Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alina Ewald, Associate Lecturer in Psychological Sciences, Western Sydney University

Despite a rise in dual-earner families in Australia and men wanting to be more engaged with their kids, there are still major hurdles preventing dads from fully embracing formalised flexible working arrangements such as part-time work or parental leave.

This is a problem because we know if dads achieve work-family balance it benefits children, women’s employment and men’s wellbeing.

So why are dads finding it so challenging to adopt formal flexible working arrangements to help them as a parent?

As a fathering researcher focusing on mens’ adoption of flexibility, I have identified five main reasons.

Work-family balance barriers

1. Flexibility is often feminised

Flexibility can be associated with the “mummy career track”.

Modifying work after becoming a parent is positioned as being for women with children – rather than for dads.

When men do adopt flexibility for caring, some experience a backlash in the form of stigmatisation or discrimination, especially in relation to parental leave and returning to work – even when they take short periods of leave.

In fact, the Australian Human Rights Commission found men were twice as likely to have their leave requests rejected than women.

Recent Australian data show only 8% of organisations set targets for men’s engagement with flexible working.

This issue is driven by deep-seated gender norms and stereotypes about work and care and it results in men often being left out of the flexibility conversation.

2. There is an expectation for men to focus on their career

Men’s caring responsibilities are largely invisible in the workplace and
dads often get the message to prioritise career development and financial provision over being actively involved in their children’s daily care.

In relation to this, men report a lack of workplace acceptance for flexible working arrangements and a concern regarding the career penalties that could follow.

While the benefits of dads being more hands-on as a parent are clear – including positive outcomes for child development, for father-child bonding, and for men’s wellbeing – negative career implications are often cited as a prominent downside associated with some forms of flexibility.

Underpinning the expectation for men to be dedicated to their careers are masculine norms and the work devotion schema (a moral obligation to dedicate oneself to work).

However, Australian research shows men want more flexibility and some are even willing to change their job to achieve this.

3. Men don’t know what they are entitled to

There is sometimes a lack of awareness from men and a lack of resources from employers surrounding what men are entitled to.

Many dads aren’t fully aware of the work-family policies available to them or where to look. They are sometimes reluctant to ask employers directly due to a perceived lack of entitlement or fears around negative judgement.

As a result, when it comes to finding out about flexibility, men often have to dig around on their own to figure out what they are actually able to use.

The lack of readily available information for men reinforces the message that flexibility for parenting is not really designed for dads.

To help overcome this issue, organisations should ensure they have conversations with fathers, and not just with mothers, about adjusting their work schedules when they have children.

4. Occupational barriers

Men in different positions within organisations face distinct challenges when attempting to adopt flexible caregiving arrangements.

Those in high-status roles such as senior workers or managers have a lot of control over their work hours but they are often reluctant to adopt formal flexibility for caring due to concerns it may signify a lack of commitment to work.

In contrast, men working in lower-status roles report a lack of power to request flexibility and some report having requests denied or being pressured to not access flexibility options.

5. A lack of male role models

There is a lack of role-modelling from other men and a lack of spaces for men to learn from each other about working flexibly.

Men also report being hesitant about using flexible work arrangements because they don’t see their leaders embracing or setting an example themselves. This leads to concerns it could result in negative outcomes, leading to missed promotions or career opportunities.

Having more male leaders working flexibly for family reasons would set an example for other men but barriers exist due to expectations from some leaders to be present at work.

Where to from here?

In order for things to change, men’s caregiving roles must become more visible at work and organisations must better support dads in adopting flexibility for caring purposes.

Some effective ways to improve the situation include having male leaders model flexibility, organisations promoting the idea that flexibility is for dads too and telling men about their work-family entitlements when they become, or are about to become, a father.

Alina Ewald does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. The balance battle: 5 reasons why dads are struggling with workplace flexibility – https://theconversation.com/the-balance-battle-5-reasons-why-dads-are-struggling-with-workplace-flexibility-237317

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Konstantine Panegyres, McKenzie Postdoctoral Fellow, researching Greco-Roman antiquity, The University of Melbourne

When we read about the lives of people from the ancient past, we naturally want to know what they looked like.

But how do we find this out?

In recent years, computer-assisted reconstructions of the faces of famous figures from the Greco-Roman world have become popular.

In 2020, for example, a digital artist went viral for using artificial intelligence (AI) technology on the busts of Roman emperors to recreate their faces in a photo-realistic way.

How are facial reconstructions done?

The simplest form of facial reconstruction involves adding realistic-looking skin, eyes and hair to Greek or Roman busts. Other methods can be more complicated.

One of the most famous facial reconstructions of any individual from the Greco-Roman world was the case of Hermione Grammatike. Hermione was a teacher in her 20s who died in Egypt in the early 1st century CE.

Hermione’s ancient portrait and skeleton both survived with her mummy. So, any attempt to reconstruct her face on the basis of the skeletal remains could be compared with the portrait of her.

In 1997, British Museum researchers used CT (computed tomography) scans to create a 3D image of Hermione’s face.

After reconstructing the surface of the face using the skull, the researchers then consulted the coffin portrait to nuance the details.

In spite of this rigorous combination of methods, they acknowledged difficulties:

Since the skull does not carry enough information to completely determine the facial surface, facial reconstruction from skulls will always contain an element of art. The reconstructed face is likely to resemble that of the living person but is very unlikely to be an exact replica.

So, even with careful techniques, there still remain some doubts about facial reconstruction.

But such reconstructions are becoming more accurate. This is largely thanks to new methods of DNA extraction and analysis, which make it possible to work out the correct colours of people’s hair, skin and eyes.

How reliable were ancient portraits of people?

Basing reconstructions of people’s faces on their surviving busts or portraits is not an entirely safe procedure.

In some cases, there are discrepancies between ancient portraits of people and ancient literary descriptions of what they looked like.

For example, according to ancient texts, the philosopher Aristotle was bald or (alternatively) had short hair and a short beard, as well as small eyes. He wore rings on his fingers and luxurious clothes.

However, ancient busts that have been identified as depicting Aristotle show him with a full beard and plenty of hair.

This raises a new problem: which pieces of information are more reliable – the ancient artwork or the ancient literary description? In cases such as these, it seems almost impossible to decide.

But some ancient portraits must have been fairly accurate depictions of their subjects.

A Greek poem from the 1st century CE describes a boxer who became so disfigured by his sporting profession, he no longer resembled his official portrait. In a dispute over their father’s inheritance, the boxer’s brother showed the boxer’s portrait in a court of law and successfully claimed the boxer was not actually his brother – thus denying his inheritance. This case shows some ancient portraits must have been accurate enough to even be used as a sort of legal proof of identity.

Other authors indicate portraits were not always made solely for accuracy. The Roman writer Claudius Aelianus informs us that

in Thebes a law was in force which instructed artists – both painters and sculptors – to make their portraits flattering. As punishment for those who produced a sculpture or painting less attractive than the original the law threatened a fine of a thousand drachmae.

The wish to see historic faces is universal

In around 39 BCE, the Roman scholar Marcus Terentius Varro published a collection of famous people’s portraits, “not allowing their likenesses to disappear or the lapse of ages to prevail against immortality in men”.

Varro’s collection apparently included 700 portraits of famous historical Greek and Roman people, and each portrait was accompanied by an epigram and brief biography. This collection must have satisfied the wish of the public to know what the faces of famous people looked like.

Clearly, ancient and modern people share this fascination.

We can surely enjoy reconstructions of the faces of people from ancient times. We just need to keep in mind two important issues.

Firstly, ancient portraits and busts were themselves not always reliable depictions of people, so reconstructions based on them are of uncertain accuracy.

Secondly, modern researchers acknowledge that reconstructions based on skulls have limitations, though the accuracy of this method is rapidly improving.

So, the next time you see a reconstruction of some ancient person’s face, be cautious before thinking that you are really looking at the exact, almost photographic likeness of someone from the past. You might be – or you might not.

Konstantine Panegyres does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Computer ‘reconstructions’ of faces from ancient times are popular. But how reliable are they? – https://theconversation.com/computer-reconstructions-of-faces-from-ancient-times-are-popular-but-how-reliable-are-they-236516

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ivan Maksymov, Principal Research Fellow at AI and Cyber Futures Institute, Charles Sturt University

Optical illusions, quantum mechanics and neural networks might seem to be quite unrelated topics at first glance. However, in new research I have used a phenomenon called “quantum tunnelling” to design a neural network that can “see” optical illusions in much the same way humans do.

My neural network did well at simulating human perception of the famous Necker cube and Rubin’s vase illusions – and in fact better than some much larger conventional neural networks used in computer vision.

This work may also shed light on the question of whether artificial intelligence (AI) systems can ever truly achieve something like human cognition.

Why optical illusions?

Optical illusions trick our brains into seeing things which may or may not be real. We do not fully understand how optical illusions work, but studying them can teach us about how our brains work and how they sometimes fail, in cases such as dementia and on long space flights.

Researchers using AI to emulate and study human vision have found optical illusions pose a problem. While computer vision systems can recognise complex objects such as art paintings, they often cannot understand optical illusions. (The latest models appear to recognise at least some kinds of illusions, but these results require further investigation.)

My research addresses this problem with the use of quantum physics.

How does my neural network work?

When a human brain processes information, it decides which data are helpful and which are not. A neural network imitates the function of the brain using many layers of artificial neurons that enable it to store and classify data as useful or not beneficial.

Neurons are activated by signals from their neighbours. Imagine each neuron has to climb over a brick wall to be switched on, and signals from neighbours bump it higher and higher, until eventually it gets over the top and reaches the activation point on the other side.

In quantum mechanics, tiny objects like electrons can sometimes pass through apparently impenetrable barriers via an effect called “quantum tunnelling”. In my neural network, quantum tunnelling lets neurons sometimes jump straight through the brick wall to the activation point and switch on even when they “shouldn’t”.

Why quantum tunnelling?

The discovery of quantum tunnelling in the early decades of the 20th century allowed scientists to explain natural phenomena such as radioactive decay that seemed impossible according to classical physics.

In the 21st century, scientists face a similar problem. Existing theories fall short of explaining human perception, behaviour and decision-making.

Research has shown that tools from quantum mechanics may help explain human behaviour and decision-making.

While some have suggested that quantum effects play an important role in our brains, even if they don’t we may still find the laws of quantum mechanics useful to model human thinking. For example, quantum computational algorithms are more efficient than classical algorithms for many tasks.

With this in mind, I wanted to find out what happened if I injected quantum effects into the workings of a neural network.

So, how does the quantum tunnelling network perform?

When we see an optical illusion with two possible interpretations (like the ambiguous cube or the vase and faces), researchers believe we temporarily hold both interpretations at the same time, until our brains decide which picture should be seen.

This situation resembles the quantum-mechanical thought experiment of Schrödinger’s cat. This famous scenario describes a cat in a box whose life depends on the decay of a quantum particle. According to quantum mechanics, the particle can be in two different states at the same time until we observe it – and so the cat can likewise simultaneously be alive and dead.

I trained my quantum-tunnelling neural network to recognise the Necker cube and Rubin’s vase illusions. When faced with the illusion as an input, it produced an output of one or the other of the two interpretations.

Over time, which interpretation it chose oscillated back and forth. Traditional neural networks also produce this behaviour, but in addition my network produced some ambiguous results hovering between the two certain outputs – much like our own brains can hold both interpretations together before settling on one.

What now?

In an era of deepfakes and fake news, understanding how our brains process illusions and build models of reality has never been more important.

In other research, I am exploring how quantum effects may also help us understand social behaviour and radicalisation of opinions in social networks.

In the long term, quantum-powered AI may eventually contribute to the development of conscious robots. But for now, my research work continues.

Ivan Maksymov does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. A quantum neural network can see optical illusions like humans do. Could it be the future of AI? – https://theconversation.com/a-quantum-neural-network-can-see-optical-illusions-like-humans-do-could-it-be-the-future-of-ai-237645

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Priyanka Dhopade, Senior Lecturer in Mechanical Engineering, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau

Like the global space industry, which aims to reach a value of US$1.8 trillion by 2035, New Zealand’s aerospace sector is growing rapidly.

But as our latest research shows, it is falling short on addressing urgent sustainability issues because of a perception this would incur short-term costs and slow growth.

Many countries are prioritising the development of national space strategies. Usually, these include plans to increase access to venture capital, grow a specialist workforce and develop flexible regulations and sovereign defence capabilities.

But sustainability leadership in space is crucial, given rising concerns over space debris, and emerging issues such as ozone depletion from rocket launches and the accumulation of alumina and soot particles in Earth’s atmosphere as re-entering objects burn up.

The politics of growth

New Zealand’s aerospace regulatory system was catalysed by Rocket Lab USA’s commercial decision to launch rockets from a spaceport on the Māhia peninsula.

This was followed by the establishment of New Zealand’s Space Agency. This small unit of the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) regulates launch payloads and fosters business development by facilitating access to funding for commercial ventures and scientific research.

A central component of New Zealand’s commercial aerospace activity is a bilateral agreement with the US. This enables the launch of American payloads aboard Rocket Lab’s Electron vehicle, negotiated in part by the Space Agency.

MBIE targets an annual revenue of NZ$10 billion by 2030. This is in alignment with New Zealand’s 2023 aerospace strategy and national space policy, and is supported by the appointment of New Zealand’s first cabinet minister for space.

But our study suggests the Space Agency’s dual role as regulator and sector developer introduces a conflict of interest between promoting sustainability and fostering economic growth. This tension is exacerbated by current budget constraints which place too high a demand on the agency’s resources to fulfil both commitments.

The government is simultaneously a customer, investor and regulator of the sector. Yet, it is being relied upon for leadership in sustainability.

Expectations versus reality

Companies are looking to the government for incentives to prioritise sustainability, such as monitoring emissions and pollutants from launches.

The Space Agency has progressed a space debris removal policy, but some say this is not proactive enough. Already, more than 80% of the objects in Earth’s orbits are junk.

The policy does not keep pace with the growing number of market entrants, which will generate a larger environmental footprint on and off Earth.

Minister for Space Judith Collins says her office works with the Ministry for the Environment, the Environmental Protection Authority and industry representatives such as Rocket Lab to “ensure that potential harms to the environment are monitored and mitigated”.

However, this commitment lacks quantifiable details and is not reported in any government documentation. This creates a vacuum where no party (government, industry or the public) assumes responsibility for sustainability.

A sustainability leadership vacuum

The absence of sustainability leadership allows nations with “soft” power, such as the US, to set the rules through the control of resources and norms, such as the renewed goal to head back to the Moon.

To navigate this challenge, we need leadership through international cooperation as well as a robust domestic approach to encouraging and rewarding sustainability initiatives.

Recent initiatives, including small prizes and seed funding for feasibility studies, along with efforts to streamline regulatory approvals, have been announced to aid the growth of the sector.

However, while there is a strong push for accelerated growth, the documents lack clarity on the investment required to sustain business development.

Unlike other countries where government co-financing often plays a crucial role in advancing space-related technologies, New Zealand’s approach to financial support – whether through grants, loans, tax incentives or employment regulations – remains poorly defined.

While the national space policy document cites sustainability values, it falls short of outlining specific approaches or initiatives. Notably, it lacks a clear working definition of sustainability.

The need for clarity and balance

As the aerospace sector grows – amid the uncertainties of climate change, rapid technological developments and continued American influence – we need to clarify the relationship between public and private actors.

Specifically, we need clear guidelines on who is responsible for balancing growth and regulation with environmental and social impacts of industrial activities.

The aerospace sector could benefit from looking to other economically-driven industries that willingly participate in sustainability initiatives, such as the Sustainable Business Network and the B Corp movement.

This approach would address space sustainability concerns in a more balanced manner, as opposed to the growth-driven mindset that often disregards sustainable development.

By shifting the mindset, we can pave the way for a more responsible and forward-thinking aerospace sector.

Catherine Qualtrough is affiliated with Aerospace Auckland/NZ.

Priyanka Dhopade does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. NZ’s Space Agency is both regulator and developer of the aerospace industry – that’s a point of tension – https://theconversation.com/nzs-space-agency-is-both-regulator-and-developer-of-the-aerospace-industry-thats-a-point-of-tension-236255

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sasha Bailey, PhD Candidate and Research Assistant, The Matilda Centre for Research in Mental Health and Substance, University of Sydney

Puberty blockers are medications that stop the body from producing oestrogen and testosterone. In the clinic, they’re called gonadotropin-releasing hormone agonists (GnRHa).

