Category / Research themes

Health Survey for England

Research themes

Did you know?

Over eight in ten (84%) people aged 65 and over agree that ‘marriage is still the best kind of relationship’, compared with fewer than four in ten (38%) people aged 18-34.

from : British Social Attitudes 26th Report

The Lifelong Health and Wellbeing Research theme had an excellent meeting with representatives from the Health Survey for England team at NatCen. This is Britain’s leading centre for independent social research, a not-for-profit organisation, dedicated to making an impact on society and advancing the role of social research in the UK.

Their research covers all areas of social policy, and findings have direct, practical application in terms of understanding social behaviour and informing policy. They bring to life what is really going on in Britain today.

The work is carried out by experienced researchers using innovative, high quality research methods, earning them an international reputation for delivering robust and rigorous research.

They work around the full range of social policy areas such as

Health & Lifestyle

Social & Political Attitudes

Children, Schools & Families

Crime & Justice

Employment, Skills & Education

Income & Welfare

Social Inclusion

Transport & Environment

There is a wealth of data available in the form of raw statistics and reports and including a ‘blood bank’.

Please click on the link below to find out more or please contact Rachel Craig

Senior Research Director, Health Survey for England

Direct line: 020 7549 7012

NatCen Social Research  Rachel Craig Rachel.Craig@natcen.ac.uk

 

 

BUDI works for Internationalising Dementia Education and Research

By Mariela Gaete-Reyes

 Thanks to the Fusion Investment Fund, SMN Strand Santander Scholarships 2012-13, I was able to visit Chile and Colombia as a BUDI ambassador this summer. The objective of the visits was to undertake collaborative work with two institutions and to develop networks with other institutions and academics in both countries to explore the possibilities of working collaboratively with them in the future.

In Santiago I did scoping interviews with 8 key actors working in dementia, which explored the social-economic and political situation of people living with dementia in Chile and their families. These interviews are the basis of a research grant proposal for a comparative study (underway), in which I worked with Dr Paulina Osorio at Universidad de Chile; she is an anthropologist with a PhD in Sociology. What was evident from the interviews was the absence of public policy relating to dementia in Chile, and consequently, the scarcity of state support. Although this can be expected in a country where there is not welfare state, it means that families have to arrange, do and/or pay for all the care. Connected to this is the prevalence of a medicalised view of dementia in Chile which is reflected, in part, in the lack of social research around dementia.

I visited Hospital Clínico Universidad de Chile, and had a meeting with Dr Patricio Fuentes. He is a consultant neurologist and has 20 years of experience working with people with dementia. Dr Fuentes is part of the medical and scientific advisory panel (MSAP) of Alzheimer’s Disease International (ADI). In his role, he provides expert advice and acts as the Chilean ambassador for ADI. Dr Fuentes expressed his interest in working collaboratively with us in research.

I got in contact with Corporación Profesional Alzheimer y otras Demencias COPRAD. This is a multidisciplinary organisation constituted by professionals that seek to contribute to the preservation of mental health and the improvement of the quality of life for people living with Alzheimer and other types of dementia, and also their family carers. I had a meeting with the vice-president of this association, Andrea Slachevsky, who is a consultant neurologist and has a PhD in Neuroscience (Paris). Her interests are in public policy and she, together with the corporation and other actors, has been working to put forward a National plan for dementia, this is called: Plan Nacional de Enfermedad de Alzheimer y Otras Demencias.

I had two meetings with the director of Corporación Alzheimer Chile, Nubia Alvarado. This organisation was created by family members of people with dementia and they have several services for individuals with dementia and their families. This organisation subscribes to ADI. Nubia Alvarado also expressed interest in working with us. I also visited the Instituto Nacional de Geriatria, a geriatric hospital, and had a meeting with the Director of the Hospital, Dr. Juana Silva. They have different levels of care for older people: ambulatory, daytime hospitalisation (four hours), this service is provided when somebody needs to be seen by different specialists; the objective is preventing longer periods of hospitalisations; and hospitalisation. Instituto Nacional de Geriatría has a unit which focuses on training, research, dissemination and extension. When I visited they were about to start a course on dementia care. Dr. Juana Silva manifested her interest in working with BUDI.

 

Instituto Nacional de Geriatría. Photos: Courtesy Instituto Nacional de Geriatría.

