, were also expert in the fields of meteorology, hydrography, oceanography, geophysics and linguistics. The records of these scientists and their various collections would …

Australia's Black Saturday Fires - Comparison Of Techniques For Estimating Emissions From Vegetation Fires, Clare Paton-Walsh, Louisa K. Emmons, Christine Wiedinmyer

Faculty of Science - Papers (Archive)

We present a comparison of techniques for estimating atmospheric emissions from fires using Australia's 2009 "Black Saturday" wildfires as a case study. Most of the fires started on Saturday the 7th of February 2009 (a date now known as "Black Saturday") and then spread rapidly, fanned by gale force winds, creating several firestorms and killing 173 people. The fires continued into early March, when rain and cooler conditions allowed the fires to be extinguished. In this study, we compare two new techniques (and one more established method) to estimate the total emissions of a number of atmospheric trace gases from …

Evidence Of Enso Mega-Drought Triggered Collapse Of Prehistory Aboriginal Society In Northwest Australia, Hamish Mcgowan, Samuel K. Marx, P Moss, Andrew Hammond

Faculty of Science - Papers (Archive)

The Kimberley region of northwest Australia contains one of the World's largest collections of rock art characterised by two distinct art forms; the fine featured anthropomorphic figures of the Gwion Gwion or Bradshaw paintings, and broad stroke Wandjina figures. Luminescence dating of mud wasp nests overlying Gwion Gwion paintings has confirmed an age of at least 17,000 yrs B.P. with the most recent dates for these paintings from around the mid-Holocene (5000 to 7000 yrs B.P.). Radiocarbon dating indicates that the Wandjina rock art then emerged around 3800 to 4000 yrs B.P. following a hiatus of at least 1200 yrs. …

Prevalence Prescription: Prescribing Practices Of Clozapine In Australia Between 2005 2010, Shae-Leigh C. Vella, Nagesh Brahmavar Pai

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Clozapine is an anti-psychotic used to treat refractory schizophrenia. This study reviews the rates of clozapine prescription for refractory schizophrenia in a region of Australia and compares the prescribing patterns to the estimated prevalence rates of refractory schizophrenia in the region. Utilising a pharmacoepidemiological approach; the results indicated that only 8.4% of the individuals estimated to be suffering from refractory schizophrenia in the region were prescribed clozapine between 2005 and 2010, with only 4.1% continuing clozapine to the conclusion of the study. In conclusion it is evident that clozapine is widely under-prescribed in this area of Australia.

'It's Good To Have Wheels!': Perceptions Of Cycling Among Homeless Young People In Sydney, Australia, Belinda Crawford, Christopher Rissel, Rowena Yamazaki, Elise Franke, Sue Amanatidis, Jioji Ravulo, Jeni Bindon, Siranda Torvaldsen

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

Participation in sporting or recreational programs can be unattainable for many disadvantaged young people. Encouraging regular cycling is an important public health strategy to increase participation in physical activity and expand personal transport options for marginalised youth. Perceptions and attitudes toward cycling were explored in eight focus groups, involving 47 young people who were experiencing or at risk of homelessness in central and south-western Sydney, Australia. The benefits of cycling for physical activity, personal transport, independence and social inclusion were recognised. Barriers to regular cycling included compliance with mandatory helmet legislation; a lack of cycling skills and experience; a paucity …

The Ethical Commitments Of Health Promotion Practitioners: An Empirical Study From New South Wales, Australia, Stacy M. Carter, Christiane Klinner, Ian Kerridge, Lucie Rychetnik, Vincy Li, Denise Fry

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

In this article, we provide a description of the good in health promotion based on an empirical study of health promotion practices in New South Wales, the most populous state in Australia. We found that practitioners were unified by a vision of the good in health promotion that had substantive and procedural dimensions. Substantively, the good in health promotion was teleological: it inhered in meliorism, an intention to promote health, which was understood holistically and situated in places and environments, a commitment to primary rather than secondary prevention and engagement with communities more than individuals. Procedurally, the good in health …