If adolescents take these medications during puberty, bodily changes associated with puberty are prevented. If these medications are stopped, these bodily changes resume.

Puberty blockers have been used since the early 1980s to treat early-onset puberty in young children.

Beginning in the 1990s, puberty blockers have also been used in transgender adolescents to help prevent the unwanted development of masculinising or feminising physical changes that occur during puberty.

What are the benefits for transgender adolescents?

Many transgender children describe anxiety about unwanted physical changes that will occur because of puberty, especially as adolescence approaches.

For those presumed female at birth, these unwanted changes include breast development and starting periods. For those presumed male at birth, these unwanted changes may include the development of a deeper voice, an Adam’s apple, facial hair and a masculine physique.

Many of these physical changes are irreversible and result not only in gender dysphoria but also misgendering. This is when transgender people are mistakenly assumed to be the gender they were presumed at birth. Misgendering can be a significant and lifelong source of distress.

Some transgender people will seek out surgery to address these unwanted irreversible changes. This might be to masculinise their chest, feminise their face, alter their voice, or reduce their Adam’s apple.

For transgender young people and their families, the most obvious benefits of puberty blockers are to avoid unwanted changes that come with puberty. It can also reduce misgendering and prevent the need for future surgery.

Several studies have assessed the potential benefits of puberty blockers. A 2024 systematic review of the research found consistent evidence showing they effectively suppressed puberty.

The study the review authors identified as being the highest quality found significantly improved psychological outcomes. Puberty blockers reduced suicidal thoughts and actions in transgender adolescents compared to those who had not accessed the treatment.

When should puberty blockers be started?

Puberty blockers can only be started once puberty has commenced. The age at which this occurs varies considerably between individuals. To avoid unwanted physical changes, puberty blockers should ideally begin in early to mid-puberty.

However, many transgender adolescents have been started on puberty blockers in late puberty or even after puberty has finished.

In England, for example, at least 12 months of puberty-blocker treatment was previously mandatory for any transgender adolescent under 18 who wished to access oestrogen or testosterone. This resulted in many young people starting puberty blockers well after their puberty was complete.

One potential problem with commencing puberty blockers beyond early or mid-puberty is that unwanted physical changes have already occurred, so many benefits of this treatment are no longer expected to occur.

The recent systematic review on puberty blockers noted that, while many studies saw improvements in psychological wellbeing, others failed to observe a difference. One possible explanation is that none of these studies accounted for the stage of puberty at which treatment was commenced.

Notably, a more recent study from Harvard University confined the analysis to treatment with puberty blockers in early to mid puberty. It found treatment was associated with significant reductions in anxiety, depression and suicidal thoughts.

Risks of puberty blockers for transgender adolescents

Puberty blockers are generally well-tolerated. But as with any medical intervention, they can also cause unwanted effects. This includes reductions in bone density and fertility, and changes in adult height.

When started beyond early to mid puberty, they are more likely to cause menopausal-like side effects, such as hot flashes. This is due to a reduction in sex hormone production.

There are also potential long-term effects of puberty blockers that are still being investigated.

Brains mature substantially during adolescence. But it remains unclear what effect puberty blockers may have on cognitive development. While the use of puberty blockers in early-onset puberty has not been shown to affect cognitive functioning, studies in transgender adolescents are ongoing.

Where are the randomised controlled trials of puberty blockers?

Randomised controlled trials are typically considered the gold-standard way to study the effectiveness of medical interventions.

To date, there have been no randomised controlled trials of puberty blockers for transgender adolescents, which has led some to label this treatment as experimental. However, conducting such trials of hormonal interventions in transgender youth is problematic, as it would be unethical to withhold treatment for research purposes.

It’s common not to have data from randomised controlled trials in paediatric care more broadly. The use of puberty blockers for early puberty displays similar research gaps.

However, the politicisation of trans young people has seen the use of puberty blockers in transgender adolescents held to a different standard.

How are puberty blockers accessed in different clinical settings?

In the United Kingdom, puberty blockers will now only be accessed by transgender adolescents via the National Health Service (NHS) in a research setting, following the adoption of recommendations by the Cass review, which reviewed gender identity services available to children and young people via the NHS.

One of the main criticisms of the review was it failed to consider the likely harms of denying transgender adolescents hormonal interventions.

In Australia, health experts have also cautioned against comparing our health system to the NHS and highlighted that many of the review’s recommendations align with existing practices within Australian specialist gender services.

Puberty blockers in Australia are accessed by transgender adolescents as part of a comprehensive, team-based approach to gender-affirming care. This emphasises holistic, individualised care which considers the young person’s stage of puberty, while balancing potential benefits and risks.

Sasha Bailey receives research funding from The Matilda Centre for Research in Mental Health and Substance Use, Suicide Prevention Australia, and The Pride Foundation. She is Secretary of the NSW Branch of Public Health Association of Australia, Secretary of GLBTIQ Multicultural Council, and Early Career Member of the Editorial Board of Prevention Science. Sasha currently serves on the ACON Research Ethics Review Committee, Family Planning Australia Research Ethics Committee, and Community Mental Health & Drug and Alcohol Research Network Research Ethics Consultation Committee.

Dr Cristyn Davies receives funding from the Australian Research Council and the Medical Research Future Fund. Dr Davies reports voluntarily being President of the Australian Association for Adolescent Health; co-chair of the Human Rights Council of Australia; co-chair of the Child and Youth Special Interest Group for the Public Health Association of Australia; an ambassador to Twenty10 Incorporating the Gay and Lesbian Counselling Service of New South Wales; and co-chair of the research committee for the Australian Professional Association for Trans Health.

Ken Pang is a paediatrician at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne. He receives research funding from the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council, the Medical Research Future Fund, the Royal Children’s Hospital Foundation, and the Hugh D T Williamson Foundation. He is a member of the Australian Professional Association for Trans Health, the World Professional Association for Transgender Health, and the editorial board of the journal, Transgender Health.

Rachel Skinner is a paediatrician at the Sydney Children’s Hospitals Network and receives research funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council, the Medical Research Future Fund and the Australian Research Council. She has professional memberships with the Australian Professional Association of Transgender Health and the World Professional Association of Transgender Health.

– ref. What are puberty blockers? What are the benefits and risks for transgender children? – https://theconversation.com/what-are-puberty-blockers-what-are-the-benefits-and-risks-for-transgender-children-226006

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anya Schiffrin, Senior Lecturer in Discipline of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University

As the News Media Bargaining Code agreements in Australia start to wind down, there is discussion about what will come next. Media academic Andrea Carson calls the codes, passed in 2021, “world-first” legislation because Australia was the first country to use competition law to get Google and Meta to pay news publishers for the news they distribute and profit from.

According to former chair of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) Rod Sims, about A$250 million flowed to news publishers each year. It’s just a fraction of what would have been a fair price.

Globally, the code has had an enormous impact. Countries that have discussed putting in their own versions have immediately seen Google strike deals with local publishers in an effort to forestall legislation.

The amounts paid out are far less than what is owed. If there were equal bargaining power and Google had to pay for the intellectual property produced by others which it made use of, it would be much more. But something is better than nothing. Thanks to the Australian law, Google has paid out tens of millions of dollars to publishers around the world. We will never know the exact amount, as Google requires publishers to sign non-disclosure agreements.

Google is, of course, dependent on news to make its search more attractive to audiences and advertisers. Research in several countries has also shown just how important quality news is for Google.

Not surprisingly, Google has mounted full-on campaigns against code-type legislation in Brazil, South Africa, California, Indonesia and other countries where it has been proposed.

Meta, which owns Facebook, has been, if anything, even worse. It has been adamant about resisting paying for the news that passes over its platforms. It has threatened to drop all news from countries that adopt and enforce legislation like the bargaining code, spooking regulators.

These tactics have been effective. The two firms have done a good job killing off proposed regulation in many markets.

Now with Meta saying it will pull out of news distribution in Australia, as it did in Canada, and Google reportedly saying it will only sign one-year deals with publishers, the question is: what will come next? Media reports suggest the government is considering a levy on tech companies.

Would a tech levy work?

The OECD has tried and failed to get a global agreement to raise corporate taxes – an agreement that would have prohibited digital taxes. In the meantime, the US government, influenced by its tech giants, is strongly opposed to such taxes. US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has spent a good deal of time calling up her counterparts and telling them not to impose them.

However, since the US has essentially blocked a global agreement on corporate taxes, many countries have decided to keep or adopt digital services taxes. Indeed, more than 18 countries have such taxes and some 20 others have proposed them. According to PWC, these may be levied on online sales, digital advertising, data usage, e-commerce, or streaming services.

While levies on streaming services to fund local content have been put in place in France, Switzerland, Canada, Portugal and are coming into force in Spain, and they’re being discussed in Australia, no government has used the funds raised from digital service taxes to directly support journalism.

In theory, taxes on tech have advantages over bargaining codes. The Australian version of the bargaining code doesn’t fully resolve the problem of power imbalances between the large social media firms and the publishers, and there were no requirements to spend the money on journalism. In theory, a tax on tech could address these shortcomings.

However, before publishers start pushing for taxes on tech to support journalism, there are a few things to consider. Is there public support for giving the revenue raised to journalism rather than putting it into the general kitty to be spent by the government? If there is support for a tax to support journalism, who decides on the allocation? How could there be safeguards to ensure governments don’t use the funds to support their media allies?

It’s also important to remember that, of course, tech firms oppose taxes. They’ve offshored their revenues for years and resisted paying taxes. In the US, Maryland in 2021 passed a tax on digital advertising and the state has spent years fighting off multiple lawsuits. We should expect even more resistance to a tax than to the bargaining code.

Making tech firms pay for what they use to make money

The bargaining code addressed a simple issue: how to force the platforms to pay fairly for the intellectual property they were effectively stealing and which enhanced their profits, given the imbalance of powers in this market. In doing so, it helped address another major societal issue: how do we pay for quality journalism, a public good from which all benefit? It never pretended to adequately resolve that question, but at least it was a start.

Every country needs to address the theft of intellectual property that diminishes both the incentives and ability to produce the news on which we all — including the platforms — depend. The bargaining codes were a start.

But democratic governments should also publicly fund quality news media. With the platforms having appropriated for themselves so much of the advertising revenues on which the media used to depend, it is natural to turn to digital taxation. It is not a matter of either/or; it should be a matter of both/and. Pragmatism should prevail. As the economist Dean Baker says, “the best policy is the policy you can pass”.

This article was written with research assistance from Philip Crane, Emma Goldhaber, Reena Mensingh and Lei Zhu.

Anya Schiffrin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Would a tech tax be a fair way to make Google and Meta pay for the news they distribute and profit from? – https://theconversation.com/would-a-tech-tax-be-a-fair-way-to-make-google-and-meta-pay-for-the-news-they-distribute-and-profit-from-237234

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Richard Meade, Senior Research Fellow in Economics and Social Sciences, Auckland University of Technology, and Adjunct Associate Professor, Centre for Applied Energy Economics and Policy Research, Griffith University

Like the petroleum industry itself, households are heavily invested in existing transport technologies. Getting oil and gas companies – and consumers – to switch to zero-emissions transport is a huge challenge.

We can’t presume battery electric vehicles (EVs) will displace fossil fuel vehicles any time soon. They are not accessible to most households and don’t offer radically better transport services. They drive on the same congested roads with the same speed limits.

On the supply side, electrifying entire transport fleets requires major infrastructure expansions. Even with strong demand, such infrastructures will struggle to displace Big Oil’s dominant and affordable alternative.

It’s a classic chicken-and-egg predicament. Consumers and vehicle makers won’t switch unless they are confident the required refuelling infrastructures will be available. But those infrastructures won’t materialise without sufficient demand.

Repurposing existing infrastructure to supply clean fuels could convince both consumers and vehicle manufacturers to make the switch. But what would that take?

Clean fuel alternatives

Major economies (including the United States, European Union and Japan) and car manufacturers, such as Toyota and BMW, are actively promoting clean hydrogen-based technologies such as hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. Toyota and some heavy vehicle manufacturers are also investing in vehicles that could combust clean hydrogen.

Whether “green hydrogen” might work for mass transport remains hotly debated. But it’s not the only possibility – biofuels made from renewable feedstocks have the potential to at least partly decarbonise transport (especially aviation).

And so‑called “drop-in fuels” could also substitute for fossil fuels. Known as e‑fuels, these are synthetic fuels made by combining hydrogen with carbon dioxide.

As such they could decarbonise transport faster and more widely because they can be used in existing vehicles – and supplied via existing infrastructures. A recent EU ban on new fossil fuel vehicle sales from 2035 was softened to allow for this.

As with EVs, vehicles running on clean hydrogen, biofuels or e‑fuels don’t revolutionise transport beyond reducing emissions. But they might get a head start on EVs by solving that chicken-and-egg problem: making possible the conversion of entire vehicle fleets to run on clean fuels, while developing the required refuelling infrastructures.

Affordability and scale

Repurposing existing fossil fuel infrastructures to supply clean fuels could be faster and cheaper than building new ones, such as the massively expanded electricity systems required for mass EV adoption.

For example, zero-emissions hydrogen can be produced from natural gas, but the process itself produces greenhouse gas emissions. Carbon capture storage (CCS) – removing the emissions and storing them securely in geological structures such as depleted gas fields – is one possible solution.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change sees CCS as feasible and playing a significant role in reducing greenhouse emissions. This would mean oil companies could adapt to producing zero-emissions hydrogen while renewable hydrogen or e‑fuel production develops.

The required geological structures are located near oil and gas infrastructures, which could also be converted to transport the resulting clean fuels.

These technologies might not yet be economically viable. But the same was true of EVs only 20 years ago. Concerted investment – and production at scale – was pivotal in improving their economics.

Repurposing fossil fuel infrastructures also opens the door to converting existing vehicles to run on clean fuels. This requires little or no modification for drop-in fuels, which are substitutable for existing fuels by design. Alternatively, vehicles can be converted to combust clean hydrogen (or dual fuel mixtures).

This could be much more affordable – and attractive to vehicle owners – than buying new vehicles (even assuming suitable options were available).

Putting coal out of business

In the process, Big Oil could avoid its existing assets becoming sunset investments. Critically, it could also profit from repurposing its infrastructures, by decarbonising sectors currently dominated by the other major carbon polluter, coal.

For example, hydrogen is a more credible substitute than electrification in some large coal-consuming industries, such as steelmaking.

However, given the need for scale and co‑ordination, it’s unlikely individual oil and gas companies could profitably repurpose their infrastructures on their own.

But industry-wide agreement and co‑ordination to produce a particular clean energy (or mix of energies) could substantially reduce investment risks. Laws against collusion would likely prohibit such agreements, so targeted exemptions and close regulatory oversight would be needed.

Relatedly, firms might commit to accelerating the green transition in return for regulated – but guaranteed – rates of return. While not perfect, this strategy has a precedent in the way competing US electricity utilities became regulated monopolies.

Alternatively, franchise bidding could see firms pay to win a time-limited monopoly to achieve an accelerated green transition.

This has been used to support the rollout of other natural monopoly infrastructures such as water networks, toll roads, cable TV and fibre broadband. It creates a contest that Big Oil couldn’t afford to lose.

Repurposing the past

History offers relevant lessons. EVs were once a dominant automobile technology over a century ago. But they were quickly displaced with the arrival of affordable and convenient fossil fuel vehicles.

Emerging clean fuels hold the promise of fast refuelling and long ranges, combined with zero emissions, meaning the days of EVs could again be numbered.

Recall, too, that 19th-century investors accelerated the transition to rail by buying canals that competed with trains. They then either retired them or repurposed them as rail routes.

Had those investors anticipated motorised vehicles and roads displacing rail, they likely would have invested less. That they didn’t means current generations benefit from access to more railways than would otherwise be available.

The same is potentially true for the fossil fuel industry. Past investment in polluting infrastructures could benefit current and future generations if repurposing those infrastructures accelerates the green transition.

Richard Meade does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. What if Big Oil championed – and profited from – the green transition? Here’s how it could work – https://theconversation.com/what-if-big-oil-championed-and-profited-from-the-green-transition-heres-how-it-could-work-236232

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Monica Whitty, Professor of Software Systems and Cybersecurity, Monash University

In the world of the internet, clicks are currency. The more people click on a website, social media post or an advertisement, the more that content generates revenue.