 
There were at least three people who expressed interest in coming to BUDI as visiting scholars at some point. Jean Gajardo, OT, MSc in Social Gerontology, who is doing a PhD in Public Health at Universidad de Chile. Javier Nuñez, who is a GP and works in matters relating to Dementia, and Agnieszka Bozanic a neuropsychologist who has worked with individuals with dementia and their families. Carolina Perez who works at Instituto Nacional de Geriatría is thinking about undertaking a postgraduate course (MSc or PhD) and was interested in hearing what we could offer.

After being in Chile, I went to Colombia and met a colleague from BUDI, Ben Hicks, to undertake an academic exchange in collaboration with Universidad del Rosario. We had a four day activity programme in Bogota and Nocaima. Our activities in Bogota included giving lectures/presentations at the University and MEDERI hospital to medical and OT students about the work we do at BUDI and other dementia related themes. We also participated in discussion panels. We visited Hospital Universitario de Barrios Unidos to observe a session of the programme PERMEA (Programa de Estimulación y Rehabilitación de la Memoria y la Atención), for the stimulation and rehabilitation of the memory for people with dementia and other memory problems.

Mariela Gaete-Reyes giving a talk at Universidad del Rosario.

 

Ben Hicks giving a talk at Universidad del Rosario.

As part of our academic visit we went to Nocaima a rural community close to Bogota. In Nocaima we were introduced to the Healthy Municipality project and had the opportunity to interact with Semillas de Amor, a group of elderly people. We also visited a care home which depends on the church and on donations of the local community. The care home has 33 residents and only one carer and she manages to do all the care and take them to the GP when needed. Finally, we visited Universidad Nacional de Colombia and held a meeting with the Faculty of Nursing to explore collaborative work in ‘Care for carers’, which is a training programme offered to carers of people with chronic illnesses.   

Hopefully from this visit we will be able to continue working in collaboration with the institutions we visited in Chile and Colombia in dementia research and education. So, many thanks again to the Santander Scholarship.

 
Institutions visited:

Santiago, Chile

  • Instituto Nacional de Geriatría.
  • Hospital Clínico Universidad de Chile, Geriatric section.                                 
  • Corporación Profesional Alzheimer y otras Demencias COPRAD.    
  • Corporación Alzheimer Chile.
  • Universidad de Chile, Facultad de Ciencias Sociales.  

 

Bogotá, Colombia

  • Universidad del Rosario, Facultad de Medicina y Ciencias de la Salud (Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences) and Facultad de Jurisprudencia (Faculty of Law).
  • Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Facultad de enfermería (Faculty of Nursing).      

BU establishes Food & Drink Research Group

Delicious links

Early September saw the official launch of the recently formed Food & Drink Research Group (at Bournemouth University).  This cross-university research group has current membership from all schools, while formally residing under the ‘Leisure, Recreation & Tourism’ theme (See: http://blogs.bournemouth.ac.uk/research/files/2012/10/BU-Research-Themes-information-060913.pdf).  The Food & Drink Research Group focuses on a wide-range of food and drink issues ranging from consumers’ food choices to local food and drink production and distribution to healthy eating, to name.  Group members have also studied the different meanings people attach to food and eating, for example among students in Dorset and pregnant women in Nepal.

Academics associated with the Food & Drink Research Group are involved with studies focusing on consumers, the hospitality industry, food producers, wholesalers, distributors and the retailing industry. In addition, members have researched food labelling, aspects of nutrition, health promotion and education. The research group aims to act as a hub to all food and drink research activity across the University. In the spirit of Fusion, the group is focusing on student consultancy projects, PhD research, and engagement with industry.

The next meeting of the Food & Drink Research group is scheduled for November 6th at 10.30 in The Retreat at Talbot Campus.

Anybody member of staff interested in joining the group should contact Rhyannan Hurst (email: rhurst@bournemouth.ac.uk ).

Fusion Funding: Linking level I & H through Design and Engineering Research

Fusion

Background:

Through the BSc Design Engineering Level I Design Projects (DP) unit we aim to enhance student understanding of key theory through practical implementation. For their Level H Advanced Technology and Innovation (ATI) unit the students are expected to examine a technical area of engineering, develop their understanding and produce a research paper. This Fusion co-creation project aims to link these activities by implementing Level I DP solutions to solve Level H ATI research problems.