Cities Of Australia And The Pacific Islands, Robyn Dowling, Pauline M. Mcguirk

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

1. Cities in this region may be understood as forming two groups - those of Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand and those of the Pacific Islands - each with distinct characteristics. 2. All countries in this region are dominated by primate cities, but in the case of Australia primate cities are the capitals of states in the federal union. 3. Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand exhibit many of the urban characteristics of other developed countries, such as the United States. 4. The urban character of Pacific Island cities is similar to that of less developed countries though they are smaller and have …

Post-3.11 Australia-Japan Co-Operation: Facing Non-Traditional Security Challenges: Items Of Sentimental Value, Anne A. Collett

Faculty of Law, Humanities and the Arts - Papers (Archive)

To those for whom this talk and the photographs that accompany it may cause distress, I apologise, and hope that what I have to say will be taken in the spirit intended - that is, as a tribute to those who worked to find ways to alleviate distress, heal wounds, offer comfort and repair damage. This talk offers me (and I hope you as an audience) an opportunity to think through the meaning of 'connection', and the meaning of photographs, their relationship to collective memory and community, and their capacity to allow survivors and those who witness tragedy intimately or …

Engaging Aboriginal Art From The Idea Of Australia, Ian A. Mclean

Faculty of Law, Humanities and the Arts - Papers (Archive)

In writing the first national history of Australian art Bernard Smith was instrumental in inventing the idea of an Australian national culture. In this respect his histories should be understood in the context of a wider postcolonial – or at least post-empire – discourse that shaped the idea of Australia after the world wars. Galvanizing the many threads of this discourse was the idea of an independent nation state. What role did Aboriginal art have in this discourse? As a committed Marxist Smith had a great deal of sympathy for the downtrodden, including Aborigines. However the idea of the nation …

Simulation In Dietetic Education In Australia, Peter Williams, Eleanor Beck

Faculty of Health and Behavioural Sciences - Papers (Archive)

In 2011 the Dietitians Association of Australia conducted a survey of simulated learning experiences in all universities offering dietetic course in Australia. A total of 35 SLEs currently used were identified: 14 paper-based, 15 physical-based and 6 computer or video based.

Australia's Hand Out Addicted Car Industry Needs Some Tough Love, Henry Ergas

Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences - Papers: Part A

The Federal Government will contribute millions of dollars to Australian car manufacturers Holden and Ford in an effort to keep Australia's automotive sector afloat. The government will add $34 million to a $103 million rescue package for Ford's Victorian assembly plant that will see the facility remain open until at least 2016. The funding, which will be met by a grant from the Victorian Government, comes as Holden is reportedly negotiating with Canberra over co-investment to produce a new Commodore model in 2018. But should governments continue to bail out an industry that is lagging in Australia and internationally? University …

Pcoc National Report On Outcomes In Palliative Care In Australia July To December 2011, Samuel F. Allingham, Sonia Bird, Maree Banfield

Australian Health Services Research Institute

The Palliative Care Outcomes Collaboration (PCOC) was established in mid-2005 and is funded under the National Palliative Care Program supported by the Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing. The goal of the PCOC is to use standardised, validated, clinical assessment tools to benchmark and measure outcomes in palliative care; and assist palliative care services to improve the quality of care. Further information on the tools can be found at www.pcoc.org.au. Each service involved in PCOC submits data every six months. The data are then collated and fed back to services to inform service improvement. Participation in PCOC is voluntary. …

Outcomes In Palliative Care, Report 12 (July - December 2011) - South Australia, Samuel F. Allingham, Sonia Bird

Australian Health Services Research Institute

PCOC aims to assist services to improve the quality of the palliative care they provide through the analysis and benchmarking of patient outcomes. In this, the twelfth PCOC report, data submitted for the July - December 2011 period are summarised and patient outcomes benchmarked to enable participating services to assess their performance and identify areas in which they may improve.