But cybercriminals can exploit this rapidly growing market for clicks through what are known as “click frauds”. And everyone, from everyday internet users to large organisations that use the web to share content or sell their products, is vulnerable.

But what exactly are “click frauds”? And what can be done to prevent them?

What is click fraud?

Click fraud occurs when someone creates a network of bots or sets up “farms” of human workers to generate clicks online. It can take many forms.

Fraudsters often use automated bots or click farms to generate fraudulent clicks on ads or likes on their own websites. They create websites and invite businesses to advertise on their site at a cost. If advertisers are paying per click, then the fraudster will earn money for their business (which is often a fake business) and divert traffic to their site.

Alternatively, a genuine business might create their own advertisements and place them on various websites. Cybercriminals might bombard these advertisements with clicks, which will be very costly for genuine businesses when they are paying per click.

The motivation here may be that the criminal has their own genuine business, and they are hoping the advertising cost will be so expensive it will put their competitor out of business.

A third method is that a criminal may create a fake website they hope users will click on.

This is because the site has a malicious link that will download malware onto a user’s computer, or because they hope to scam the user in another way (for example, by paying upfront fees for a service or items that do not exist).

By increasing traffic to their website, the website moves up in online search rankings. This impacts the general user who believes that because the site is high up in the order, it is a genuine and popular business they should trust.

Higher clicks can lead to higher trust

The psychological theory of planned behaviour provides some explanation for why people might trust a site that has numerous clicks and likes compared to a site that has few.

According to the theory, human behaviour is guided by three main factors: attitudes, subjective norms and perceived behavioural control.

Let’s consider each of these with respect to click fraud:

Attitudes: people often associate higher numbers of clicks, likes and traffic with credibility and trustworthiness. This is based on the belief that if many others engage with a site, it must be valuable, reputable or of high quality.

Subjective norms: subjective norms involve the perceived social pressure to perform or not perform a behaviour. If people see their peers, or society in general, trusting and using sites with many clicks and likes, they may feel pressured to trust these sites as well. This social influence can reinforce the behaviour of valuing and trusting high-traffic sites.

Perceived behavioural control: high traffic, clicks and likes can serve as indicators a site is reliable, reducing the perceived risk and effort required to evaluate it. When people perceive it is easier to trust a site with many popularity indicators, they are more likely to trust that site.

How can you prevent click fraud?

Ad fraud software is one method to prevent harm from click fraud.

Businesses can use specialised ad fraud detection and prevention tools, such as ClickCease, Fraudlogix or DoubleVerify. These tools can analyse click patterns, detect anomalies and block suspicious activity.

Businesses can also use IP blacklists to identify and block known fraudulent IP addresses. An IP – or “internet protocol” – address is a unique identifying number for any device connected to the internet.

Businesses can also employ geo-targeting to limit ad exposure to specific regions or locations, reducing the risk of fraudulent clicks from irrelevant or high-risk areas.

The general internet user can also be a part of the solution. We need to change our online shopping and trust behaviours. Some of the following checks will help users determine if a website or business is genuine:

• verify the source. Is it credible and well-known?
• hover over the URL. Is it a known web address? It may mimic one, so a close inspection is needed. For example, the legitimate website www.google.com might be www.go0gle.com
• become more aware of click fraud. Knowing it is prolific and that you are most likely to encounter it in your everyday life will help you learn to spot it and avoid it.
• use antivirus and anti-malware software protection to help protect you, identify malicious websites, and keep your software up to date. You cannot solely rely on this software to protect you, but it is an important part of the solution.

Monica Whitty receives funding from RCUK, ARC, Defence and Intelligence UK and Australia

– ref. What are ‘click frauds’ – and how can we stop them? – https://theconversation.com/what-are-click-frauds-and-how-can-we-stop-them-237397

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hassan Kalantari Daronkola, Senior lecturer, Swinburne University of Technology

Ever considered working for yourself? Some of the oft-touted perks make it seem like a dream. You get more control over your time, total freedom over creative and business decisions, and a better work-life balance.

For many self-employed entrepreneurs, however, this promise proves a cruel mirage. Financial insecurity, unforeseen obstacles and having to work lonely late nights can all make the reality very different.

And although they might be running a business solo, entrepreneurs don’t get to exist in their own little bubbles. The pressures they face can put serious strain on all of their relationships.

Perhaps none so much as that with a spouse, who gets a front-row seat to all the ups and downs.

My recent research sought to examine what it’s like when a partner’s business becomes the other significant other.

What it found was troubling, but perhaps unsurprising – that having a self-employed partner can significantly reduce your life satisfaction, especially when family, leisure and work are your own key priorities.

Read more:
Having it all is a myth: family and personal commitments are pushing women out of their own businesses

An important contribution

The self-employed form a small but significant chunk of Australia’s total workforce – just under 16% in 2022. They also make an important economic contribution.

It’s important to note that self-employment isn’t always a choice. In challenging economic periods, the percentage of self-employed will often rise as people are “pushed” into starting their own businesses out of necessity.

This phenomenon, also known as the “unemployment push” or “refugee effect”, suggests that people often turn to entrepreneurship when faced with limited job opportunities or a poor job market.

This kind of necessity-driven entrepreneurship can provide a crucial source of income for entrepreneurs. It can also generate new job opportunities for others, if these new businesses become successful enough to start hiring.

But it’s not easy, and can pose significant challenges for their spouses and other close family members. These should not be overlooked.

Partners bear the costs, too

My study examined data spanning more than 80,000 respondents and 60 countries from the latest World Values Survey, which is conducted every five years.

It found the spouses of self-employed individuals tend to have lower life satisfaction.

A range of factors could be contributing to this effect, from the heavy stress of financial uncertainty to difficulties disconnecting from work, which can strain personal relationships.

My research also found the perceived importance of family, leisure and work amplified this effect. The more important these aspects were to a spouse, the lower their life satisfaction was likely to be.

This is largely in line with what you’d expect. The demands and irregular hours associated with self-employment can lead to less family time, less time for shared leisure activities, and increased stress.

On top of this, ambitious, career-focused individuals might struggle to manage the additional responsibilities and stress that come with their partner’s self-employment, leading to lower life satisfaction.

The picture was even worse when both partners were self-employed – life satisfaction was significantly lower. This reflects some unique challenges that are different again to those of the other households.

Having just one self-employed partner can significantly disrupt the work-family balance. Now imagine both! It can quickly become extremely challenging to manage responsibilities like caring for children, let alone find time off to be together.

In Australia, where work-life balance is a deeply valued cultural norm, the strain of having a self-employed spouse can be particularly challenging.

Read more:
Life’s big moments can impact an entrepreneur’s success – but not always in the way you’d expect

What should be done?

The self-employed and their partners make a valuable contribution to Australia, so it’s important we look after them.

Our findings suggest we need to create better support systems for families where one or both partners are self-employed, particularly in economic downturns.

This could include mental health supports to deal with the stress of self-employment and financial planning services to assist in managing the ups and downs.

Policies designed to directly address the financial insecurity of self-employment could have a disproportionate impact. This could include new tax breaks specific to solo entrepreneurs.

Expanding access to affordable childcare could also make it easier for both partners to juggle their work and home responsibilities, especially when money is tight.

The benefits of working for yourself shouldn’t cost the wellbeing of those closest to you. By creating better support systems for self-employed families, we can slowly fix this equation.

Hassan Kalantari Daronkola does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Married to the job? How having a self-employed partner might be hurting your happiness – https://theconversation.com/married-to-the-job-how-having-a-self-employed-partner-might-be-hurting-your-happiness-236510

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ben McCann, Associate Professor of French Studies, University of Adelaide

The children’s show Peppa Pig, first screened in the United Kingdom in 2004, is now broadcast in more than 170 countries and has become a billion-dollar brand. Its smart three-act structure, told in five-minute episodes, has been used to teach creative writing and even to help us think philosophically.

Having watched Peppa Pig for 12 years with my own kids, I’m always drawn back to Daddy Pig – the cheerful, striving figure who is often considered “silly” by his children.

Daddy Pig is constantly being fat-shamed and ridiculed, yet he remains steadfast and hardworking. He is jovial, explains science to his family, (eventually) listens to his wife and children and, most importantly, never loses his patience.

This Father’s Day, I’d like to take this opportunity to recognise Daddy Pig for being a role model for dads all over the world.

A hapless dad?

Daddy is a classic example of the “hapless dad” trope commonly found in family-oriented films and TV shows. These father figures are typically portrayed as well-meaning, but clueless and inept when it comes to handling chores and responsibilities.

Hapless dads struggle to cook, clean or care for children, and rely on others (usually the mother) to bail them out. They have good intentions, but they’re bad at following through – and their efforts often backfire.

In the episode Pancakes, Daddy’s flipped pancake sticks to the ceiling. In Daddy Loses His Glasses, he realises he has been sitting on his glasses for the whole episode. Each episode invariably ends with everyone laughing at “silly Daddy”, including Daddy himself.

In my favourite episode, Daddy Puts Up A Picture, Daddy hammers a nail into a wall, with predictably unfortunate results. But he keeps calm. He asks Peppa and George to help him as he plasters and paints to repair the damage. He then bathes them and everything returns to normal.

It’s a great example of how to create tension in storytelling: will Daddy clean everything up before Mummy Pig gets home? It also teaches a valuable life lesson: don’t panic.

Daddy Pig isn’t hapless. He is a wonderful role model who always gives 100% to his work, exuding a warmth and stoicism that ennobles us.

Comic relief

Comic relief characters in children’s TV and literature personify cheerfulness and jokiness. Comedy seeks to minimise the anxieties felt by the reader or audience, by reinforcing the message that life is not to be taken too seriously.

As children’s literature expert Kerry Mallan noted in 1993, these characters have faults:

they may, for instance, be vain, lazy, frivolous, clumsy or naive but these faults are not fatal […] and the reader or audience is able to laugh at the comic character’s expense.

Daddy Pig declares himself “a bit of an expert” in several things, including map reading, kite flying and trumpet playing, but is usually proven clueless. He says he can speak French, but he can’t.

These bungling, clumsy attempts to exert his patriarchal authority gently poke fun at traditional gender stereotypes and portray Daddy as someone who is at ease with his own frailties.

Children will chuckle at slapstick situations such as Daddy getting stuck in cement, while adults will appreciate the more subtle humour such as how Daddy fixes the computer by turning it off and on again, or when he sends his family to sleep while reading them a book on concrete. This double play of humour links Daddy Pig back to the Shakespearean fool.

Yet, every once in a while, Daddy also gets to “win” an episode. In Long Train Journey, Daddy is invited to go overseas for work. He is treated like royalty, served coffee and orange juice in the buffet car (not even the king is afforded such luxury) and is finally recognised for his fame and expertise in all matters of concrete.

Importance of play

Researchers have noticed the importance of father–child play. Like Bandit from Bluey, Daddy’s play is often physical, spontaneous and playful.

In Daddy’s Birthday, he is the happiest when jumping in muddy puddles with Peppa and George. In Marble Run, he turns the whole house into a marble run course – and the children are delighted.

In Camping, Daddy shows Peppa and George how to light a campfire by rubbing two sticks together. He could just use the matches Mummy Pig offers, but he perseveres and eventually the fire is lit – and everyone cheers.

Daddy’s playful nature helps create a positive and enjoyable environment for his family. He is actively involved in their lives and is always there to give love and support during important moments.

Daddy Pig, we salute you

After nearly 400 episodes, Daddy Pig continues to embody the lovable yet imperfect patriarch, whose actions demonstrate the importance of family values, hard work and knowing when to quit. Richard Ridings, the British actor who has voiced the character since 2004, has often reiterated Daddy Pig’s resilience.

In Father’s Day, Peppa and George make Daddy a cake full of cereal, ketchup and blue cheese. Daddy’s response? “Tasty!”

Despite all the slings and arrows thrown his way, Daddy Pig embraces life, shakes off its frustrations and keeps his spirits up. What more could you ask for?

Ben McCann does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Happy Father’s Day, Daddy Pig – despite your faults, you’re TV’s greatest dad – https://theconversation.com/happy-fathers-day-daddy-pig-despite-your-faults-youre-tvs-greatest-dad-236698

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael O’Keefe, Director, Master of International Relations, Department of Politics, Media and Philosophy, La Trobe University

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese may be attempting to backpedal from a “hot mic” moment at the Pacific Islands Forum this week in which he joked the United States “go halvies” on a new regional policing agreement.

But putting aside any awkwardness, the deal itself represents a significant diplomatic victory for Australia, as well as a security win for the Pacific.

The geopolitical rivalry between China and Australia, the United States and their allies has been encroaching on all aspects of regional diplomacy, and Pacific leaders came into this meeting wanting to refocus the agenda.

And one of the most important issues to the Pacific is transnational crime. With drug cartels from Latin America using Fiji and other Pacific nations as a transit point for drugs entering Australia and New Zealand, transnational crime now sits alongside climate change as the top two regional priorities.

In January, three tonnes of methamphetamine were seized in Fiji. If delivered to markets in Australia and New Zealand, it could have been valued at hundreds of millions of dollars.

Asian crime syndicates and outlaw motorcycle gangs from Australia and New Zealand are also present in some countries, bringing other crimes, such as human trafficking, prostitution and scamming operations.

In June, Fijian Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka told Pacific leaders:

We know that crime and criminal groups do not respect borders. Rather, they manipulate borders with their business model. Cybercriminals ignore borders altogether.

What the new policing agreement will do

This is why this week’s headline announcement of a A$400 million Australian-funded Pacific Policing Initiative is so vital. It’s a comprehensive program designed by Pacific police to meet the increasing threat of transnational crime.

There are three main pillars to the agreement, which will establish:

• four new policing centres providing specialist training across the region

• a Pacific policing support group able to deploy trained officers to countries for major events or to respond to crises

• a Pacific policing coordination hub in Brisbane that will have access to Australian Federal Police facilities for training.

Albanese has been keen to emphasise the idea was developed as a collaborative effort by Pacific police chiefs.

Unlike previous bilateral efforts involving Australia, this initiative will be truly regional. And despite some apprehensions about the geopolitical impact of the deal, the consensus among Pacific leaders is the initiative will be highly beneficial.

Papua New Guinea’s prime minister, James Marape, described it as “a concept that is born from within”.

The entire Pacific is the biggest unpoliced space in planet earth. […] it is really important that we come together in this manner.

Spiralling drug use and HIV infections

The threats from transnational criminals are framed as a problem thrust on the region from outside. These organised crime groups are only interested in the strategic value of the Pacific as a waypoint in their distribution networks.

These criminals are also taking advantage of gaps in the Pacific policing capacity and the vulnerability of regional police to corruption.

Unfortunately, the side effect of being a transshipment hub is rising drug use in many Pacific nations themselves, with associated social and health problems such as sex work and HIV infections.

The number of new HIV cases in Fiji, in particular, is surging at an alarming rate. As one UN official said:

It’s a serious concern, we are seeing young people, teenagers, dying of HIV today and that’s shocking. […] We are seeing 10-year-olds, 12-year-olds coming in to clinics testing positive because of drug use.

Read more:
Meth addiction, HIV and a struggling health system are causing a perfect storm in Fiji

The geopolitics behind the deal

Responding so comprehensively to this need will also ensure Australia is viewed as the “partner of choice” for at least a generation of Pacific police.

Many Pacific leaders feel Australia has struggled over the years to deliver a satisfactory response to their concerns over climate change. The policing initiative, however, is an example of Australia delivering on a promise. This will likely give Canberra a boost in its ongoing battle with China for influence.

The deal builds on Australia’s successful military diplomacy in the Pacific in recent years. Canberra has funded key defence infrastructure, such as the Lombrum and Blackrock bases in PNG and Fiji, respectively, and delivered military equipment, such as patrol boats and bushmaster vehicles.

These are practical examples of Canberra using the tools of statecraft at its disposal to achieve its national interests – namely crowding out
Chinese influence in this strategic area.

The policing agreement stands in sharp contrast to China’s failure to negotiate a regional security agreement of its own in 2022.

Of course, there is some wariness over the deal. Vanuatu Prime Minister Charlot Salwai said he wanted to ensure the policing initiative is “framed to fit our purposes and not developed to suit the geostrategic interests and geo-strategic denial security postures of our big partners”.

Under the agreement, each Pacific government can decide how it chooses to participate in the initiative. The response from the Solomon Islands, which has signed a controversial police deal with China, will now be watched closely in Canberra.