Context:

Level I BSc Design Engineering students were each asked to design a Fatigue Testing machine and, in order to this, they had to develop basic understanding of fatigue and fracture mechanics. These student solutions represent a wide range of designs but can essentially be condensed to two underlying technologies: Pneumatic actuation & Electric motor drive.


By providing the basic building blocks and adaptable elements students can create simple fatigue testing machines to support their ATI research through experience of research lab work yielding research output and practical understanding.

Progress:

The basic design of outline systems and a reference platform have been finalised and part orders generated. This represents specifying 135 component items including structural framework, mechanical drive systems, pneumatics, programmable logic controller (PLC), data acquisition (DAQ), load cell and amplifier, motor controller and motor gearbox unit etc. Hopefully these elements will begin arriving shortly and custom components can be produced in Tolpuddle House before the end of September.

Next step:

The next stage is to build up reference platforms in both Pneumatic and Mechanical configurations. Oh, and learn how to programme a PLC, DAQ software and a SCADA package, doh!

About us:

Dr Nigel Garland is the senior lecturer is Sustainable Design within the School of Design Engineering and Computing.

Dr Zulfiqar Khan is the Director of the Sustainable Design Research Centre.

Find out about the Creative, Digital and Cognitive Science research theme

Research themes

As we start the new academic year, this is an opportune moment to reflect on the activities within this theme over the past 12 months and consider how the theme will develop in the future.

We held several meetings with mixed results. On the upside, we introduced ‘elevator pitches’ from staff who had ideas for funding applications/research papers and wanted to work collaboratively with other members of staff. This format worked extremely well with staff being able to cross-pollinate ideas, knowledge and skills in order to get some forward momentum in their projects.

We also held a number of these sessions with the Entrepreneurship & Economic Growth research theme. This proved to be a real winner and ensured that research themes were not seen as silos.  On the downside, this theme stills lacks a certain amount of staff engagement to develop real critical mass.

In terms of developing this theme in the future, two opportunities stand out. Earlier this year BU signed a ‘Manifesto for our Creative and Digital Economy’ with local businesses and councils. The aim of this initiative is to enhance the creative and digital economy of Bournemouth, Christchurch, Poole and Dorset. We hope that staff working within this research theme will play a major role in helping to create a thriving international hub driving economic growth. Secondly, this theme has now incorporated the research centres of the School of Design, Engineering & Computing and hopes to integrate  research into Design Simulation, Sustainable Design, and Smart technology to name but a few.

We will be running a number of research meetings during the coming academic year, so please come along and make your contribution to a thriving and societally import research theme.

Dr John Oliver

The Media School

 

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    Find out about the Leisure, Recreation and Tourism research theme

    Research themes

    The past year has seen an increasing level of activity in this research theme, with lots of collaborative research and bidding taking place.  Following numerous events in BU’s Festival of Learning,  July saw BU hosting the ‘Making Waves’ conference, the annual conference of the Association for Events Marketing Educators.  Over 130 delegates from around the world attended the conference, and feedback shows that they found it a useful and thought-provoking conference, with interactive sessions that made it a true “event experience”. 

    This summer has also seen the award of the 2015 Leisure Studies Association conference to Bournemouth University.  This conference will be titled “Creating Leisure” and as the LSA conference is the largest annual conference in leisure research in the UK it provides BU with a great opportunity to showcase the best of our leisure research.  This will be part of a succession of major international conferences held at BU in the Leisure, Recreation and Tourism theme, from the Advances in Tourism Marketing Conference (2009), the 3rd Conference of the International Association for Tourism Economics (2011), the International Conference on Tourism, Climate Change and Sustainability (2012) and the AEME ‘Making Wages’ conference (2013).

    Last academic year also saw greater activity in seminars, ideas cafés and a festivity ‘mash-up’, and we are looking forward to a stimulating programme of Leisure, Recreation and Tourism events this year.

    Prof Adam Blake

    School of Tourism

     

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      CEMP Research and Innovation meetings: an invitation

      Funding opportunities

           This academic year CEMP will continue to publish a fortnightly research & innovation funding bulletin via this blog.

      The Research & Innovation meetings will also continue, but we want to invite colleagues from the rest of the Media School and across BU to tell us how we can increase engagement and collaboration in all aspects of pedagogic / educational research and innovation related to media / technology.

      Previously, the model has been like this –

      The bulletin is posted on a Thursday – this contains information about funding calls and also monitors live projects and reports on the outcomes of all bids.

      The next Thursday, we meet to discuss the calls in the bulletin and report on bids in progress.