This report is broken into three sections:

Section 1 summarises each of the four major benchmark measures and subsets and presents national benchmarking results for these benchmarks

Section 2 presents additional analysis for each of the sixteen benchmarks

Section 3 …

Health Workforce Australia Expanded Scopes Of Practice Program: Compendium Of Data Requirements And Evaluation Tools, Cristina J. Thompson, Karen Quinsey, Darcy Morris, Robert Gordon, Kathryn E. Williams, Patrea R. Andersen, Milena Snoek, Simon Eckermann, Kathy Eagar

Australian Health Services Research Institute

The evaluation of the Expanded Scopes of Practice (ESOP) Program is structured to include data collection at the local; sub-project and national leve l. Local projects are responsible for conducting their own project evaluation within the overarching framework of the national evaluation. This means that projects will collect a range of data to support evaluation activities. In some cases this data will be analysed locally and for other evaluation activiti es it will be analysed by the NET. The National Evaluation Team will not finalise the sub-project data analyses until the first quarter of 2014.

Are We There Yet? Closing The Gap In Indigenous Health In Australia: Monitoring Clinical Performance In Aboriginal And Islander Community Control Health Services In Queensland, Kathryn S. Panaretto, Selwyn Button, Adrian Carson, Dallas Leon, Rhonda Schibasaki, Gail Wason, David Baker, Ian Ring

Sydney Business School - Papers

Abstract presented at the World Congress of Cardiology, Dubai, United Arab Emirates, 18-21 April 2012.

Characteristics Of Power Quality Disturbance Levels In Australia, Sean Elphick, Vic Smith, Vic Gosbell, Robert Barr

Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences - Papers: Part A

The Australian Long Term Power Quality Survey (LTNPQS) now covers 2,000 sites with a range of different characteristics including strength (related to fault level), line construction and dominant load type. This paper details the latest outcomes of the LTNPQS project in terms of both disturbance levels and reporting methods. A comparison of the differences between voltage, unbalance and harmonic THD levels at strong (close to transformer) and weak (towards the end of LV feeders) sites has been performed and significant differences have been found. A multivariable linear regression study has been undertaken in order to investigate the correlation between site …

Citizen Of Australia...Citizen Of The World: An Australian New Woman's Feminist And Nationalist Vision, Sharon Crozier-De Rosa

Faculty of Arts - Papers (Archive)

Writing in the 1890s, South Australian author, Catherine Martin, contributed to what John Docker has labelled ‘those feverish years of utopian and dystopian visions’. Her popular 1890 novel, An Australian Girl, presents modern historians with one fin-de-siècle vision for a newly emerging Australian nation, a vision that reveals itself as a utopian blend of feminist and nationalist aspirations. What emerges from this book is a sense of an Australian landscape that was as feminised as masculinised; a belief in a national identity that may have been transnationalist in that it was shaped by understandings of what it meant to be …

Crustal Architecture And Geodynamics Of North Queensland, Australia: Insights From Deep Seismic Reflection Profiling, R J. Korsch, D L. Huston, R A. Henderson, R S. Blewett, I W. Withnall, C L. Fergusson, W J. Collins, E Saygin, N Kositcin, A J. Meixner, R Chopping, P A. Henson, D C. Champion, L J. Hutton, R Wormald, J Holzschuh, R D. Costelloe

Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health - Papers: part A

A deep crustal seismic reflection and magnetotelluric survey, conducted in 2007, established the architecture and geodynamic framework of north Queensland, Australia. Results based on the interpretation of the deep seismic data include the discovery of a major, west-dipping, Paleoproterozoic (or older) crustal boundary, considered to be an ancient suture zone, separating relatively nonreflective, thick crust of the Mount Isa Province from thinner, two layered crust to the east. Farther to the east, a second major crustal boundary also dips west or southwest, offsetting the Moho and extending below it, and is interpreted as a fossil subduction zone. Across the region, …

Curriculum Renewal For Public Health Nutrition - A National Case Study, Australia, Heather Yeatman, Andrea Begley, Roger Hughes, Lisa Schubert, Lauren Williamns, Claire Palermo

Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health - Papers: part A

Effective workforce preparation and continuing professional development in public health nutrition are essential to address the immense challenges facing nutrition in the world today. A national Curriculum Renewal in Public Health Nutrition project in Australia (2011/12) built on previous international work on PHN competencies and facilitated scholarly dialogue on innovative teaching and learning and curriculum mapping strategies.