In short, the Pacific Policing Initiative is good public policy and diplomacy. It will certainly improve the fight against transitional crime by providing regional police with the resources and expertise they need.

Success on policing shouldn’t breed complacency, however. Australia has a long way to go to meet Pacific expectations on climate change. No doubt China will be searching to gain an advantage in this area.

Michael O’Keefe has received funding from the Australian Army Research Centre.

– ref. ‘Hot mic’ moment aside, the Albanese government’s Pacific policing deal is a masterstroke of diplomacy – https://theconversation.com/hot-mic-moment-aside-the-albanese-governments-pacific-policing-deal-is-a-masterstroke-of-diplomacy-237663

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Liam Moore, Lecturer in International Politics and Policy, James Cook University

This week, one of the world’s largest fossil fuel exporters went to a meeting of island states strongly affected by human-induced climate change.

Or, in more conventional language, Australian leaders attended the annual Pacific Islands Forum in Tonga.

Since 1971, this forum has been the top diplomatic meeting for Pacific nations, including Australia and New Zealand. Security was on the agenda this year, against a backdrop of geopolitical manoeuvring and unrest in New Caledonia. But one issue made its presence felt above all else: climate change.

At the forum’s opening, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres made that clear:

There is an enormous injustice in relation to the Pacific and it’s the reason I am here […] The small islands don’t contribute to climate change but everything that happens because of climate change is multiplied here.

Australia is walking a difficult line at the summit. Pointing to our domestic green energy progress isn’t enough. Our neighbours are focused on Australia’s emergence as the world’s second largest exporter of fossil fuel emissions and steady opening of more gas and coal fields. Even as Australia’s climate and migration pact with Tuvalu came into effect, Tuvalu’s climate change minister, Maina Talia, called for an end to the “immoral and unacceptable” acts of opening new mines, continuing fossil fuel subsidies and exporting fossil fuels.

Australian leaders hope to co-host the world’s top climate talks in 2026 in partnership with Pacific Island nations. While some Pacific leaders are opposed to co-hosting without an Australian pledge to end new goal and gas projects, others see it as a way Australia can show it is truly part of the “Pacific family”.

What happened at the forum?

A big-ticket item at this year’s forum was the Falepili Union, a pact between Australia and Tuvalu signed last year and coming into effect at the forum. Minister for International Development and the Pacific, Pat Conroy, claimed it was the

most significant agreement between Australia and one of its Pacific partners since the agreements for Papua New Guinea’s independence in 1975.

The pact allows 280 Tuvaluans a year to move to Australia, whilst committing Australia to funding climate adaptation work and disaster response efforts on the islands. Significantly, the treaty also states Australia will recognise the statehood of Tuvalu — even if it were to be submerged due to climate change.

In return, Tuvalu and Australia will agree “together” on any arrangements involving Tuvalu’s security or defence. Effectively, this gives Australia the extraordinary ability to block any actions of Tuvalu it feels do not serve its regional interests. This is significant, as China seeks to expand its influence in the Pacific.

At the leaders forum on Thursday, the joint bid to host the 31st United Nations climate conference is expected to be discussed. It’s not guaranteed, as Türkiye has also put in a bid. Pacific leaders have made it clear they will push hard for Australia to go beyond efforts to cut local emissions.

What else might we see?

Analysts have been closely watching how New Zealand leaders approach the forum. While New Zealand has very strong connections to the Pacific and has been actively supporting climate adaptation work in many Pacific nations, the new right wing government is showing signs of backing away from domestic climate efforts.

At the forum, New Zealand’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, Winston Peters, drew attention for downplaying the human role in changing the climate and claiming some Pacific islands are actually growing.

Are island nations united? Not on everything. But on climate, they have learned the power of speaking with a united voice. In recent years, Pacific nations have become the new face of climate diplomacy. At the 2022 Sharm el-Sheikh climate talks in Egypt, Pacific nations were visible and effective in their push to secure better promises of funding to cover loss and damage done by climate change.

Pacific expert George Carter this week described the effective Pacific approach: inviting Australia to be more active as a member of the Pacific family while at the same time pressing us to cut reliance on fossil fuels.

Pacific leaders have consistently said they are willing to take their allegiances elsewhere if high-level rhetoric does not turn into action. In 2019, former Fijian Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama claimed climate reluctance by Australia’s Morrison government would push Pacific nations closer to China.

This is because adapting to sea level rise is expensive, and Pacific nations are small.

Vanuatu, for instance, was the first nation to figure out how much climate adaption would cost them. The answer: A$260 million by 2030 just to respond to loss and damage. To phase out fossil fuels and decarbonise the nation in addition to adaptation projects would cost $1.75 billion — a staggering amount for a small country.

Vanuatu is already the world’s most disaster-prone nation. Rising to the challenge of protecting shorelines and relocating villages comes on top of that.

Fiji has completed six climate-related community relocations to date. According to the government, 42 more need immediate help and another 800 will need assistance soon. Without external funding, the need will soon dwarf what the government can offer.

What’s next?

For the Pacific, climate change is everything. When Guterres talked about moving away from fossil fuels, many observers took that to be a comment aimed at Australia.

It’s unlikely Australia can keep the Pacific onside with bilateral pacts, regional policing initiatives or by pointing to domestic efforts to go green and achieve net-zero later. For the Pacific, the future is now. Climate change is lapping at their shores, and future promises are worth very little.

Liam Moore does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Talk isn’t enough: Pacific nations say Australia must end new fossil fuel projects – https://theconversation.com/talk-isnt-enough-pacific-nations-say-australia-must-end-new-fossil-fuel-projects-237749

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mia Cobb, Research Fellow, Animal Welfare Science Centre, The University of Melbourne

Labradoodles, puggles, dorgis, cavoodles, cavapoos: whatever you call them, there’s no escaping the explosion of designer crossbreeds parading along our streets and through our dog parks these days.

People have flocked to these hybrid dogs as the health problems associated with pedigree breeds became more widely known. As the theory goes, crossbreed designer dogs are more genetically diverse, so are less likely to suffer the health issues plaguing purebreds.

But are these designer mixes actually healthier than their purebred cousins? This was the question researchers from the United Kingdom’s Royal Veterinary College set out to answer in a new paper published overnight.

The study focused on three common poodle crossbreeds: pockapoos, labradoodles and cavapoos. It found they were no more or less healthy than their pure-breed counterparts. The researchers hope the findings will help dog owners make more informed, evidence-based decisions when selecting their next furry friend.

Designer crosbreeds

Most dogs alive today were not bred under human control. Regardless, humans have created more than 400 modern dog breeds in around 200 years, each with their own looks and temperaments.

Some popular dog breeds, such as the golden retriever, have mixed-breed origin stories. However, many are “pedigree dogs” bred from a limited gene pool.

Advocates for purebred dogs say they have more predictable health, behaviour and appearance. And many pedigree registers no longer permit the inclusion of crossbreed dogs.

Over time, however, this lack of genetic diversity among purebreds has led to
extreme body types and serious welfare problems for many dogs.

To overcome these issues, some breeders have turned to “out-crossing”: deliberately mating two dogs from different breeds. The goal is to dilute inherited physical or behaviour problems, producing healthier puppies. The aspiration being that the offspring will prove more robust than their parents, also known as “hybrid vigour”.

This has led to a rise in “designer crossbreeds”. In particular, poodles have been crossed with other breeds, such as:

• the cavalier King Charles spaniel-cross, known as the cavoodle in Australia and cavapoo in the United Kingdom

• the cocker spaniel-cross, known as the spoodle in Australia and cockapoo in the UK

• The labrador retriever-cross, known as the labradoodle. This mix was originally bred by an Australian, to create a non-allergenic guide dog.

Oodles of health issues?

The research from the Royal Veterinary College involved a survey of about 9,400 people.

Some owned a cross-bred dog – either a cockapoo (spoodle), cavapoo (cavoodle) or labradoodle. Others owned one of their purebred “progenitor” or founder breeds – either a cavalier King Charles spaniel, cocker spaniel, labrador retriever or poodle. All dogs were aged under five years.

The authors tested the assumption that designer crossbreeds have less chance of suffering common disorders compared to their founder breeds.

They compared odds for the 57 most common health disorders across the three designer crossbreeds with each of their founding (progenitor) breeds. In all, 342 comparisons were made.

Common health issues included eye and ear infections, diarrhoea, and cruciate ligament rupture.

And the results? The poodle-cross dogs and comparable founder-breed dogs shared health outcomes 87% of the time.

Crossbreeds were more likely to experience a small number of disorders (7%). But they were less likely to experience a small number (6%) of other disorders.

Overall, there was no compelling evidence in these poodle crossbreeds of “hybrid vigour”. There was also no evidence purebreds were significantly healthier than the designer crossbreed dogs.

What does this all mean?

The authors concluded that, given their results, prospective dog owners wondering which dog to buy should consider other factors such as breeding conditions, temperament and the health of a puppy’s parents.

The study focused only on young adult dogs. Crossbreeding may bring health benefits that don’t emerge until later in life. So a study that repeats these questions when the dogs are seniors would help us understand how designer crossbreeds age, and identify risk factors so we can help them age well.

Importantly, the study only looked at three types of crossbreeds, all involving poodles. Other designer crossbreeds may experience better health than their purebred cousins.

For example, flat-faced dogs such as pugs and French bulldogs are likely to experience breathlessness and skin and eye problems. Crossing these breeds with other dogs would reintroduce a proper muzzle to their face, bringing health and welfare advantages.

Who could dogs be?

All this raises important questions. Where do the animals in our lives come from? How are they bred, and is this information transparent? Are we OK with current breeding practices? And if not, what must change?

It stands to reason that, when searching for the perfect canine companion, we want one that will be healthy, long-lived, and happy to live with us.

These attributes are good for the dog. They are also good for their people. A healthy dog means fewer vet bills. Longer-lived equals more time shared together, and living happily with us translates to less stress, and a better quality of life for everyone in the home.

So how do we find that dog?

Some European countries mandate that dogs must meet strict physical, genetic and behaviour requirements before being registered and used for breeding. This requires a nationally consistent licensing regime and well-resourced enforcement – both of which are lacking in Australia.

What ultimately controls if dogs are healthy, long-lived and happy is us. Breeders decide which dogs to mate. Dog lovers decide which puppy to buy. And when we vote, we help decide how governments regulate the breeding industry.

For the sake of our canine friends, I hope we choose well.

Mia Cobb does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. New research busts the myth that crossbred ‘designer dogs’ are healthier than pedigrees – https://theconversation.com/new-research-busts-the-myth-that-crossbred-designer-dogs-are-healthier-than-pedigrees-237648

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alison Reeve, Deputy Program Director, Energy and Climate Change, Grattan Institute

Every year, authorities release a snapshot of how reliable our electricity supply will be in the coming decade. And each time, commentators have divergent takes on what it all means.

So it is with the latest reliability snapshot released by the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) on Thursday. Essentially, the report says the national electricity grid – which serves the five eastern states and the ACT – is in a better place than last year. But we’re not out of the woods.

Media coverage interpreted the findings in vastly different ways. Some claimed it was good news for future energy reliability. Others suggested the Albanese government’s renewables strategy had created the risk of power shortages for years to come.

So let’s take a closer look at how the forecast should be understood, and what it means for Australian electricity users.

What has changed since last year?

AEMO manages the nation’s electricity and gas systems and markets. Its annual outlook is known formally as an “electricity statement of opportunities”.

AEMO looks at what’s in the investment pipeline for the next decade, in terms of electricity generation, transmission and storage. It then tests if this combination of assets is able to maintain the reliability of the grid. A potential shortfall is a warning that, without further investment, homes and businesses could suffer electricity shortages.

Last year’s forecast warned of a need for more investment, particularly for transmission lines, to deliver a reliable electricity supply. So what’s changed this time around?

AEMO says the outlook for energy reliability has improved. It pointed to progress on an extra 5.7 gigawatts (GW) of new generation and storage developments since last year. These include:

• 3.9GW of battery storage
• 1.2GW of large-scale solar
• about 400 megawatts (MW) of wind power
• 365 kilometres of transmission connections.

The improved forecast also takes account of a two-year extension in the life of the Eraring coal plant in New South Wales and the ongoing rapid increase in rooftop solar capacity. Other projects making progress include a 750MW gas plant in NSW’s Hunter Valley and pumped hydro storage including Snowy 2.0.

In 2023, investment in new large-scale renewable energy slowed, though investment in rooftop solar and large and small batteries remained strong. The government responded by expanding its underwriting program to support large-scale generation projects. This program makes it easier for project proponents to secure financing, by topping up future revenues if they fall below an agreed level.

There’s more good news. The 12GW electricity generation capacity approved last financial year is nearly double the 6.9GW approved the year before.

It’s also worth noting how far Australia has already come in its transition to renewable energy. We’re fast approaching the halfway mark, averaging about 40% renewable generation. Some days, renewables can meet 100% of the demand for electricity.

In 2000, renewables’ share was only 2%. We have seen a huge transformation in just 24 years.

But what could go wrong?

Australia is still heavily reliant on coal-fired power plants, some of which are fast approaching retirement. The next big one due to close is Eraring, the country’s largest, in 2027. Yallourn in Victoria and Callide B in Queensland are due to close in 2028.

The latest forecast assumes the schedule for closures doesn’t change. By 2035, though, AEMO expects 90% of coal capacity to have closed, reducing it from the current 21GW to 1.4GW.

The grid is also facing a rapid rise in electricity consumption in the next decade and beyond. This is a result of the electrification of transport, industry and households. So new generation and transmission must be built to meet this new demand, as well as to replace ageing coal.

AEMO also tests the impacts of all these developments and the inherent uncertainty of events. It does this by modelling project delays and cancellations, power station shutdowns and closures, and changes in demand.

The results of this modelling are presented in its forecasts, according to different scenarios. Often, media outlets pick up on either the most positive or negative of these scenarios, leading to the divergent headlines we’ve seen today.

Insurance against black-outs

AEMO is taking out a form of insurance against outages this summer by activating the Reliability and Emergency Reserve Trader (or RERT) mechanism. AEMO will call for tenders for large electricity users, such as aluminium smelters, to agree to power down when the system is under strain, in return for payments. In addition, owners of back-up generators could be paid to turn them on to feed power into the grid if energy demand looks like it might exceed supply.

AEMO has also asked electricity retailers to ensure they have contracts in place for enough supply to meet a one-in-two-year level of peak demand.

Tools like these have been used a lot more often in recent years as the chart below shows.

This suggests the system has been under more stress. It points to the need, as AEMO signalled in last year’s statement, to increase investment in the system.

What does this mean for households?

The statement’s main scenario, the one considered most likely by AEMO, suggests Australia is largely on track for maintaining a stable electricity supply. That’s provided the current pipeline of investment delivers on time and generators aren’t retired early.

The system operates to a very high reliability standard of no more than 10.5 minutes’ interruption to supply across the whole system for the year. The vast majority of outages (97%) are caused by network failures – storms, wind, traffic accidents – rather than lack of generation.

For Australians connected to the national grid, this means it’s still very unlikely their lights will go out in a widespread and prolonged blackout.

Since 2008, Grattan Institute has been supported in its work by government, corporations, and philanthropic gifts. A full list of supporters is published at www.grattan.edu.au.

Alison Reeve does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article. In addition to her role at Grattan Institute she is a Visiting Fellow at the Australian National University’s Institute for Climate, Energy and Disaster Solutions. .

– ref. Wondering what to make of warnings about our electricity system? The outlook is improving – but we’re not out of the woods – https://theconversation.com/wondering-what-to-make-of-warnings-about-our-electricity-system-the-outlook-is-improving-but-were-not-out-of-the-woods-237750

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gwilym Croucher, Associate Professor, Melbourne Centre for the Study of Higher Education, The University of Melbourne

This week, Education Minister Jason Clare made an announcement that could reshape the landscape of international education in Australia.

He revealed how from 2025, Australian universities, TAFEs and vocational colleges will have caps on the number of international students they can enrol.

The approach is highly complicated. It involves some groups of students and excludes others, and uses formulas that apply differently to different institutions.

It will take some time for each institution to understand what this means for them and for sector-wide effects to kick in. Many details are also not yet public.

However, it is already clear Australia has taken a highly bureaucratic approach.

Our comparison with similar recent moves in the United Kingdom and Canada suggests it could set a new benchmark in government micromanagement of international education.

International parallels

For decades, Australia, the UK and Canada sought to attract international students. This included national branding campaigns and visa conditions allowing graduates post-study work rights. It also involved migration rules favouring graduates with certain types of skills.