      The next Thursday, the updated bulletin is posted

      ….and so on.

      So far, we’ve been successful in one of our two key objectives – increasing CEMP bidding activity, but less successful in the other – developing collaboration with other people in BU, either in response to the funding calls in the bulletin or to try to match peoples’ ideas for projects / innovation to funding opportunities. This second objective is a service / function CEMP can offer to the University, and we’d like more colleagues to access this.

      So – we’d like to review how we do this, in order to get better at the second objective, and to this end the first R&I meeting of this year is an open forum and everyone is invited to either come along and contribute to the discussion or to add a comment to this post if you have ideas but can’t make the meeting.

       

      Meeting details:

      Thursday 26th September 10-12

      CEMP’s new office (CAGO2)

      Tea, coffee and pastries to be served!

      Key issues for discussion:

      • How can CEMP support people in developing research / innovation projects?
      • What are the structural obstacles and how can we overcome them?

      When we’ve got everyone’s ideas / requests for how to proceed, we’ll decide how to go ahead.

      I hope we’ll see you there or read your ideas on the blog.

      Julian

       

      Don’t get left behind with the new BU Research Themes

      Guidance, Research themes

      BRIAN

      As posted by Matthew Bennett yesterday, the Research Themes have changed.  Information about the changes to each Research Theme can be found here.

      Research Themes are captured on BRIAN and so it is important to ensure you are still linked to the correct theme(s) in BRIAN when the new version is released later this month. 

      Over the next week, we will be emailing users affected by the revision to the themes to confirm which of the new themes are most relevant to them.  We will map those affeced across to the new themes.  If the new theme is no longer relevant then we will inform them how to change this.

      If you don’t already identify any research themes in your BRIAN profile, this is a good chance to add that information.  The new Staff Profile Pages, which will go live in October, will be based around Research Themes and so it is important that you have identified at least one.

      Find out about the Lifelong Health and Wellbeing research theme

      Research themes

      Behaviour and lifestyle factors are major contributors to morbidity and mortality; some are well recognised such as unhealthy diet and lack of exercise while effects of others such as social isolation and social relationships are less clear. We are a vibrant group and experienced in working with communities, voluntary organisations, businesses, local authorities and health and social care providers. We lead on a range of local, national and global projects and publish in top international journals.

      Work within this theme has a broad focus across several disciplines within the fields of health and nursing, midwifery, nutrition, social work and social policy, and psychology. The main research activities include:

      •             Promoting public health and effective nutrition

      •             Addressing social exclusion and improving social relationships

      •             Older people and marginalised groups and interagency working;

      •             Psychological interventions in chronic conditions;

      •             Socioeconomic investigation;

      •             Midwifery, maternal and perinatal health;

      •             Qualifying and post-qualifying social work practice and education;

      •             Visual cognition;

      •             Tourism and wellbeing;

      •             Mental and physical wellbeing across the lifespan;

      •             Early year’s development

      We have a membership of approximately 90 academics across the University and have a very active PhD group led by Ashley Mitchell (HSC).

      Highlights this year have included our success at securing an EU IAPP award (VeggiEAT), worth 1.6 million Euros and active participation in the Festival of Learning where the theme hosted over 29 events.

      Each term we have a meeting with the next one being on September 18th in EBC 202 where we are fortunate to have Rachael Craig Senior Research Director, Health Survey for England who will share with us the data sets and blood samples that are available for us to use for research purposes.

      If this interests you please sign up and come along to the next meeting, we would love to see you.

      Assoc Prof Heather Hartwell

      School of Health and Social Care

      School of Tourism

       

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        Find out about the Biodiversity, Environmental Change and Green Economy research theme

        Research themes

        Staff and students have been extremely but successfully busy undertaking policy-relevant, interdisciplinary research science aimed at: increasing understanding of environmental change and its impacts on biodiversity, ecosystems services, the physical environment and human livelihoods, evaluating environmental management options and policy responses, developing sustainable solutions to enhance environmental conditions and human wellbeing.

        Research into the green economy has included carbon storage and management, renewable energy, green tourism, sustainable design, leadership of sustainable development, and the linkages between the environment and the economy. 