Global Change And Fire Regimes In Australia, Geoffrey J. Cary, Ross A. Bradstock, A Malcolm Gill, Richard J. Williams

Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health - Papers: part A

Global change can be defined strictly in terms of changes in atmospheric composition, climate and land use (Walker and Steffen 1996), although broader definitions also include human population, economy and urbanisation (Steffen et al. 2004). In Australia, global change significantly affects the drivers of fire activity and there is potential for considerable changes in fire regimes. It is widely accepted that carbon dioxide (C02) concentration in the atmosphere is steadily increasing (see Steele et al. 2007), as is nitrous oxide (Forster et al. 2007). Atmospheric methane concentration has also risen significantly, but is now relatively constant (Beer et al. 2006). …

Archaeological Science In Australia: Integrating Across Disciplines And Scales Of Analysis, Zenobia Jacobs

Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health - Papers: part A

The basic questions in prehistoric archaeology have not changed much over the last forty years. In Australia, we continue to debate when and where Australia and its arid interior were first colonised, and whether or not these early colonisers were responsible for the extinction of the Australian megafauna. These questions are broad and any answers involve interdisciplinary teamwork that crosses conventional academic boundaries - the humanities and sciences.

Rural Placements Are Effective For Teaching Medicine In Australia: Evaluation Of A Cohort Of Students Studying In Rural Placements, H H. Birden, I Wilson

Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health - Papers: part A

Introduction: Medical education in Australia is increasingly delivered through longitudinal placements in general practice and other community settings. Early meaningful exposure to patients has been shown to improve the transition from medical student to junior doctor. This study examines the experience of the first year cohort of the University of Western Sydney (UWS) Medical School long-term rural placement students. Results have been placed in the context of other published results for rural training schemes, comparing and contrasting the present results to those of others. Methods: Students undertaking a rural placement in their final year of the UWS medical program (n=21) …

Perceived Coping & Concern Predict Terrorism Preparedness In Australia, Garry Stevens, Kingsley Agho, Melanie Taylor, Alison L. Jones, Margo Barr, Beverley Raphael

Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health - Papers: part A

Background In the aftermath of major terrorist incidents research shows population shifts towards protective behaviours, including specific preparedness and avoidance responses. Less is known about individual preparedness in populations with high assumed threat but limited direct exposure, such as Australia. In this study we aimed to determine whether individuals with high perceived coping and higher concern would show greater preparedness to respond to terrorism threats. Methods Adults in New South Wales (NSW) completed terrorism perception and response questions as part of computer assisted telephone interviews (CATI) in 2010 (N=2038). Responses were weighted against the NSW population. Multiple logistic regression analyses …

C-Amp Dependent Protein Kinase A Inhibitory Activity Of Six Algal Extracts From South Eastern Australia And Their Fatty Acid Composition, Ana Zivanovic, Danielle Skropeta

Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health - Papers: part A

c-AMP dependent protein kinase (protein kinase A, PKA) is an important enzyme involved in the regulation of an increasing number of physiological processes including immune function, cardiovascular disease, memory disorders and cancer. The objective of this study was to evaluate the PKA inhibitory activity of a range of algal extracts, along with their fatty acid composition. Six algal species were investigated including two Chlorophyta (Codium dimorphum and Ulva lactuca), two Phaeophyta (Phyllospora comosa and Sargassum sp.) and two Rhodophyta (Prionitis linearis and Corallina vancouveriensis), with the order of PKA inhibitory activity of their extracts identified as follows: brown seaweeds > red …

Conservation Planning In A Cross-Cultural Context: The Wunambal Gaambera Healthy Country Project In The Kimberley, Western Australia, Heather Moorcroft, Emma Ignjic, Stuart Cowell, John Goonack, Sylvester Mangolomara, Janet Oobagooma, Regina Karadada, Dianna Williams, Neil Waina

Faculty of Science - Papers (Archive)

This article illustrates how a conservation planning approach combined Indigenous knowledge and Western science to support Indigenous Traditional Owners to make decisions about managing their ancestral lands and seas, and communicate more strategically with external stakeholders.