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Current SPRU Projects

The innovation pool in Australian biotechnology: Assessing optimal strategies for fostering innovation through patenting and patent pooling (2009-2012)

This multidisciplinary project aims to examine the relationship between patents, patent pooling and innovation in the Australian biotechnology industry. It is an ARC discovery project directed by Associate Professor Dianne Nicol, Centre for Law and Genetics at the University of Tasmania. Dr. Critchley is a chief investigator along with Dr. Jane Neilson (University of Tasmania) and Professor Reiko Aoki (Institute of Economics, Hitotsubashi University, Japan).

Public perceptions of, and trust in human biobanks

This is a project run by the Centre for Law and Genetics and the Menzies Research Institute at the University of Tasmania. It aims to describe Australians' attitude towards the use and storage of human biological material for medical research purposes. It will also examine the impact of commercialization on attitudes and intention to donate a biological sample for research purposes. Dr. Critchley is a collaborator on this project and is involved in questionnaire design, data collection and statistical analysis.

The Stem Cell Research Environment: Drawing the Evidence and Experience Together

This is a multidisciplinary international project aimed at understanding the impact of stem cell research on science and society (2008-2010). It is funded by the Canadian Stem Cell Network and brings together an international team of collaborators to examine the nature of the stem cell research environment and its impact on research strategies, movement of trained researchers, capacity to conduct research, intellectual property in and ownership of research outputs, funding opportunities, research productivity, reception of emerging technologies, public perceptions of the research and future investment mechanisms. It seeks to inform public policy and will contribute to the broader knowledge base surrounding the complex ethical, legal and social issues engaged by stem cell research and other novel technologies. The project is run by Professor Timothy Caulfield, Director of the Health Law Institute, University of Alberta, Canada. Dr. Critchley is a collaborator on this project along with a number of other international scholars from Canada, the US, the UK, and Europe.

Employee-Workplace Fit: Matching Employees' Relational, Individual and Collective Work Styles with Congruent Workplaces

In this ongoing collaborative project, Dr Frank Cahill and Dr Elizabeth Hardie use the Relational, Individual and Collective (RIC) theoretical framework to develop new measures of employee's own Work RIC styles and perceptions of their Workplace RIC style to assess employee-workplace fit. Surveys are currently being conducted in a number of Australian and multinational organizational settings to validate the new scales and examine the importance of matching employee and workplace styles to enhance job satisfaction and commitment to the organisation. Development and expansion of some aspects of this project could be suitable for a postgraduate student with interests in organisational psychology.

Culture and Gender Differences in Social Self-Aspects

This experimental investigation of spontaneous self-descriptions compares relational and collective sociality in Australian and Asian men and women. This cross-cultural project is a collaboration of Emiko Kashima (La Trobe University), Elizabeth Hardie (Swinburne University), Ryuutaro Wakimoto (University of Tokyo) and Yoshi Kashima (University of Melbourne). Spin-off projects suitable for honours and postgraduate students may be available.

Detecting socially desirable responses to psychological tests and social surveys: measuring relational, individual and collective types of enhancement bias.

Accurate self-report data is crucial, whether selecting job applicants from personality test scores or formulating social policy from public opinion survey results. This collaborative project of Dr Elizabeth Hardie and Dr Christine Critchley will tackle a long-standing psychometric problem: socially desirable responding. Existing measures are limited in scope, measuring only self-enhancement. This project will construct innovative new scales to measure three types of enhancement bias: individual, relational and collective. This project is in its early stages and we would welcome involvement by new postgraduate students.

Relational, individual and collective trust: A new conceptual framework and measurement tools for the study of social trust.

This ongoing project, initially supported by a grant to Dr Elizabeth Hardie from the Swinburne Researcher Development Scheme, involves the development of Trust Judgment Scales which can be applied to any type of trust: intra-personal individual trust, interpersonal relational trust, intra-group and inter-group collective trust, or societal public trust. The project involves a series of studies, some of which have been conducted in collaboration with Dr Christine Critchley and postgraduate students, Jarrod Walshe and Matt Searle. There is scope for new postgraduate students to become involved in this project.

Public Perceptions of Personalized Nutrition: A Comparison of Australia and The Netherlands

This international collaborative project between Renske Pin (University of Twente) and Christine Critchley and Elizabeth Hardie (Swinburne University) was supported by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research, the Centre for Society and Genomics, the former Australian Centre for Emerging Technology and Society, and the Swinburne CATI facility. The project examines the influence of positive emotions, perceived consequences, cost/benefit perceptions and trust on intentions to adopt personalized nutrition. We collected data from representative samples of adults in The Netherlands (n=2109) and Australia (n=1000) and used structural equation modeling to explore cross-cultural similarities and differences in the process of forming intentions.

 

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