        Our research continues to be internationally recognized, as demonstrated in publications in leading journals like Science, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, ISME Journal (Nature’s Group), Proceedings of the Royal Society Series B, PLoS, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, Quaternary Science Reviews, and Journal of Human Evolution, amongst many others. We recently launched a globally unique Masters degree in the Green Economy, which is delivered by distance learning.  Fish Ecology was defined as a world leader by SCOPUS citation rankings in 2012.

        PhD student numbers have increased by 200% since 2007 due to our success at attracting external funding for BU’s novel match-funded PhD programme, and increased success at winning externally funded PhD studentships.

        Our contribution to the Festival of Learning was substantial – we organised 16 events and activities, all of them well attended and enjoyed by attendees. This included a series of events to commemorate the centenary of the death of Alfred Russel Wallace. As the co-discoverer of the theory of evolution with Charles Darwin, as well as founding the discipline of biogeography, Wallace has left a substantial scientific legacy. A wildlife walk was held culminating in a visit to the monument marking Wallace’s final resting place. One suspects that Wallace himself would have enjoyed the wildlife walk most of all, complete with encounters with snakes, beautiful butterflies and remarkable slaver ants – all elements of Dorset’s wonderful biodiversity.  Wallace 100 Celebration does not end here! A forthcoming event will take place on 12th of October in partnership with Thomas Hardye School (Dorchester).

        The Poole & Purbeck Portal successfully launched in March this year, funded by Fusion. The portal is an on-line community to promote better understanding of our region’s unique natural and heritage assets.  Exciting opportunities, knowledge and expertise are shared on the Portal, creating a gateway for new collaborations across the region.  We invite you to join us by registering your interest on http://www.pooleandpurbeckportal.co.uk/

        Dr Genoveva Esteban

        School of Applied Sciences

         

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          September’s Biodiversity, Environmental Change and Green Economy Research Theme Seminar- Monday 23rd Sept

          After a short summer hiatus the research theme seminars are back.  This month I am pleased to present something a little different.

          We will be joined by some of the ‘Black Fish’ team as they pass through Bournemouth on their UK speaking tour. “The Black Fish is an international marine conservation movement on a mission to end the industrial overfishing of our oceans. Through investigation and action they work to expose and challenge illegal and destructive fishing practices”.

          For more information see their website http://theblackfish.org/

          Environmental activism is a step away from our daily academic lives so please come along and join the debate!

          Date: Monday 23rd September; Room: K103; Time:  11am – 1pm

          Find out about the Entrepreneurship and Economic Growth research theme

          Research themes

          The Entrepreneurship and Economic Growth Theme has been very active in the last 12 months, the group has met 6 times in total with two meetings being held jointly with the Creative, Digital and Cognitive Science research theme.  The focus has been on support for interactive activity between Schools and the meetings have included attendees from the Business School, DEC, Media and Tourism.  A highlight of these sessions has been the opportunity for researchers to present their research ideas with a view to encouraging others to join them to establish a research group, while this activity is in its infancy there are two groups that have formed around high growth start-ups and the marketing and branding in the retail sector that are very promising.  The theme also supported more than 6 events at the Festival of Learning and ‘Equipping the business leaders of the future’ was a particular success with over 50 delegates from academia, industry and the public sector discussing the future development of this key activity and how research can support and inform the direction.  The next year will see attempts to expand the network to individuals outside the University, to share experiences around building networks, writing bids and disseminating research.

          Prof Dean Patton

          Business School

           

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            Find out more about the Communities, Cultures and Conflicts research theme

            Research themes

            Throughout the world societies, their citizens, and those excluded from them are facing many challenges concerning identity and citizenship, social and cultural adaptation, and responding to growing social and global inequalities. In a time of protracted economic, political and social uncertainties the BU research theme Communities, Cultures and Conflicts offers a forum for taking individual and integrated, inter-disciplinary approaches these issues. to exploring, which explicitly involves learning from past communities and peoples, we are looking to expand future research collaboration around such issues as:

            • Sustainable growth & cultural transformation
            • Cultural adaptation & globalisation
            • Communication, culture and society
            • Equality, diversity & governance
            • Conflict, violence & warfare
            • Welfare & social protection
            • Media as an agent of socio-cultural & political transformation
            • Crisis management & disaster planning

            Perceptions of conflict, vulnerability and the development of social welfare in the context of political violence and extremism forms part of our research theme’s work, as has consideration of difference and diversity across cultures and communities whilst considering the implications of this for contemporary fluid communities. Research has been completed in respect of Central European, Southeast Asian as well as UK communities

            Our internationally renowned Disaster Management Centre offers education and training to organisations in risk assessment and risk reduction, major incident management & business continuity, and disaster recovery. We also offer one-day major incident management workshops for school bursars, headmasters and deputy headmasters (www.bournemouth.ac.uk/disaster-management).