Until recently, all three countries managed international education in two main ways. First, through quality assurance systems focused on the education international students receive. Second, through visa systems focusing on which students can enter the country, how much they can work and how long they can stay.

This approach worked well, with each country experiencing significant growth in international student numbers. In Australia, the number of international students has grown on average around 5% per year since 2005.

But when international student numbers grew very quickly after borders reopened post-pandemic, all three governments became concerned. They sought new ways to manage the influx of new students.

While many within the education sector argued the surge in new students was a short-term feature of post-COVID recovery, it proved very easy for others to portray the situation as immigration “out of control”.

What happened in Canada?

After the pandemic, the number of international students in Canada grew by around 30% per year for two years in a row. By 2023 there were more than one million international students in the country, compared with around 600,000 two years earlier.

In response, the Canadian government announced it would cap the number of study permits, to reduce the number of new international students in vocational and undergraduate programs by 35% in 2024.

Each province and territory has been given a cap based on its overall population. This will have a significant impact on urban metropolitan areas where international students prefer to study, notably the Greater Toronto Area, but will have less effect on other regions.

What about the UK?

The number of international students in the UK has also surged, reaching a historic high last year of more than 750,000. This growth was entirely driven by an increase in students from non-European Union countries, as the number of students coming from the EU declined by 8%.

In response, the UK government stopped allowing international students to bring their partners and children with them.

This has already had an impact, with a 16% decline in student visa applications in the year to July 2024.

What’s going on in Australia?

Initially, through the now-infamous Ministerial Direction 107 (signed in December 2023), the Australian government tried to reduce the surge in new students by denying large numbers of student visa applications.

The Department of Home Affairs’ approach disproportionately affected students from India and low-income countries, while having little impact on students from China. The approach also disproportionately hit universities outside big cities and those with fewer international students.

Unfortunately, this completely undermined the Department of Education’s long-term strategy, which has been focused on increasing the diversity of the student population and the diversity of providers.

A new approach in Australia

So now the Albanese government is trying again. This time, each institution will be allocated a quota of new international students for 2025.

Australia’s largest universities, which also have high proportions of international students and are the most research-focused, will see the biggest cuts.

Many of these will have caps on new students set halfway between their 2019 and 2023 commencing numbers. Universities with the smallest proportions of international students will have their caps set at 2023 numbers. Private tertiary providers look like they will have significant cuts too.

The overall result will mean international students will find it more difficult to study at the large and high-ranked universities in Sydney and Melbourne. There will also be far fewer places in private colleges for lower-cost vocational programs.

The winners are public universities and TAFEs that currently enrol fewer international students.

What now?

What happens beyond 2025 is anyone’s guess, and will be determined through negotiations between the yet-to-be-established Australian Tertiary Education Commission and each provider.

What is clear is Australia is taking an even more extreme approach to managing international student enrolments than two of our major competitors.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Australia’s approach to international student caps is even more radical than in the UK and Canada – https://theconversation.com/australias-approach-to-international-student-caps-is-even-more-radical-than-in-the-uk-and-canada-237752

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Cassandra Cross, Associate Dean (Learning & Teaching) Faculty of Creative Industries, Education and Social Justice, Queensland University of Technology

We often think of fraudsters as people on the opposite side of the world. They will manipulate and exploit victims through words on a computer screen, or loving messages through the phone. But romance fraud can also happen in person, with the fraudster sleeping in the bed beside you.

This was the circumstance Australian writer Stephanie Wood found herself in. It’s also the basis for the new television series Fake, currently screening on Paramount+. A dramatisation of Wood’s powerful memoir by the same name, the series outlines the many lies and betrayals of an intimate relationship.

It’s a brutal insight into the world of deception which characterises romance fraud.

When love hurts

Romance fraud (or romance scams) is what it sounds like – offenders use the guise of a relationship to gain a financial reward. In most cases, it’s through the direct transfer of money from the victim, but it can also be through using personal credentials to commit identity crimes.

From the outside, it’s hard to understand how romance fraud is so effective. However, research has documented the range of grooming techniques, social engineering tactics and methods of psychological abuse deployed by offenders. Offenders know exactly what to do and say to gain the compliance of their victim.

Offenders target a person’s vulnerability and work hard to build strong levels of trust. There are endless calls, texts and emails that create a bond. Then follows the inevitable “crisis”, whereby the offender needs money urgently for a health emergency, criminal justice situation, business need or even a cryptocurrency investment opportunity.

For many, this can result in ongoing payments and substantial losses. Over A$200 million was reported lost by Australians to this fraud type in 2023, but this is likely a gross underestimation of actual figures. It also doesn’t capture the many non-financial harms, including physical and emotional declines in wellbeing.

When the relationship finally ends, it’s too late. The money is gone, the extent of the deception is laid bare, and recovery from the heartache and loss is a constant battle.

There is a well-documented “double hit” of victimisation, with individuals needing to grieve the relationship as well as any financial losses.

Seeing is not believing

There are countless incidents of romance fraud where the offender and victim never meet: the deception takes place entirely online. But it’s important to know fraudsters also operate in person.

Wood’s memoir details an extraordinary level of lies and dishonesty presented to her throughout her relationship. Stories that laid the groundwork for later fabrications. Stories that were deliberate and calculated in how they were used to gain her trust, and later used against her.

The motivations of these real-world deceivers are not always straightforward. Often it’s about money, but not always. For Wood, not being asked for money allayed potential suspicions, but it didn’t reduce her feelings of loss and emotional devastation upon discovering the extent of the lies.

Wood is by no means alone in her experience. Marketing executive Tracy Hall endured a similarly sophisticated and all-encompassing level of deceit in her relationship with convicted conman Hamish McLaren (known to her as Max Tavita).

In her book, The Last Victim, Hall recounts snippets of their daily lives over a 16-month period, with McLaren portraying himself as a successful professional in finance. His mail was addressed to Max Tavita and his phone conversations were with real people. Yet his whole identity and the world he represented to Hall was a complete fabrication.

The experiences of Wood and Hall highlight the sheer depth of elaborate deception that can be perpetrated in an intimate relationship. Critically, it highlights romance fraud isn’t relegated to an online environment.

How can we prevent romance fraud?

There is an overwhelming amount of shame and stigma associated with romance fraud. The dynamics of these deceptive relationships are misunderstood, and this perpetuates negative stereotypes and a discourse of victim blaming, even from friends and family.

In hindsight, the warning signs might seem obvious, but fraudsters tend to effectively disguise these in real time and deploy deliberate tactics to overcome any suspicion.

We must all create a culture that empowers victims to come forward to raise awareness. This isn’t intended to create fear or anxiety, but to normalise the threat fraud poses, and to allow for difficult conversations if it happens. Ongoing silence from victims only favours the offender.

How to protect yourself from romance fraud

It’s inevitable we’ll continue to swipe right in our efforts to find love. But keep a healthy level of scepticism and an open dialogue with family and friends in any quest for a new relationship.

Don’t be afraid to conduct your own searches of people, places and situations presented to you in a relationship. There is a memorable moment in Fake where the protagonist refutes her friend’s offer of assistance, saying “this is a love story not an investigation”. Sadly, sometimes an investigation is necessary.

No matter what the circumstance or the person, think carefully before sending any money. Only give what you are willing to lose.

Deception comes in many forms. We must recognise it for what it is, and the impact it has on victims. But we must also not give into those who lie, and let them define who we are or dictate our ability to trust.

If you or someone you know has been a victim of romance fraud, you can report it to ReportCyber. For support, contact iDcare. For prevention advice, consult Scamwatch.

Cassandra Cross has previously received funding from the Australian Institute of Criminology and the Cybersecurity Cooperative Research Centre.

– ref. Romance fraud doesn’t only happen online – it can turn into real-world deception – https://theconversation.com/romance-fraud-doesnt-only-happen-online-it-can-turn-into-real-world-deception-237653

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael O’Keefe, Director, Master of International Relations, Department of Politics, Media and Philosophy, La Trobe University

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese may be attempting to backpedal from a “hot mic” moment at the Pacific Islands Forum this week in which he joked the United States “go halvies” on a new regional policing agreement.

But putting aside any awkwardness, the deal itself represents a significant diplomatic victory for Australia, as well as a security win for the Pacific.

The geopolitical rivalry between China and Australia, the United States and their allies has been encroaching on all aspects of regional diplomacy, and Pacific leaders came into this meeting wanting to refocus the agenda.

And one of the most important issues to the Pacific is transnational crime. With drug cartels from Latin America using Fiji and other Pacific nations as a transit point for drugs entering Australia and New Zealand, transnational crime now sits alongside climate change as the top two regional priorities.

In January, three tonnes of methamphetamine were seized in Fiji. If delivered to markets in Australia and New Zealand, it could have been valued at hundreds of millions of dollars.

Asian crime syndicates and outlaw motorcycle gangs from Australia and New Zealand are also present in some countries, bringing other crimes, such as human trafficking, prostitution and scamming operations.

In June, Fijian Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka told Pacific leaders:

We know that crime and criminal groups do not respect borders. Rather, they manipulate borders with their business model. Cybercriminals ignore borders altogether.

What the new policing agreement will do

This is why this week’s headline announcement of a A$400 million Australian-funded Pacific Policing Initiative is so vital. It’s a comprehensive program designed by Pacific police to meet the increasing threat of transnational crime.

There are three main pillars to the agreement, which will establish:

• four new policing centres providing specialist training across the region

• a Pacific policing support group able to deploy trained officers to countries for major events or to respond to crises

• a Pacific policing coordination hub in Brisbane that will have access to Australian Federal Police facilities for training.

Albanese has been keen to emphasise the idea was developed as a collaborative effort by Pacific police chiefs.

Unlike previous bilateral efforts involving Australia, this initiative will be truly regional. And despite some apprehensions about the geopolitical impact of the deal, the consensus among Pacific leaders is the initiative will be highly beneficial.

Papua New Guinea’s prime minister, James Marape, described it as “a concept that is born from within”.

The entire Pacific is the biggest unpoliced space in planet earth. […] it is really important that we come together in this manner.

Spiralling drug use and HIV infections

The threats from transnational criminals are framed as a problem thrust on the region from outside. These organised crime groups are only interested in the strategic value of the Pacific as a waypoint in their distribution networks.

These criminals are also taking advantage of gaps in the Pacific policing capacity and the vulnerability of regional police to corruption.

Unfortunately, the side effect of being a transshipment hub is rising drug use in many Pacific nations themselves, with associated social and health problems such as sex work and HIV infections.

The number of new HIV cases in Fiji, in particular, is surging at an alarming rate. As one UN official said:

It’s a serious concern, we are seeing young people, teenagers, dying of HIV today and that’s shocking. […] We are seeing 10-year-olds, 12-year-olds coming in to clinics testing positive because of drug use.

Read more:
Meth addiction, HIV and a struggling health system are causing a perfect storm in Fiji

The geopolitics behind the deal

Responding so comprehensively to this need will also ensure Australia is viewed as the “partner of choice” for at least a generation of Pacific police.

Many Pacific leaders feel Australia has struggled over the years to deliver a satisfactory response to their concerns over climate change. The policing initiative, however, is an example of Australia delivering on a promise. This will likely give Canberra a boost in its ongoing battle with China for influence.

The deal builds on Australia’s successful military diplomacy in the Pacific in recent years. Canberra has funded key defence infrastructure, such as the Lombrum and Blackrock bases in PNG and Fiji, respectively, and delivered military equipment, such as patrol boats and bushmaster vehicles.

These are practical examples of Canberra using the tools of statecraft at its disposal to achieve its national interests – namely crowding out
Chinese influence in this strategic area.

The policing agreement stands in sharp contrast to China’s failure to negotiate a regional security agreement of its own in 2022.

Of course, there is some wariness over the deal. Vanuatu Prime Minister Charlot Salwai said he wanted to ensure the policing initiative is “framed to fit our purposes and not developed to suit the geostrategic interests and geo-strategic denial security postures of our big partners”.

Under the agreement, each Pacific government can decide how it chooses to participate in the initiative. The response from the Solomon Islands, which has signed a controversial police deal with China, will now be watched closely in Canberra.

In short, the Pacific Policing Initiative is good public policy and diplomacy. It will certainly improve the fight against transitional crime by providing regional police with the resources and expertise they need.

Success on policing shouldn’t breed complacency, however. Australia has a long way to go to meet Pacific expectations on climate change. No doubt China will be searching to gain an advantage in this area.

Michael O’Keefe has received funding from the Australian Army Research Centre.

– ref. ‘Hot mic’ moment aside, Pacific policing deal is a masterstroke of diplomacy for the Albanese government – https://theconversation.com/hot-mic-moment-aside-pacific-policing-deal-is-a-masterstroke-of-diplomacy-for-the-albanese-government-237663

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hunter Bennett, Lecturer in Exercise Science, University of South Australia

Since the inception of the Australian Football League Women’s (AFLW) competition in 2017, women’s football participation has increased rapidly, from about 380,000 in 2016 to around 600,000 in 2022.

Women now represent approximately one-third of all players nationally.

During this time, the AFLW has evolved dramatically.

In 2017, it started with eight teams playing a short eight-round competition. Next season, which begins on Friday night, 18 teams will play across a 15-round campaign.

By 2026, the competition will feature a full 17-round season, with female AFLW players becoming full-time athletes like the men.

The impact of injuries

Team success and career longevity rely heavily on one critical factor – staying healthy.

Teams with lots of injuries don’t win many games, and injured players often have shorter careers.

This is why injury prevention is one of the most heavily researched topics around the globe.

The first step in any good injury prevention plan is injury surveillance.

Injury surveillance is the process of observing and tracking injuries to identify which are most common and result in the most missed matches.

By identifying the areas of greatest need, targeted injury prevention strategies can be created.

There is a large body of research examining the most common injuries in male Australian football at all levels (including community, sub-elite and elite).

This research is often used to guide injury prevention strategies for women’s football.

However, this has an issue – we don’t know if women have the same injury patterns as men.

This is important when we consider there are key differences between how men’s and women’s Australian football is played.

At some levels (such as elite and sub-elite), woman’s football is currently played with 16 players on the field, rather than 18.

It has a shorter game duration and fewer player rotations than the men’s competition, which can affect the speed of the game and the fatigue players experience.

Finally, stoppages occur 30% more often in women’s football, and women’s teams have more than twice as many contested possessions and tackles per minute of match-play than men, highlighting it has more frequent player-to-player contact.

Key differences between men and women

Researchers from the University of South Australia recently conducted the largest league-wide study of the injury patterns of sub-elite women’s football to date, tracking the injures experienced by seven clubs competing in the South Australian National Football League Women’s competition during the 2023 season.

Ankle sprains, concussions and anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuries were the most common and burdensome. Conversely, there were very few muscle strains.

Most injuries occurred during matches (rather than at training), and more than two-thirds occurred in a contact situation (such as during a tackle or a marking contest).

Importantly, these injury patterns were notably different from those often seen in males.

First, hamstring muscle strains were one of the least common injuries, despite being one of the most common in men.

Second, ACL injuries occurred about twice as often in women than men.

Finally, and arguably most notably, concussion rates were about three-times higher than men – something that has been seen in prior seasons at the elite AFLW level.

Similar observations have been made in other contact sports such as rugby, where women not only experience higher rates of concussion, but also get concussed via different mechanisms to men.

Not only does this suggest women require different injury prevention strategies than men, but that concussion injuries should be a key prevention focus for all competition levels.

What could be done to fix the issue?

There are some possible concussion prevention strategies that could be considered for women footballers.

Tackles with an upright body position have been shown to increase the likelihood of the tackler’s head contacting their opponent’s shoulder, which increases concussion risk.

So specific tackle skill training to ensure athletes keep a low body position and contact the opposition’s mid-section could be an option to help reduce the rate of tackle-related concussion.

Recent research has indicated neck strength might protect against concussions and that injury prevention programs that include neck exercises can reduce the number of head and neck injuries.

As such, exercises to improve neck strength could be a great introduction to pre-season training, in conjunction with normal upper and lower body strength training.

Similarly, a study of athletes from a range of sports (including soccer and volleyball) suggested improving core muscle strength and stability may reduce the risk of concussion, which could be trained easily throughout the entire season.

