Australian Content Research Articles

What is ‘children’s television’ in the streaming era?: Assessing content discoverability through Australian children’s streaming platform fluencies

In line with international trends, increasing numbers of children in Australia use streaming video platforms to watch television on-demand from extensive catalogues. Child viewers thus tend to negotiate platform interfaces organised by algorithmic curation to select content, rather than accessing content via scheduled linear TV. The deeper implications of this substantial shift in child audience habits around television have yet to be robustly reckoned with across scholarly and national policy approaches. Indeed, policy settings in Australia have not kept pace with these transformations, one result of which has been that 84% less Australian content was aired on free-to-air commercial broadcasters in 2022 compared to 2019. Key producer bodies fear the sector is in serious peril and may not withstand the current instability. Given that local children’s television meets Australian children’s best interests by situating them within their own socio-cultural context, the issue has become a site of significant policy, industry, and cultural concern. At this precarious time for the Australian children’s television sector, this article outlines key findings of a mixed method study with Australian children aged 7–9 ( n = 37) and their adult guardians to illustrate how children understand, identify, and discover ‘local’ and ‘children’s’ content on streaming platforms. This child audience research contributes to current policy and scholarly debates around the ‘routes to content’ audiences develop in the streaming era. A focus of our analysis is how and if children find Australian content. Our aim is to shed light on how ‘discoverability’ issues compound the current state of turmoil for the sector. We elucidate children’s digital fluencies with platform interfaces but highlight their limited cultural literacies with the content itself, which poses significant implications for industry and policy strategy around local content discoverability for child audiences on streaming platforms.

Mermaids and bin chickens: Australian teenagers’ engagement with screen stories in the on-demand age

Australian teenagers have grown up with abundant choices in digital screen entertainment including social media, gaming, and global streaming video services such as Netflix. This participatory audience study investigates how, why and to what extent Australian teenagers engage with drama and movies in their daily lives, including Australian stories. The research findings show that Australian teens enjoy watching long-form screen stories on their favourite streaming services and that on-demand delivery is critical to their viewing preferences. Although many remember with affection the Australian drama they watched as children, teens now place a low priority on a screen story being Australian. A sophisticated audience that particularly values diverse and inclusive representation, teens’ deprioritising of Australian content – and linear television – has profound implications for policy, for Australian screen production and for public service broadcasters the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the Special Broadcasting Service.

REVIEW: A fascinating, timely account of ABC ‘soft power’

International Broadcasting and Its Contested Role in Australian Statecraft; Middle Power, Smart Power, by Geoff Heriot. Melbourne, VIC: Anthem Press. 2023. 292 pages. ISBN 9781839985041
 In May 2023, Australia’s Minister for Foreign Affairs Penny Wong announced what she called a ‘transformational package of support’ for the Pacific, including money for infrastructure, security and criminal justice. It came amid growing competition with China in the Pacific. included in the package was a promise to ‘leverage’ Australia’s strengths, including broadcasting (and sports links), as part of an Indo-Pacific Broadcasting Strategy, enabling more Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) members to access Australian content. Australian external broadcasting was firmly back in the spotlight.

Sustained Decline of Direct General Practitioner Reporting of Adverse Drug Reactions in Australia and Paucity in Details of Australian Reports in Safety Advisories.

There have been substantial changes in the nature of reporting pathways and review of suspected adverse drug reactions (ADRs) in Australia since the establishment of the now defunct Advisory Committee on Safety of Medicines early in 2010. The aim of this study was to (1) examine the reporting in Australia of suspected ADRs from various sources, including general practitioners (GPs), since 1990; (2) compare the reporting of Australian GPs with that in two other countries (New Zealand and the United Kingdom [UK]) with comparable safety monitoring programmes for the period 2007-2019; and (3) explore the extent to which Australian reporting of suspected adverse reactions has motivated communication to healthcare professionals in the period 1995-2019. Annual reporting of sources of ADRs in Australia were obtained from Government reports, the Australian Statistics in Medicines and Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) websites. Details of the annual reporting by GPs in the UK were obtained from published sources and have been provided on request by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency. Details of the annual reporting by GPs in New Zealand were provided on request from the Centre for Adverse Reaction Monitoring. All issues of the Australian Adverse Drug Reactions Bulletin were accessed from the National Library of Australia, and issues of the Medicines Safety Update from February 1995 to December 2019 were accessed online from the TGA website. Each issue was searched to identify and score safety advisories. From 1990 to 2002 in Australia, overall reporting gradually increased, and the three major groups of reporters (GPs, hospitals and sponsors) each contributed about 30%. The relative contributions to reporting changed in the period 2002 to 2009. There was then a steep fall in reporting from GPs and the start of a very marked increase in reporting from product sponsors. GP reporting in Australia was lower than the two other comparable countries (New Zealand and the UK), and continues to fall, while in the UK at least, GP reporting is rising. The analysis of safety advisories shows a relatively stable Australian content from 1995 to 2008, followed by a sharp decline, so that by 2019 and 2020 there was barely any Australian reporting-driven content. In 1995 and 1996, Australian reports of suspected adverse reactions were the sole apparent reason for the publication of safety advisories. From 1997 to about 2008, Australian reports of suspected adverse reactions were the major reason for publication, but after this time, Australian reports became less important. During this later period, the apparent motive for publication of the safety advisory shifted to being based primarily on a publication in the medical literature, or publicity, but was sometimes based on an overseas regulator's advice or action, or action by a product sponsor. It is our contention that the decline in GP reporting in Australia and the current paucity in details of Australian reports in safety advisories are closely linked.