            We have clusters of researchers exploring ways of deepening democracy through developments in political communication and in the production and consumption of news. There are also research groups investigating trends in consumer culture (especially in digital consumption), studying the histories of the media industries and the communication professions as a way of understanding their present state and possible futures, and researching cultural narratives.

            The multiple facets of identity, social inequality, conflict, and resource availability are narratives with a long time depth. Archaeology and anthropology have the theoretical frameworks and analytical tools to detect and contextualise these for societies of the past and, by doing so, enrich the debate about some of the fundamental and universal themes of humanity. An understanding of such aspects in the past has repercussions for our perceptions of similar issues today and vice versa.

            Contributions from ‘Past Peoples and Societies’ may develop around questions such as: What are the determinants of societal continuity and change and their effect at the level of individuals and communities? How does adaptation reflect the dual, biocultural nature of humans? How do population development, migration and transitions shape communities and cultures? What is the impact of human-environment interaction and technological response?

            The National Centre for Post-Qualifying Social Work is at the forefront of post-qualifying social work educational provision in England, working in partnership with 80 local authorities. We are one of the few CPD providers endorsed by The College of Social Work (TCSW) to provide post-qualifying social work education. We offer a range of CPD programmes in specialist areas such as Child Care, Vulnerable Adults, Approved Mental Health Practice, Practice Education, and Leadership and Management, and are committed to developing excellence in post-qualifying education, practice development and research. We undertake research and evaluation studies for a range of local, regional and national bodies (www.ncpqsw.com).

            Prof Jonathan Parker

            School of Health and Social Care

             

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              Find out more about the Ageing, Society and Dementia research theme

              Research themes

              The 2013/14 academic year sees the launch of a new BU research theme, Ageing, Society and Dementia.  This new theme brings together the ageing component of the previous Health, Well-Being and Ageing theme with the body of work that has been emerging from the Bournemouth University Dementia Institute. This new theme is not just a result of internal activity and interest in the subject but reflects the external policy drive, nationally and internationally, to respond appropriately to the ever increasing numbers of people who will be affected by dementia worldwide. Thus, this new theme is a direct response to one of society’s big challenges – an ageing demographic and a shrinking pool of family members and paid workers who will be available to support this population.

              To give a very brief overview of the considerable activity in the 2012/13 academic year in the area of dementia is challenging, mainly as the cross-school and inter-disciplinary Bournemouth University Dementia Institute (BUDI) team  have secured 25 externally funded projects since its launch in May 2012, as well as several internal awards for projects via BUs Fusion Investment Fund and 6 dementia PhD studentships. All BUDI’s work  falls under five sub-themes of Service Improvement; Dementia Friendly Environments; Dementia Friendly Leisure; Education and Leadership; and Public Awareness and Knowledge Translation. One of the key areas of public awareness raising activity was featured at the Festival of Learning via an art exhibition collating 600 stories from people with dementia and the general public about their experiences and perspectives on dementia.  We were lucky enough to secure the support for this event from one of the Alzheimer Societies ambassadors, Angela Rippon.

              Improving public awareness about dementia is a challenge, and at BU our unique team, many of whom have approached the study of dementia for the first time in the last few months and who bring alternative ideas and approaches to the table, is key to our future success. We are working in partnership with EU colleagues via ERASMUS MUNDUS funding to develop a new Masters programme ‘Innovations in Dementia’; we have multiple ongoing projects to see through to a successful completion, and many planned events and several new doctoral students and researchers joining the team in the next few months. However our key challenge for the next academic year is to secure high quality research grants and other income streams to ensure we continue our fused approach of education, research and knowledge exchange/practice development to enable this theme to flourish from its successful but very small beginnings.