Finally, rule changes could reduce the opportunity for contact concussions to occur. Some common suggestions have included banning “the bump” to reduce shoulder to head contact, and limiting the number of players allowed on one side of the field during a kick in after a point is scored to reduce congestion.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Concussion risks for women footballers are greater than men: why, and what can be done? – https://theconversation.com/concussion-risks-for-women-footballers-are-greater-than-men-why-and-what-can-be-done-235090

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Evangeline Mantzioris, Program Director of Nutrition and Food Sciences, Accredited Practising Dietitian, University of South Australia

Whether you enjoy chocolate milk regularly, as a weekend treat, or as an occasional dose of childhood nostalgia, it probably wouldn’t be the first option you think of for post-workout recovery.

Unless you’re on TikTok, perhaps. According to many people on the social media platform, chocolate milk is not only delicious, but it offers benefits comparable to sports drinks after a workout.

So is there any evidence to support this? Let’s take a look.

Rehydrating after a workout is important

Water accounts for somewhere between 50% and 60% of our body weight. Water has many important functions in the body, including helping to keep our body at the right temperature through sweating.

We lose water naturally from our bodies when we sweat, as well as through our breathing and when we go to the toilet. So it’s important to stay hydrated to replenish the water we lose.

When we don’t, we become dehydrated, which can put a strain on our bodies. Signs and symptoms of dehydration can range from thirst and dizziness to low blood pressure and confusion.

Athletes, because of their higher levels of exertion, lose more water through sweating and from respiration (when their breathing rate gets faster). If they’re training or competing in hot or humid environments they will sweat even more.

Dehydration impacts athletes’ performance and like for all of us, can affect their health.

So finding ways to ensure athletes rehydrate quickly during and after they train or compete is important. Fortunately, sports scientists and dietitians have done research looking at the composition of different fluids to understand which ones rehydrate athletes most effectively.

The beverage hydration index

The best hydrating drinks are those the body retains the most of once they’ve been consumed. By doing studies where they give people different drinks in standardised conditions, scientists have been able to determine how various options stack up.

To this end, they’ve developed something called the beverage hydration index, which measures to what degree different fluids hydrate a person compared to still water.

According to this index beverages with similar fluid retention to still water include sparkling water, sports drinks, cola, diet cola, tea, coffee, and beer below 4% alcohol. That said, alcohol is probably best avoided when recovering from exercise.

Beverages with superior fluid retention to still water include milk (both full-fat and skim), soy milk, orange juice and oral rehydration solutions.

This body of research indicates that when it comes to rehydration after exercise, unflavoured milk (full fat, skim or soy) is better than sports drinks.

But what about chocolate milk?

A small study looked at the effects of chocolate milk compared to plain milk on rehydration and exercise performance in futsal players (futsal is similar to soccer but played on a court indoors). The researchers found no difference in rehydration between the two. There’s no other published research to my knowledge looking at how chocolate milk compares to regular milk for rehydration during or after exercise.

But rehydration isn’t the only thing athletes look for in sports drinks. In the same study, drinking chocolate milk after play (referred to as the recovery period) increased the time it took for the futsal players to become exhausted in further exercise (a shuttle run test) four hours later.

This was also shown in a review of several clinical trials. The analysis found that, compared to different placebos (such as water) or other drinks containing fat, protein and carbohydrates, chocolate milk lengthened the time to exhaustion during exercise.

What’s in chocolate milk?

Milk contains protein, carbohydrates and electrolytes, each of which can affect hydration, performance, or both.

Protein is important for building muscle, which is beneficial for performance. The electrolytes in milk (including sodium and potassium) help to replace electrolytes lost through sweating, so can also be good for performance, and aid hydration.

Compared to regular milk, chocolate milk contains added sugar. This provides extra carbohydrates, which are likewise beneficial for performance. Carbohydrates provide an immediate source of energy for athletes’ working muscles, where they’re stored as glycogen. This might contribute to the edge chocolate milk appears to have over plain milk in terms of athletic endurance.

Coffee-flavoured milk has an additional advantage. It contains caffeine, which can improve athletic performance by reducing the perceived effort that goes into exercise.

One study showed that a frappe-type drink prepared with filtered coffee, skim milk and sugar led to better muscle glycogen levels after exercise compared to plain milk with an equivalent amount of sugar added.

So what’s the verdict?

Evidence shows chocolate milk can rehydrate better than water or sports drinks after exercise. But there isn’t evidence to suggest it can rehydrate better than plain milk. Chocolate milk does appear to improve athletic endurance compared to plain milk though.

Ultimately, the best drink for athletes to consume to rehydrate is the one they’re most likely to drink.

While many TikTok trends are not based on evidence, it seems chocolate milk could actually be a good option for recovery from exercise. And it will be cheaper than specialised sports nutrition products. You can buy different brands from the supermarket or make your own at home with a drinking chocolate powder.

This doesn’t mean everyone should look to chocolate milk when they’re feeling thirsty. Chocolate milk does have more calories than plain milk and many other drinks because of the added sugar. For most of us, chocolate milk may be best enjoyed as an occasional treat.

Evangeline Mantzioris is affiliated with Alliance for Research in Nutrition, Exercise and Activity (ARENA) at the University of South Australia. Evangeline Mantzioris has received funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council, and has been appointed to the National Health and Medical Research Council Dietary Guideline Expert Committee.

– ref. Is chocolate milk a good recovery drink after a workout? A dietitian reviews the evidence – https://theconversation.com/is-chocolate-milk-a-good-recovery-drink-after-a-workout-a-dietitian-reviews-the-evidence-236685

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Susan M. Sawyer, Professor of Adolescent Health The University of Melbourne; Director, Royal Children’s Hospital Centre for Adolescent Health, The University of Melbourne

The age a child can be arrested, charged and jailed in Australia is back in the spotlight.

Last year, the Northern Territory became the first jurisdiction to raise the age of criminal responsibility from ten to 12. Now its new, tough-on-crime government has pledged to return it to ten. It comes after Victoria walked back its earlier commitment to raise the age to 14, settling instead on 12.

But the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child says 14 should be the absolute minimum. It raised this age from its earlier recommendation (in 2007) of 12, citing a decade of new research into child and adolescent development.

So what does the science say? What happens to the brain between ten and 14? And how much can those under 14 understand the consequences of their actions?

Who is an adolescent?

Our research shows adolescence is a critical period for development. It’s the time children’s experiences and explorations shape how they develop cognitive skills (including critical thinking and decision making), as well as social and emotional skills (including moral reasoning).

Adolescence also lasts longer than we tend to think. Important brain development begins during late childhood, around eight to nine years. Intense changes then follow during early adolescence (ages ten to 14). But these changes continue well into the twenties, and full cognitive and emotional maturity is not usually reached until around age 24.

However, everyone’s brain matures at a different rate. That means there is no definitive age we can say humans reach “adult” levels of cognitive maturity. What we do know is the period of early adolescence is critical.

What does puberty do to the brain?

Puberty is a defining feature of early adolescence. Most of us are familiar with the changes that occur to the body and reproductive systems. But the increase in puberty hormones, such as testosterone and oestrogen, also trigger changes to the brain. These hormones increase most sharply between ten and 15 years of age, although gradual changes continue into the early twenties.

Puberty hormones change the structures in the brain which process emotions, including the amygdala (which encodes fear and stress) and ventral striatum (involved in reward and motivation).

This makes adolescents particularly reactive to emotional rewards and threats. Our research has shown the brain’s sensitivity to emotions increases throughout early adolescence until around 14 or 15 years old.

At the same time, changes in puberty have been linked to increased sensation seeking and impulsive behaviours during early adolescence.

This context is crucial when we discuss the behaviour of children in the ten to 14 age range. The way their brains change during this period makes them more sensitive and responsive to emotions, and more likely to be seeking experiences that are new and intense.

How do adolescents make decisions?

The emotional context of puberty influences how younger adolescents make decisions and understand their consequences.

Decision making relies on several basic cognitive functions, including the brain’s flexibility, memory and ability to control impulses.

These cognitive abilities – which together help us consider the consequences of our actions – undergo some of the steepest development between ages ten and 14. By age 15, the ability to make complex decisions has usually reached adult maturity.

But adolescents at this age remain highly susceptible to emotions. So while their brain may be equipped to make a complex decision, their ability to think through the consequences, weighing up costs and benefits, can be clouded by emotional situations.

For example, research has shown 13-14 year-olds were more distracted from completing a task and less able to control their behaviour when they viewed images that made them feel negative emotions.

The social world of teenagers also has a significant impact on how they make decisions – especially in early adolescence. One study found that while older adolescents (aged 15-18) are more influenced by what adults think when weighing up risk, adolescents aged 12-14 look to other teenagers.

Experiments have also shown adolescents aged 12-15 make riskier decisions when they are with peers than by themselves. Their brain responses also suggest they experience a greater sense of reward in taking those risks with peers.

How do teens understand the consequences of their actions?

The concept of criminal responsibility is based on whether a person is able to understand their action and know whether it is wrong.

Moral reasoning – how people think about right and wrong – depends on the ability to understand another person’s mental state and adopt their perspective. These skills are in development across adolescence.

Research suggests it may take more effort for adolescent brains to process “social” emotions such as guilt and embarrassment, compared to adults. This is similar when they make moral judgements. This evidence suggests teenage brains may have to work harder when considering other people’s intentions and desires.

Young adolescents have the cognitive ability to appreciate they made a bad decision, but it is more mentally demanding. And social rewards, emotions and the chance to experience something new all have a strong bearing on their decisions and actions in the moment — possibly more than whether it is right or wrong.

Early adolescence is critical for the brain

There are also a number of reasons adolescent brains may develop differently. This includes various forms of neurodisability such as acquired brain injury, fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and intellectual disability, as well as exposure to trauma.

Teenagers with neurodevelopmental disorders will likely cope differently with decision making, social pressure, impulse control and risk assessment, and face extra difficulties. Across the world, they are disproportionately incarcerated.

In Australia, Indigenous children and adolescents are incarcerated in greater numbers than their non-Indigenous peers.

Each child matures differently, and some face extra challenges. But for every person, the period between ten and 14 is critical for developing the cognitive, social and emotional skills they’ll carry through the rest of their life.

Susan M. Sawyer was a member of the Victorian government’s Youth Justice Act Independent Expert Advisory Group. She receives funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council.

Nandi Vijayakumar receives funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council and the Australian Research Council.

– ref. Can a 10-year-old be responsible for a crime? Here’s what brain science tells us – https://theconversation.com/can-a-10-year-old-be-responsible-for-a-crime-heres-what-brain-science-tells-us-237552

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nick Haslam, Professor of Psychology, The University of Melbourne

The language of mental ill health is inescapable. Diagnostic terms, such as depression and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), pervade popular culture and saturate the online world. They are the currency of countless news stories and awareness campaigns.

The rise of diagnostic labels could be celebrated. It suggests the public’s mental health literacy is increasing and the stigma attached to mental illness is in decline. As the shame associated with it diminishes, mental illness comes out of the shadows.

But the rise of diagnostic language may also have downsides. Some critics argue it reflects the medicalisation of distress and may contribute to over-medication. And just as naming conditions may reduce stigma, it could also increase it. Labels can be sticky, having lasting effects on how others judge people with mental illness, and how they see themselves.

In a new study, my colleagues and I examined how labelling a person’s relatively mild or marginal mental health problems affects how others perceive them.

We found the presence of labels increases empathy and concern for those affected, but also pessimism about their capacity to recover. Essentially, diagnostic labels appear to be a mixed blessing when used at the less severe end of the distress spectrum.

Concept creep

When we talk about the rise of diagnostic labels, a particular concern is that concepts of mental illness have been expanding in recent years. They now encompass a wider range of experiences than they did previously. This so-called “concept creep” implies people may be using diagnostic terms to refer to phenomena that are relatively mild or marginal.

British psychologist Lucy Foulkes has argued people may be increasingly over-identifying mental illness. This means they are applying diagnostic labels to experiences that fall below the diagnostic threshold.

Recent studies (including those from my research group) support this possibility. This research has found people who hold expansive concepts of mental illness are more likely to diagnose themselves than those with narrower concepts.

The implications of applying diagnostic terms loosely are unclear. Using them to label relatively mild distress might have positive effects, such as encouraging people to take that suffering seriously and seek professional help.

But it might equally have negative effects, stigmatising the labelled person or leading them to be defined and constrained by their illness. It might even lead people to diagnose themselves inappropriately.

Our study

We wanted to understand the impact of these broadened concepts of mental illness by examining how diagnostic labelling influences the perception of people experiencing relatively mild problems.

Across two experiments, we presented almost 1,000 American adults with short descriptions of a hypothetical person experiencing a marginal, non-severe mental health problem. Each description was carefully tested to fall near the diagnostic threshold.

Participants were randomly assigned to read otherwise identical descriptions either with or without a diagnostic label (major depressive disorder, generalised anxiety disorder and bipolar disorder in experiment one, and PTSD, obsessive compulsive disorder and binge-eating disorder in experiment two).

After reading each description, we asked participants to report how much empathy they felt towards the person, how appropriate they were for professional treatment, and how much they should receive accommodations at school or work, such as extra time on assignments or special leave.

We also asked how likely they thought the person would be to recover fully (both experiments) and how much control they had over their problems (experiment two). We then compared these judgments between the label and no‑label conditions.

Labels had an impact

Participants who read descriptions preceded by a diagnostic label tended to report greater empathy toward the person and more support for efforts to accommodate their problems. They also saw the person as more appropriate for treatment than those who read the same descriptions unlabelled.

At the same time, the presence of labels led participants to see the person’s problems as more lasting and their recovery as less under their control.

Many of these judgments varied between disorders. There was some evidence that labelling effects were strongest for less familiar disorders such as binge-eating and bipolar disorders.

Mixed blessings

When diagnostic labels are applied to marginal cases of mental illness, the implications seem to be mixed. On the one hand, labels legitimise help-seeking, promote flexible support and boost empathy. These positives contradict suggestions that labelling promotes stigma.

However, diagnostic labels also seem to encourage the view that mental health problems are persistent and that people have limited capacity to overcome them. In other words, diagnostic labels may lead people to see mental illness as an enduring identity rather than a transient state. These perceptions may erode expectations of recovery for people experiencing problems and undermine efforts to achieve it.

Even the apparent benefits of labelling could have a downside in the context of relatively mild distress. It might encourage unnecessary and ineffective treatment or entrench a “sick” role by offering special accommodations to people with marginal impairments.

Our findings shed light on the possible consequences of the ongoing expansion of diagnostic concepts. As these concepts spread to less severe forms of distress and impairment, and diagnostic labels are used more loosely, we must be alert to the probable costs as well as benefits.

Nick Haslam receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

– ref. Diagnostic labels may increase our empathy for people in distress. But there are downsides too – https://theconversation.com/diagnostic-labels-may-increase-our-empathy-for-people-in-distress-but-there-are-downsides-too-237553

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Smith, Associate Professor in American Politics and Foreign Policy, US Studies Centre, University of Sydney

The recent Democratic National Convention in Chicago was a showcase of impressive speeches. Presidential nominee Kamala Harris justified the newfound enthusiasm of Democrats with a strong acceptance speech, but even she couldn’t match the oratorical power of Michelle and Barack Obama two nights earlier.

US political culture is marked by visionary speeches, from Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address and William Jennings Bryan’s “Cross of gold” to Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” and Ronald Reagan’s “Tear down this wall”. This rhetorical tradition infuses events such as party conventions, where memorable speeches can lay the groundwork for presidential careers.

Australia also has some justly famous political speeches. There was Robert Menzies’ “Forgotten People” address of 1942, Paul Keating’s Redfern speech in 1992, and Julia Gillard’s “misogyny speech” to parliament in 2012. Noel Pearson’s eulogy for Gough Whitlam in 2014 was a rhetorical masterpiece.

But these speeches are memorable because they are so rare. Australian politicians need to be good communicators, but they are not expected to deliver the kind of soaring, visionary rhetoric we see so often in the US. Why is this?

Politics with the soul of a church

US party conventions often look like Hollywood awards ceremonies, and Steven Spielberg was involved in the planning of the recent DNC. Hollywood has become an indelible part of US political culture.

Reagan, a former Hollywood actor, set new standards for how telegenic and entertaining presidents could be. Donald Trump may not be everyone’s idea of a great orator, but the former reality TV star is certainly a master of televised spectacles.

The tradition of preaching is an even deeper cultural source of US political rhetoric. With about 30% of Americans attending religious services regularly, the sermon is the most prevalent form of public speech in the US.

