Griffith Institute for Social and Behavioural Research
The Griffith Institute for Social and Behavioural Research is an initiative to bring together 180 researchers to focus on contemporary global challenges to society and community wellbeing. Rapid social change since the 1950s has created great wealth and improved health and wellbeing for many. However, other indicators suggest deteriorating trends in individual, community and societal wellbeing. The Institute explores the nature of societal wellbeing; examines the impact of social change on wellbeing; and develops interventions that promote positive change.
Our core objectives are to:
- explore the nature of societal and individual wellbeing;
- understand the reasons for trends and patterns in individual, family,
community and societal wellbeing in post-industrialised societies; and - develop ways of improving wellbeing in Australia and internationally.
Through the Institute researchers focus their disciplinary expertise in 6 core themes:
Pathways, Transitions and Interventions for Change is a program focused on the life-course, changing social contexts for human development, and preventative interventions.
Space and Place incorporates spatial analysis into a study of how social change affects people's lives and the fortunes of places, including local communities.
Causes and Prevention of Violence explores the causes, consequences, and prospects for the control of violence in a period of change and social dislocation.
Creativity and Social Inclusion addresses the importance of creative pursuits: music, drama and dance, in personal and social skills development and as key resources in the facilitation of social inclusion.
Leadership, Learning and Change focuses on understanding the links between leadership and learning in homes, schools and communities and how that understanding can be used to help alleviate disadvantage.
Regulating the Institutions of Work focuses on topical issues surrounding regulatory institutions for worker protection and organisational justice in the changing workplace which seek to achieve a balance between organisational productivity and worker wellbeing.
For more information on the rationale for the social change and wellbeing theme, and for details of the planning that went into the development of the Institute, download the report (PDF 100kb) "Social Change and Wellbeing", May 2006 (restricted to Griffith University staff).
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