Research
Our Research
Our ambition is to become Australia’s leading regional mental health research and translation institute. Our research goal is to work with rural and regional communities to address complex mental health challenges, reduce morbidity and mortality, and alleviate pressure on health systems. Improving mental health has the potential to change lives; boost living standards, social engagement and connectedness; and drive economic productivity in the long-term.
Manna Institute has created five streams of research.
Suicide and Distress
The Distress and Suicide Prevention theme emphasises the critical need for tailored, place-based interventions that address the unique challenges contributing to distress in rural, regional, and remote (RRR) communities.
We are working on key activities, including understanding the pathways from mental wellness to illness and crisis, enhancing mental health knowledge among the community and extending professional skill sets in suicide prevention, and fostering collaboration in research and capacity building across Australia and internationally.
The work highlights the importance of involving those with lived experience in the co-creation of solutions, ensuring the relevance and impact of outcomes through our partners and Lived Experience Advisory group members.
Children, Youth and Families
Around 1 in 7 Australian children will experience a mental health disorder each year. However, there is a significant gap between needs for mental health services and the accessibility and availability of mental health services for children in Australia.
This unmet need is likely to be even larger for children living with a mental health disorder in regional, rural or remote (RRR) Australia. Along with reduced access to high quality health and mental health services, RRR children are more likely to be exposed to a number of adverse early life experiences that result in poorer long-term mental health outcomes, including social disadvantage, domestic and family violence, poorer access to high quality early education, and natural disasters.
Thus, this workstream aims to advance understanding of the mental health of children and families in RRR Australia. The workstream will examine a) the mental health needs of this population; b) the availability and accessibility to appropriate child and adolescent mental health services in RRR communities; and c) how we can leverage and apply digital technologies and interventions to improve child, adolescent and parent mental health in RRR communities.
Health & Wellbeing in Later Life
This research stream focuses on enabling and supporting health and wellbeing in later life, by promoting physical, social, cultural, cognitive, and psychological ageing well.
This holistic perspective of ageing acknowledges individual context and recognises the impact of chronic disease and disability in later life. Embedding lived experience, our research prioritises working in partnership with regional, rural, and remote communities to navigate barriers and maximise strengths through place-based approaches.
Physical Health
Australians living in rural, regional and remote (RRR) regions have higher rates of mental illness and poorer access to adequate mental health care than their urban counterparts. Similarly, the prevalence of chronic illness and more adverse outcomes is higher in RRR than metropolitan areas.
There are strong direct and indirect links between physical and mental health and the determinants for wellness in both areas are shared, therefore addressing these common determinants will play a role in improving both physical and mental health. Furthermore, the prevalence and determinants of lifestyle behaviours such as physical activity, diet, sleep, smoking, alcohol are different in RRR regions and interventions from urban regions may not be applicable or fit for purpose in RRR regions.
This workstream seeks to advance understanding of the dynamic relationship between physical health and mental wellbeing in RRR communities. Purposeful partnerships and working relationships between the community, those with living experience, researchers, community-based organisations and decision makers is central to the Physical Health Stream.
Health Planet - Healthy People
Interdisciplinary collaboration is vital and there is an urgent need to find ways to improve the human-nature relationship and the health of both planet and people, through interventions, campaigns, activities, curricula, green infrastructure and urban design. Research in this theme will go beyond understanding to application, creating accessible and effective tools for practitioners from all aspects of human-environment interaction to address health and the human-nature relationship. This research theme covers a number of interrelated requirements that consider direct impacts, indirect impacts, overarching outcomes, and the needs of rural, regional and remote communities.
Our Research Strategy
To deliver enduring results, mental health research capacity in rural and regional Australia must be cultivated. By carefully coordinating research efforts across a vast geography, we capitalise on opportunities for resource-sharing that reduces duplication, captures grant funding, inspires HDR student activities and commands public attention. In time, we envisage an institute that generates external research income to continue to meet community needs.
Our Research Focus
Collaboration is key to our research and a hallmark of our unique ecosystem. There are four key themes for the Manna Institute:
1. Leadership and development through a virtual training institute to enhance leadership and research capacity in regional mental health research among ECRs and MCRs.
2. Research across four collaboratives including existing and emerging workforce development across regional Australia; individual health and wellbeing; priority populations; and the impact of changing environmental conditions on mental health.
3. A regional Community, Industry and Research Data Asset and Toolkit for communities, researchers, and industry organisations.
4. Communication through a clear and robust communications and stakeholder engagement strategy to uplift and share this important work and the impact it’s having within Australia’s rural and remote communities.
Manna Institute has created five streams of research.
These streams include:
• Physical health / mental health
• Health and Wellbeing in Later Life
We are cultivating connections, projects and opportunities to improve mental health and wellbeing in rural, regional and remote Australia.
We are growing meaningful research and professional workforces, and engaging industry to translate research findings into much-needed initiatives.
Ours is a virtual institute, comprising the seven members of the Regional University Network – Charles Sturt University, Central Queensland University, Federation University, Southern Cross University, the University of Southern Queensland, the University of Sunshine Coast and lead institution the University of New England.