American preachers need to be compelling, given the level of religious competition, and church is where many future politicians first encounter the craft of public speaking. American political speeches often reflect the combination of uplift and warning found in preaching.

While evangelical Christianity is usually associated with the Republican Party, it is also in the DNA of Democrats because of the Civil Rights Movement and the black church. One of the standout speakers of the DNC was Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock, senior pastor of the same Baptist church in Atlanta where Martin Luther King Jr preached.

Warnock described Trump in biblical terms as a “plague on the American conscience”. But he also described a vote as “a kind of prayer for the world we desire for ourselves and for our children”.

Australia has no shortage of politicians who were raised as Christians and have Christian commitments. But unlike in the US, where even secular politicians must pay lip service to prayer, Christian politicians in Australia must adapt themselves to the secularism of Australian culture. This culture does not expect politicians to preach.

Strong speeches for weak parties

Michelle Grattan last week described Australian party conferences as “mind-numbing” compared with the “Hollywood extravaganzas” of their US counterparts.

But the spectacles at US party conventions testify to the weakness of American political parties. The Democratic and Republican National Committees have little power. Party organisations are localised and fragmented. They lack the central authority found in Australian parties, and the national convention every four years is the only time a nationwide party truly comes into existence.

Even in Congress, parties have few mechanisms for disciplining their members. Party leaders are forced to negotiate with their own side, not always successfully. Party conventions see an extravagant display of unity behind a newly nominated candidate. This is one of the few moments party unity is guaranteed.

While there is plenty of competition for power within Australian parties, in Australia it mostly takes place behind closed doors within party hierarchies. In the US, would-be legislators and executives need to campaign publicly to win the often brutal primary elections that earn them the party’s nomination.

Successful candidates must create their own personalised campaigns. They have help from local party organisations, which coordinate resources and volunteers, but they need much more than that. A candidate for national office must build their own coalition of donors that would dwarf anything a party could provide.

Hence the need for good speech-making. Competition for the attention of donors and voters is fierce, and a compelling speech is a vital way to stand out. This is especially true of candidates such as Barack Obama, who came from outside the party’s traditional power bases.

In Australia, inspirational speeches don’t have the same political currency. A system of strict party discipline, small preselection contests and short, relatively cheap election campaigns means candidates are rewarded more for other political skills.

The Australian advantage: debating

While a US politician might give a more entertaining stump speech than an Australian one, an Australian politician would probably perform better in any scenario that requires unscripted comments – especially a debate with an opponent.

Even superb US political orators can be underwhelming when they don’t have a script and a receptive audience. Congressional debates consist of prepared speeches with little direct engagement between opponents. There is no equivalent to Parliamentary Question Time, and holders of executive office (such as the president or state governors) aren’t even in the legislature.

While Congressional committee hearings can sometimes provide a simulation of the rowdiness we associate with Question Time, the structure of Congress isn’t conducive to debate in the same way.

The physical format of Westminster parliaments, with opponents facing each other directly, attests to an adversarial nature that was there from the beginning. The power of Gillard’s “misogyny speech”, which went viral globally, came partly from the way she delivered it straight into Tony Abbott’s face.

US Congress was designed differently. The framers of the Constitution loathed the idea of factions, and imagined a legislature made up of representatives who would negotiate with each other to find consensus. Congress in turn would have to negotiate with the president, who would rarely need to engage publicly with its members.

This may explain why, despite the routine brilliance of convention speeches, US presidential debates are so tedious and forgettable. Commentators who try to hype these debates by citing “great moments” from past debates inevitably reach for the same ancient zinger, “you’re no Jack Kennedy”, delivered by forgotten vice-presidential candidate Lloyd Bentsen in 1988.

The sad reality is that the most memorable and consequential presidential debate in living memory is the one we just saw, where Joe Biden performed so badly he ended his hopes of a second presidency.

In the land of the scripted, the teleprompter is king.

David Smith does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Why Americans do political speeches so well (and debates so badly)? – https://theconversation.com/why-americans-do-political-speeches-so-well-and-debates-so-badly-237314

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Phoebe Hart, Associate Professor, Film Screen & Animation, Queensland University of Technology

Ready to catch the latest screen hits for September? This month brings a fresh batch of content, including some older documentaries now streaming thanks to DocPlay and the new National Film and Sound Archive Player.

The first of these, Hearts of Darkness, is a timely watch as we await Francis Ford Coppola’s upcoming passion project, Megalopolis (and as Coppola continues to make headlines for kissing extras on the film’s set).

For those wanting a more contemporary take on documentary, Netflix’s The Man With 1,000 Kids tells the provocative story of a Dutch man who seems intent on fathering as many children as possible. And over in New Zealand, the newest season of The Traitors provides plenty of suspense and intense drama.

Enjoy the show!

Occupied City

DocPlay

Steve McQueen’s Occupied City juxtaposes two narratives: the Nazi occupation of Amsterdam and the COVID lockdown. Based on the book Atlas of an Occupied City, Amsterdam 1940–1945 by Bianca Stigter (McQueen’s wife), the documentary recites the names and addresses of Jewish families murdered by the Nazis while presenting contemporary footage of these locations, now marked by their mundane, everyday domesticity.

The film cuts to footage of the riots that took place in Amsterdam during COVID. McQueen appears to be drawing visual parallels between systems of state control.

Occupied City is a four-hour endurance that transforms watching into an excruciating visceral experience of witnessing. Streaming this film at home, one might pause, seeking escape from the weight of the images. But on the big screen, where I first saw it, there is no reprieve.

McQueen forces you to confront what it means to witness atrocity and do nothing. This cinematic endurance compels us to reckon with our own complicity, asking what it truly means to observe and act in a world still haunted by the echoes of this history. The unsettling parallels between past and present draw you into a discomforting reflection on how different forms of occupation shape urban life and memory.

– Cherine Fahd

The Traitors season two

Paramount+

The first season of murder-mystery reality show The Traitors NZ undid itself somewhat by casting a bunch of media personalities who’d known each other for years. This diminished some of the hit international franchise’s tongue-in-cheek drama, wherein the premise relies on the “traitors” in the group being able to trick the others into trusting them.

For the second season, once again hosted by Paul Henry in high-camp mode, the producers put their trust in the charm and idiosyncrasies of the general public. An impeccably cast collection of “normies” is placed in the picturesque Castle Claremont, on the aptly named Mt Horrible Road, and divided into faithfuls and traitors.

They undertake missions to accrue money for the prize pot, leveraging quickly-built relationships to their advantage. But the real pleasure is in watching everyday New Zealanders, many of whom are naturally very funny, enthusiastically lean into the show’s deceptions.

The season has good pacing, strong story beats and plenty of opportunity for players to shine. There’s no villain edit here (although the grinning Dungeons and Dragons game master Mark comes close to giving one to himself). With an awful lot of strategy – and a genuine sense that the game could go anywhere – season two is one of the strongest and funnest examples of New Zealand reality TV in years.

– Erin Harrington

Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker’s Apocalypse

DocPlay

Coinciding with the release of Frances Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis, DocPlay is currently screening Hearts of Darkness, a documentary about the making of Apocalypse Now (1979). In case you haven’t seen it, the war epic follows a US army officer serving in Vietnam as he is tasked with eliminating a rogue colonel who views himself as a god among Cambodian tribal people.

Hearts of Darkness is compiled, in part, from footage and recordings made by Coppola’s wife, Eleanor, as well as outtakes and fascinating new interviews. This documentary, which has won several prizes itself, tells the story of the long, complex and disorderly shoot in the Philippines that promised little of the prizewinning film that resulted from it.

Coppola’s aspirations were grandiose, and every day the shoot got bigger and more out of control. The chaos was intensified by Coppola’s intuitive, self-indulgent working methods. He shot “irrationally”. He wrote call sheets with “scene unknown”, encouraged drug-addled actors to improvise, and dithered about the ending.

Eleanor documents Frances’ doubts about completing the film he dubs “the idiodyssey” – and his fear of producing a pretentious flop. Everything that could go wrong does go wrong, from a typhoon that killed 200 people, to actor Martin Sheen suffering a heart attack.

This was film-making as war: a psychedelic, rock-and-roll war like Vietnam itself. And as Eleanor says, “there is a kind of powerful exhilaration in the face of losing everything”.

– Joy McEntee

Facing the Music

NFSA Player

Bob Connelly and Robin Anderson’s extraordinary 2001 documentary Facing The Music is one of many classic Australian films available to view via the new, low-cost National Film and Sound Archive (NFSA) Player.

This film is a candid portrait of the composer and teacher Anne Boyd and her radicalisation in the face of cuts to university funding by the Howard government. Set in the Department of Music at the University of Sydney, we move between footage of talented young music students and tense staff meetings where Boyd and her colleagues grapple with their growing budget deficit. They try to paper over the budget problems by teaching more classes and (excruciatingly) trying to secure external sponsorship. They work in crowded offices and teach in shabby buildings, but their dedication to their students shines.

In Boyd, Connelly and Anderson have the perfect protagonist for a story about the funding crisis in higher education. Boyd transforms from an academic who refuses to strike, because teaching is her “calling”, to staffing a picket line. But the budget deficit still looms – and Boyd and her colleagues face difficult choices.

Universities have only become more neoliberal in the years since this film was made. This beautiful film is a reminder that the university’s role as a place of knowledge is still worth fighting for.

– Michelle Arrow

The Man With 1,000 Kids

Netflix

This docuseries went gangbusters on Netflix not too long ago, unsurprisingly. It follows the exploits of a fecund fertility fraudster who employs the internet to promote his seminal services. It’s the kind of contemporary clarion call that was always going to make the streamer’s recommender system go nuts.

As well as advertising online, Jonathan Jacob Meijer spread his seed by combining regular trips to repositories around the world with travel and lifestyle vlogging on YouTube (an archive for which the producers must have cried tears of joy). The result: the Dutch citizen became the father of many, many children as far afield as Australia.

The series shows how Meijer deceived women with ticking biological clocks by being indispensable and accessible, even offering to donate his DNA “the natural way”. Going by the online pseudonym of “Viking”, Meijer was also able to exploit the desires of prospective parents seeking “top” genetic stock.

I appreciated the show’s empowering aspects as it closely follows the stories of victims. Many of the interviewees are loving and grateful parents who are understandably horrified by the situation. It’s great to see them band together with the collective goal of humbling Meijer’s hubris.

Overall, it’s a slick story with abundant plot twists and funny (if sometimes poor-taste) visual gags to boot. Maybe not entertainment for the whole the family, but a conversation starter for sure.

– Phoebe Hart

Michelle Arrow receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Cherine Fahd, Erin Harrington, Joy McEntee, and Phoebe Hart do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Nazi history, reality TV deception and the making of Apocalypse Now: what we’re streaming in September – https://theconversation.com/nazi-history-reality-tv-deception-and-the-making-of-apocalypse-now-what-were-streaming-in-september-237478

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

The advocacy group Muslim Votes Matter has put together a high-profile speakers list to launch its national campaign in Melbourne on Sunday, which is aimed at leveraging its influence for the federal election.

The group, formed earlier this year, is committed “to promoting political engagement and amplifying the voice of Australian Muslims”.

It does not intend to run candidates itself but will support those that align with its values and priorities.

Group spokesman Naser Alziyadat, a former lecturer and research fellow at Murdoch University, claimed that across Australia, there were more than 20 seats where Muslims could have the deciding vote.

“In the last 25 years, no federal government has been elected by more than a 15-seat margin. This positions us strategically to support candidates who prioritise our issues and challenge those who neglect our community,” he said.

At the Broadmeadows Town Hall launch, speakers will cover subjects ranging from conditions in Gaza, to the recent wins by Muslim candidates in the United Kingdom election, and the prospects of a hung parliament.

Wajid Akhter, a medical doctor working in the UK and a former assistant secretary general of the Muslim Council of Britain, representing The Muslim Vote UK, will “share the British election learnings with the Australian Muslim community to inform strategy and success”.

Bushra Othman, a surgeon from the Palestinian Australian New Zealand Medical Association (PANZMA) who did a three week medical mission in Gaza, will give her first-hand account of the situation there.

Nail Aykan, a former head of the Islamic Council of Victoria, from Muslim Voices of Calwell, will talk on the topic “Towards a Hung Parliament – there are no more safe seats”.

Among other speakers are Maha Abdo, CEO of Muslim Women Australia, Muahmmad Jalal, host of The Thinking Muslim podcast, and Umber Rind, a community health and anti-racism advocate who is a Yamatji Badimaya woman of Balouch cameleer ancestry.

Alziyadat said Muslim Votes Matter was “a beacon of cultural, linguistic, and professional diversity”. Its volunteers represented more than 20 different ethnic and cultural groups.

“Many of our volunteers are not Muslim, showcasing the inclusive and broad vision of our movement,” he said.

“As an independent, grassroots organisation, unaffiliated with any political party, our movement is dedicated to empowering the Australian Muslim and minority community to amplify our political voice.”

The Muslim community was the largest and one of the fastest-growing minority groups in Australia.

“Our collective voting bloc holds significant potential,” he said.

“MVM’s primary objective is to build strong partnerships with diverse community stakeholders to enhance political engagement and share resources.

“This effort will involve engaging the community through forums, workshops, campaigns, and digital platforms to encourage greater political participation and ensure representation at all levels of government.”

MVM national representative Ghaith Krayem said what had happened in Palestine in the last 10 months was “beyond reprehensible and we will not stop until the victims and all Palestinians receive the justice they so truly deserve.

“Part of that justice means holding our leaders accountable for their role in the plausible genocide unfolding in Gaza.”

Scott Morrison questions ASIO chief’s Hamas comment

Former prime minister Scott Morrison has questioned the comment by ASIO chief Mike Burgess that “rhetorical” support for Hamas would not be a problem for the security organisation.

Asked recently on the ABC if it was a problem for ASIO if a person had expressed any support or sympathy for Hamas, Burgess said: “If it’s just rhetorical support, and they don’t have an ideology or support for a violent extremism ideology, then that’s not a problem. If they have a support for that ideology, that will be a problem.”

In a Sky interview on Monday Morrison, who praised Burgess as an “outstanding” public servant, said he found the comment inexplicable.

He had worked with Burgess over a long period and many in different roles. He found the comment “completely inconsistent with what I would hear regularly from him over a long period of time.”

“The idea that any sympathy with Hamas, rhetorical or otherwise, somehow could be overlooked and you could get a leave pass to live long term in Australia – I can’t imagine that,” Morrison said, drawing a comparison with support for Stalinist purges or sympathy with Nazism. .

Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Advocacy group to launch national campaign on Sunday to ‘amplify’ Muslim political voice – https://theconversation.com/advocacy-group-to-launch-national-campaign-on-sunday-to-amplify-muslim-political-voice-237661

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Hellewell, Senior Research Fellow, The Perron Institute for Neurological and Translational Science, and Research Fellow, Faculty of Health Sciences, Curtin University

Plastic is in our clothes, cars, mobile phones, water bottles and food containers. But recent research adds to growing concerns about the impact of tiny plastic fragments on our health.

A study from the United States has, for the first time, found microplastics in human brains. The study, which has yet to be independently verified by other scientists, has been described in the media as scary, shocking and alarming.

But what exactly are microplastics? What do they mean for our health? Should we be concerned?

What are microplastics? Can you see them?

We often consider plastic items to be indestructible. But plastic breaks down into smaller particles. Definitions vary but generally microplastics are smaller than five millimetres.

This makes some too small to be seen with the naked eye. So, many of the images the media uses to illustrate articles about microplastics are misleading, as some show much larger, clearly visible pieces.

Microplastics have been reported in many sources of drinking water and everyday food items. This means we are constantly exposed to them in our diet.

Such widespread, chronic (long-term) exposure makes this a serious concern for human health. While research investigating the potential risk microplastics pose to our health is limited, it is growing.

How about this latest study?

The study looked at concentrations of microplastics in 51 samples from men and women set aside from routine autopsies in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Samples were from the liver, kidney and brain.

These tiny particles are difficult to study due to their size, even with a high-powered microscope. So rather than trying to see them, researchers are beginning to use complex instruments that identify the chemical composition of microplastics in a sample. This is the technique used in this study.

The researchers were surprised to find up to 30 times more microplastics in brain samples than in the liver and kidney.

They hypothesised this could be due to high blood flow to the brain (carrying plastic particles with it). Alternatively, the liver and kidneys might be better suited to dealing with external toxins and particles. We also know the brain does not undergo the same amount of cellular renewal as other organs in the body, which could make the plastics linger here.