              Prof Anthea Innes

              School of Health and Social Care

               

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                Find out more about the Technology and Design research theme

                Research themes

                Renewable Technology cross-School events were held during last academic year (January 2013 and Feb 2013), these were well attended. Presentations were led by academics and Local Government Representatives including from Poole Borough Council. Additional meetings took place in the area of medical engineering in collaboration with local Health Trusts with excellent attendance cross school and the medical professions. Internal cross school meetings were also organised in the area of creative design and design business. During BU’s Festival of Learning a number of public engagement events were held in June 2013. These events provided a networking opportunity for public engagement, local/regional businesses, government, community and local council representatives, academics and researchers. This included a “question time” activity, one day course in sustainable design and “let’s take pride in design and engineering”  In addition the theme exhibited with cross-school academics at the GovToday Carbon Reduction 2012 event in November 2012 at London and delivered a master class. Attendees included representatives from relevant government departments, agencies and other public sector organisations.

                Future plans include international networking and extending our public engagement activities at the next BU Festival in 2014. In addition we will develop initiatives around the computing/engineering interface. This will include autonomous systems, robotics and intelligent manufacturing. 

                 

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                  New Term, New Research Themes!

                  News from the PVC, Research themes

                  I posted earlier in the summer to let you know of the changes to the research themes (Looking to the Horizons).  We are about to launch them on the world so I thought it would be worth saying a few more words about them.  The themes were used to categorise events that ran as part of the Festival of Learning in June and the themes icons also formed part of the design and branding of the Festival.  You may also have noticed that the themes have been used in the new Postgraduate Prospectus and they will be used to structure the revised research pages on the web; yes, finally we are getting some revised pages after several false starts!  The revised pages are due to be launched in the autumn to tidy things up in time for our REF submission which is submitted in November.  We are also deep in planning for next year’s Festival of Learning and hope that each theme will showcase their work through a series of engaging events.

                  On Tuesday to Friday this week there will be an update each day from two of the Research Themes detailing activities that have taken place within the themes over the past twelve months and what the theme aims to do in future.

                  The Research Themes part of the Blog has now been redesigned with the new themes (http://blogs.bournemouth.ac.uk/research/research-themes/) and I encourage you to take a look.  If you’re not already a member of one or more of the themes then you can sign up using the form at the bottom of this post.

                  It would be a great help if you could let me know of a few choice examples of projects under each theme; things that you would like me to use while promoting the themes in the coming weeks.  Just drop me a line with the project and a short paragraph, it would be a great help!

                   

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                    Bangkok conference plans progressing well

                    Fusion

                    Planning for the 1st International Corporate and Marketing Communication in Asia Conference to be held in Bangkok on November 18-19 is progressing well, reports Prof Tom Watson.

                    He has just returned from meeting his co-organisers Assoc Prof Jirayudh Sinthuphan and Assoc Prof Saravudh Anantachart of Chulalongkorn University.

                    The conference, organised in collaboration by Chula’s Faculty of Communication Arts and BU’s Media School, has attracted interest from across Asia and the Middle East. BU’s involvement is supported by FIF.

                    The international review panel has chosen 30 abstracts from ten countries with a broad range of topics and approaches.

                    “At our meeting in Bangkok, the conference schedule was finalised and other arrangements confirmed. The facilities at Chula are very good and enable us to run parallel streams of papers on both days”, said Prof Watson. “We are really pleased with the response which is far more positive than expected. Already almost all speakers are confirmed to attend and registered.”

                    The audience will also include Thai and regional academics and representatives of the national advertising, marketing communications and public relations sectors. The conference schedule will be published shortly on the conference website: http://cuprimcconference.net/

                    Tom Watson (l), Saravudh Anantachart (c) and Jirayudh Sinthuphan (r)

                     

                    Conference venue at Chulalongkorn University

                    Academic writing workshop in Bangkok

                    Fusion, Training

                    As part of his visit to Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok to plan the FIF-supported conference that will be held in November, Prof Tom Watson of the Media School delivered a well-attended workshop on Academic Writing.

                    Four leading universities – Chulalongkorn, Assumption, Mahidol and NIDA – sent over 40 academic staff and doctoral students to the workshop held in the host’s Faculty of Communication Arts building on September 3.

                    “There is a strong push to develop research and publication outputs in Thailand, so the workshop was well-timed to catch that wave,” said Prof Watson. “Our colleagues at Chulalongkorn did a first-rate job in organising and promoting the event.

                    “The workshop was also excellent public diplomacy by BU to support so many academics in such a targeted manner. It helps build our reputation in Thailand which is sending more Masters and doctoral students to the UK. Previously Australia and the USA were the main destinations.”

                    The workshop also gave an opportunity to experience one of the venues to be used by the 1st International Corporate and Marketing Communication in Asia Conference on November 18-19.