The researchers also found the amount of plastics in brain samples increased by about 50% between 2016 and 2024. This may reflect the rise in environmental plastic pollution and increased human exposure.

The microplastics found in this study were mostly composed of polyethylene. This is the most commonly produced plastic in the world and is used for many everyday products, such as bottle caps and plastic bags.

This is the first time microplastics have been found in human brains, which is important. However, this study is a “pre-print”, so other independent microplastics researchers haven’t yet reviewed or validated the study.

How do microplastics end up in the brain?

Microplastics typically enter the body through contaminated food and water. This can disrupt the gut microbiome (the community of microbes in your gut) and cause inflammation. This leads to effects in the whole body via the immune system and the complex, two-way communication system between the gut and the brain. This so-called gut-brain axis is implicated in many aspects of health and disease.

We can also breathe in airborne microplastics. Once these particles are in the gut or lungs, they can move into the bloodstream and then travel around the body into various organs.

Studies have found microplastics in human faeces, joints, livers, reproductive organs, blood, vessels and hearts.

Microplastics also migrate to the brains of wild fish. In mouse studies, ingested microplastics are absorbed from the gut into the blood and can enter the brain, becoming lodged in other organs along the way.

To get into brain tissue, microplastics must cross the blood-brain-barrier, an intricate layer of cells that is supposed to keep things in the blood from entering the brain.

Although concerning, this is not surprising, as microplastics must cross similar cell barriers to enter the urine, testes and placenta, where they have already been found in humans.

Is this a health concern?

We don’t yet know the effects of microplastics in the human brain. Some laboratory experiments suggest microplastics increase brain inflammation and cell damage, alter gene expression and change brain structure.

Aside from the effects of the microplastic particles themselves, microplastics might also pose risks if they carry environmental toxins or bacteria into and around the body.

Various plastic chemicals could also leach out of the microplastics into the body. These include the famous hormone-disrupting chemicals known as BPAs.

But microplastics and their effects are difficult to study. In addition to their small size, there are so many different types of plastics in the environment. More than 13,000 different chemicals have been identified in plastic products, with more being developed every year.

Microplastics are also weathered by the environment and digestive processes, and this is hard to reproduce in the lab.

A goal of our research is to understand how these factors change the way microplastics behave in the body. We plan to investigate if improving the integrity of the gut barrier through diet or probiotics can prevent the uptake of microplastics from the gut into the bloodstream. This may effectively stop the particles from circulating around the body and lodging into organs.

How do I minimise my exposure?

Microplastics are widespread in the environment, and it’s difficult to avoid exposure. We are just beginning to understand how microplastics can affect our health.

Until we have more scientific evidence, the best thing we can do is reduce our exposure to plastics where we can and produce less plastic waste, so less ends up in the environment.

An easy place to start is to avoid foods and drinks packaged in single-use plastic or reheated in plastic containers. We can also minimise exposure to synthetic fibres in our home and clothing.

Anastazja Gorecki worked as a casual research assistant for the ‘Plastics and Human Health’ division of the Minderoo Foundation in 2021.

Charlotte Sofield and Sarah Hellewell do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Microplastics are in our brains. How worried should I be? – https://theconversation.com/microplastics-are-in-our-brains-how-worried-should-i-be-237401

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Erin Roger, Sector Lead, Atlas of Living Australia, CSIRO

Across Australia and around the world, citizen scientists are protecting species by recording sightings, surveying landscapes and collecting samples. No job is too big or too small. As wildlife ecologists, we are indebted to this army of volunteers.

Citizen scientists are everyday people, who are not necessarily experts but who conduct scientific research. There are more than 100,000 citizen scientists in Australia alone. As a nation, we’re the third-biggest contributor to the global citizen science platform iNaturalist. This is staggering considering our relatively small population.

We wanted to find out how citizen science data contributes to decisions by governments and conservation organisations about which species are at risk of extinction, and how they can be conserved.

One of the main ways to help conserve biodiversity is through species extinction risk assessments. These allow scientists and decision-makers to determine how threatened a species is and the best ways to protect it.

Because citizen scientists collect so much data on biodiversity, this information could dramatically improve our ability to accurately assess species. But how useful is citizen science data in achieving this goal? Our new research set out to answer this question.

While we found room for improvement, it’s important to recognise and celebrate the immense value of citizen science data. We would be lost without it.

5 types of citizen science data

Our first step was to summarise what types of data citizen scientists are collecting. We found five key types:

• evidence that a species occurs at a specific location (usually an image or sound recording including the date and time)

• evidence that a species has not been recorded at a specific location

• answers to a set of questions about a species and its environment

• physical samples such as scat (poo), soil or water samples

• collected stories or oral histories, including the voices of First Nations people.

We then considered each data type in terms of its use in addressing the globally accepted criteria for assessing extinction risk. The criteria are set by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), an international organisation devoted to nature conservation and the sustainable use of natural resources.

Room to improve

We found the data citizen scientists typically collect were often not what was most needed to assess extinction risk under IUCN criteria.

Meeting the criteria requires more than just a record of a species occurring at a given location. Detailed information such as geographic range, and evidence of population decline, is also required.

So simply encouraging citizen scientists to record more ad hoc observations of species is not the best way to inform threatened species listing. Unfortunately, this means the assessment process can’t always benefit from the great work being done.

People charged with assessing a species’ conservation status could make better use of citizen science data. While this wasn’t an explicit finding of the research, the IUCN recognises this. Its recent white paper examines how Indigenous and local knowledge could be better harnessed.

There are ways to ensure citizen science data is better used to inform IUCN assessments. They can include:

• planning projects from the outset to ensure the required data is captured

• asking citizen scientists to complete structured ecological surveys or collect specific samples

• integrating citizen scientist data with that collected by professional scientists.

But our research also revealed good news! We found new methods of data analysis – such as extracting population numbers – are helping scientists use citizen science more effectively.

Australian success stories: Fungimap and FrogID

Some citizen science projects in Australia are feeding into threatened species assessments. We described two of them in our research.

The first is Fungimap, which coauthor Jasmin Packer is involved with. Members record and map fungi through iNaturalist. These records have enabled threat assessments for at least 13 species.

In Fungimap, scientists have added extra information to the data collection fields – such as habitat and what the fungus is growing in (animal, soil or wood) – to make records more useful for assessing whether a species is threatened.

The second is FrogID, led by coauthor Jodi Rowley. It’s a free smartphone app that enables people to record frog calls. Frog experts then identify which species is making the call. More than one million frog records have been collected this way in about six years.

FrogID data helped scientists understand frog persistence after the catastrophic 2019–20 bushfires in southeast Australia. Several species, including the sphagnum frog, have now been listed as threatened using FrogID data alongside professional data.

In both projects, scientists review the images and sound recordings. This ensures their accuracy and means the data is more likely to be included in government databases. Professional scientists also tell citizen scientists what they need to help provide the knowledge needed to assess a species’ extinction risk.

Here’s how to get involved

Citizen science observations are now the largest source of open-source biodiversity data in Australia.
It’s important to ensure the data we’re collecting keeps growing.

There are many ways to get involved. The Australian Citizen Science Association website hosts a helpful project finder. You can search for projects in your local area, on a particular subject or theme, or focus on projects suitable for children or beginners.

Erin Roger is the former Chair of the Australian Citizen Science Association and is currently employed by the Atlas of Living Australia, at CSIRO.

Jasmin G Packer is Vice President of Fungimap Inc., a not-for-profit citizen science organisation for Australia’s native fungi, and a Research Fellow in the Environment Institute, University of Adelaide. Jasmin receives funding from state and local government, and not-for-profit environmental organisations, for conservation research with citizen scientists and local communities.

Jodi Rowley is the Lead Scientist of the Australian Museum’s citizen science project, FrogID. She has received funding from state, federal and philanthropic agencies.

Rachael Gallagher receives funding from the Australian Research Council and the Commonwealth Department of Climate Change, Environment, Energy and Water.

Thomas Mesaglio is currently employed by the Atlas of Living Australia, at CSIRO.

– ref. Citizen scientists can help save Australia’s threatened species if we give them more direction – https://theconversation.com/citizen-scientists-can-help-save-australias-threatened-species-if-we-give-them-more-direction-231606

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Susan Jordan, Associate Professor of Epidemiology, The University of Queensland

People who are taller are at greater risk of developing cancer. The World Cancer Research Fund reports there is strong evidence taller people have a higher chance of of developing cancer of the:

• pancreas
• large bowel
• uterus (endometrium)
• ovary
• prostate
• kidney
• skin (melanoma) and
• breast (pre- and post-menopausal).

But why? Here’s what we know, don’t know and suspect.

A well established pattern

The UK Million Women Study found that for 15 of the 17 cancers they investigated, the taller you are the more likely you are to have them.

It found that overall, each ten-centimetre increase in height increased the risk of developing a cancer by about 16%. A similar increase has been found in men.

Let’s put that in perspective. If about 45 in every 10,000 women of average height (about 165 centimetres) develop cancer each year, then about 52 in each 10,000 women who are 175 centimetres tall would get cancer. That’s only an extra seven cancers.

So, it’s actually a pretty small increase in risk.

Another study found 22 of 23 cancers occurred more commonly in taller than in shorter people.

Why?

The relationship between height and cancer risk occurs across ethnicities and income levels, as well as in studies that have looked at genes that predict height.

These results suggest there is a biological reason for the link between cancer and height.

While it is not completely clear why, there are a couple of strong theories.

The first is linked to the fact a taller person will have more cells. For example, a tall person probably has a longer large bowel with more cells and thus more entries in the large bowel cancer lottery than a shorter person.

Scientists think cancer develops through an accumulation of damage to genes that can occur in a cell when it divides to create new cells.

The more times a cell divides, the more likely it is that genetic damage will occur and be passed onto the new cells.

The more damage that accumulates, the more likely it is that a cancer will develop.

A person with more cells in their body will have more cell divisions and thus potentially more chance that a cancer will develop in one of them.

Some research supports the idea having more cells is the reason tall people develop cancer more and may explain to some extent why men are more likely to get cancer than women (because they are, on average, taller than women).

However, it’s not clear height is related to the size of all organs (for example, do taller women have bigger breasts or bigger ovaries?).

One study tried to assess this. It found that while organ mass explained the height-cancer relationship in eight of 15 cancers assessed, there were seven others where organ mass did not explain the relationship with height.

It is worth noting this study was quite limited by the amount of data they had on organ mass.

Another theory is that there is a common factor that makes people taller as well as increasing their cancer risk.

One possibility is a hormone called insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1). This hormone helps children grow and then continues to have an important role in driving cell growth and cell division in adults.

This is an important function. Our bodies need to produce new cells when old ones are damaged or get old. Think of all the skin cells that come off when you use a good body scrub. Those cells need to be replaced so our skin doesn’t wear out.

However, we can get too much of a good thing. Some studies have found people who have higher IGF-1 levels than average have a higher risk of developing breast or prostate cancer.

But again, this has not been a consistent finding for all cancer types.

It is likely that both explanations (more cells and more IGF-1) play a role.

But more research is needed to really understand why taller people get cancer and whether this information could be used to prevent or even treat cancers.

I’m tall. What should I do?

If you are more LeBron James than Lionel Messi when it comes to height, what can you do?

Firstly, remember height only increases cancer risk by a very small amount.

Secondly, there are many things all of us can do to reduce our cancer risk, and those things have a much, much greater effect on cancer risk than height.

We can take a look at our lifestyle. Try to:

• eat a healthy diet
• exercise regularly
• maintain a healthy weight
• be careful in the sun
• limit alcohol consumption.

And, most importantly, don’t smoke!

If we all did these things we could vastly reduce the amount of cancer.

You can also take part in cancer screening programs that help pick up cancers of the breast, cervix and bowel early so they can be treated successfully.

Finally, take heart! Research also tells us that being taller might just reduce your chance of having a heart attack or stroke.

Susan Jordan receives funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia

Karen Tuesley receives funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia.

– ref. Why are tall people more likely to get cancer? What we know, don’t know and suspect – https://theconversation.com/why-are-tall-people-more-likely-to-get-cancer-what-we-know-dont-know-and-suspect-235525

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Georgia Munro-Cook, Research Fellow in Sport and Disability, Griffith University

Much has been written about the success of women athletes at the 2024 Paris games, dubbed the first gender-equal Olympics with equal numbers of men and women competing.

However, the situation for the Paralympic games is much less promising.

Just 42% of athlete spots at the Paralympics will go to women (equal to the Tokyo games).

At the non-elite level, the situation is even worse.

In Australia, just 19% of women with disability are regularly involved in organised sport, compared to 34% of non-disabled women, and 27% of men with disability.

With nine years to go until the 2032 Brisbane Paralympics, these participation numbers are a significant concern.

Barriers for women with disabilities

The Australian government has invested in Paralympics Australia to improve their talent identification and pathway programs.

The goal is to build towards “Australia’s biggest ever team to achieve the nation’s best ever performance” in Brisbane 2032, according to minister for sport Anika Wells.

However, to meet this goal, Australian sport needs to address the major issues with the pathways, development and elite programs that are currently failing women with disability.

There are numerous reasons for this.

Women with disability tend to have less support to engage with sport, as many parents and medical professionals are highly protective and tend to underestimate their physical capabilities.

Consequently, they are harder to identify using traditional talent search methods, particularly in sports that may be more physical or involve contact.

In my ongoing research looking at the experiences of elite women para-athletes, one athlete revealed:

It’s been really hard to find more female athletes to take up the sport because it is quite a physical and difficult sport.

This is particularly true for women with high-support needs, who are even less likely to participate and are identified as a major gap in the Australian team.

The issue is at all levels of sport

The battle isn’t over when athletes get into the elite pathway.

Women with disability are often coached by male, able-bodied coaches, who have minimal understanding of disability. This can have a significant impact.

There are also concerns that women with disibility are more likely to receive inappropriate comments about their disability, gender or weight, or even sexual harassment from some male coaches.

Participants in my study also identified a lack of knowledge and limited research about disability sport.

One athlete said it’s “hard for [coaches or administrators] to set up [coaching] courses, say how to coach a para-athlete, when there’s not really much data.”

This was a particularly issue for sportswomen who require specialised equipment like wheelchairs or prosthetics, who have to rely on trial and error in their design.

Even national training facilities are not always accessible, respondents to my study identified, let alone grassroots facilities.

Indeed, women with disabilities often face specific accessibility challenges that are not taken into account by male-dominated disability studies and design. For example, the design of accessible toilets to accommodate menstrual issues and catheterisation (if the athlete is unable to completely empty their bladders).

Furthermore, while sport can be a place of inclusion and belonging, women with disability often experience bullying, anxiety, and exclusion, from coaches, administrators, and non-disabled parents and children.

As one respondent in my study said:

Most of us have been bullied somewhat or had rude or kind of mean comments.

In particular, some women with disabilities will avoid sports in which their body will be on display.

While the Paralympics may be a celebration of the diversity of bodies, at the lower levels, a more welcoming community must be developed to ensure a safe environment for women with disability.

Next steps

Key to creating a safe environment is the need to manage the mixed-gender training environments of many Paralympic sports.

While 8% of quota spots in Paris are ostensibly gender-neutral, in reality, sports like wheelchair rugby are significantly male-dominated (though Australia has a record three women competing in wheelchair rugby at the Paris Paralympics).

These sports are often not inclusive and haven’t adapted to ensure the safety of women.

Furthermore, though sports like wheelchair basketball are segregated at the Paralympic level, junior programs have boys and girls competing together. This is often to the detriment of the development of girls.

Training is often targeted to men, which one athlete suggested is a barrier: “I’m doing pretty much the same program as the para-men […] it’s quite hard to train together.”

Despite these significant issues facing women with disability in sport, most sport organisations do not have specific plans as to how to address this gender gap.

Instead, funding is often tied to one area of disadvantage (such as gender, disability, culture), without an understanding that people can have several disadvantages that need to be specifically addressed.

For Australia to have its most successful Paralympic games ever, we need to start thinking now about how we can change sporting cultures to better include women with disability.

I am a member of the Australian Gliders women’s wheelchair basketball team.

– ref. The Paris Olympics celebrated the gender-equal games. The picture isn’t so rosy for women Paralympians – https://theconversation.com/the-paris-olympics-celebrated-the-gender-equal-games-the-picture-isnt-so-rosy-for-women-paralympians-235773