Leave events among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people: a systematic review

BackgroundLeave events are a public health concern resulting in poorer health outcomes. In Australia, leave events disproportionally impact Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. A systematic review was conducted to explore the causes of leave events among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and strategies to reduce them.MethodsA systematic review was conducted using Medline, Web of Science, Embase and Informit, a database with a strong focus on relevant Australian content. Additionally, we examined the references of the records included, and performed a manual search using Google, Google scholar and the Australia’s National Institute for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Research. Two independent reviewers screened the records. One author extracted the data and a second author reviewed it. To appraise the quality of the studies the Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool was used as well as the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Quality Appraisal Tool. A narrative synthesis was used to report quantitative findings and an inductive thematic analysis for qualitative studies and reports.ResultsWe located 421 records. Ten records met eligibility criteria and were included in the systematic review. From those, four were quantitative studies, three were qualitative studies and three reports. Five records studied data from the Northern Territory, two from Western Australia, two from New South Whales and one from Queensland. The quantitative studies focused on the characteristics of the patients and found associations between leave events and male gender, age younger than 45 years and town camp residency. Qualitative findings yielded more in depth causes of leave events evidencing that they are associated with health care quality gaps. There were multiple strategies suggested to reduce leave events through adapting health care service delivery. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander representation is needed in a variety of roles within health care provision and during decision-making.ConclusionThis systematic review found that multiple gaps within Australian health care delivery are associated with leave events among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. The findings suggest that reducing leave events requires better representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people within the health workforce. In addition, partnership with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people is needed during the decision-making process in providing health services that meet Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural needs.

The Origins of Food Supplied to an Australian Public Hospital.

Local food procurement by public institutions such as hospitals offers multiple benefits including stimulating the local economy, creating jobs, and building resilience within the food supply. Yet no published study has attempted to quantify the local food purchase by hospitals. This baseline is needed to identify gaps, set targets, and monitor change. The objective of this study was to investigate the origin of food supplied to a metro tertiary public hospital and to describe the proportion of food budget spent on items with ingredients grown in Australia and “locally” within the state of Victoria. Food procurement data were collected and analyzed during October 2020-April 2021. All items purchased by the cook fresh kitchen supplying meals to inpatients and two childcare centres during an 8-day menu cycle period were audited. Following an inspection of food packaging labels to determine country of origin, data on the proportion of Victorian content were collected from manufacturers and suppliers of foods containing Australian ingredient. Almost 80% of the food budget (AU $17,748 and 200 items) was spent on items containing significant (at least 75%) Australian content, while 11% was spent on entirely imported foods. The specific geographic origins of 55% of the budget spent on “Australian” food remain unknown as information from manufacturers and suppliers was not available. Where data were available, 3% of food budget was attributed to entirely Victorian grown foods, including fresh fruit, vegetables, and poultry. A considerable proportion of Australian grown foods are purchased by this hospital, but it is largely unknown whether these are local, from the state of Victoria, or not. Tracing and sharing of food origin data, a clear definition for “local” food, and an understanding of Victorian food growing industries are needed to progress the “local food to hospital” agenda.

Accrediting Indigenous Australian Content and Cultural Competency Within the Bachelor of Laws

The most recent version of the Council of Australian Law Deans Law School Standards calls for embedding Indigenous cultural competence in Australian law degrees as a matter of best practice. To support this work Universities Australia has produced several reports that establish a best practice framework for Indigenous cultural competence, which is reinforced by the Universities Australia Indigenous Strategy 2017-2020. Universities and law schools have a responsibility to drive this change, to be reflective, and to contribute to an expanding community of practice on Indigenous cultural competence in legal education. This paper explores how Charles Sturt University embedded Indigenous cultural competency across core curriculum content of the Bachelor of Laws. The authors provide a detailed explanation of the course pedagogical mapping and specific subject content that was submitted for institutional accreditation.

Methodological and technical considerations for video-based auditing of hand hygiene compliance in clinical practice: an exploratory study

Direct observation is the gold standard method for measuring hand hygiene compliance but its utility is increasingly being questioned. Various alternative electronic methods have been proposed, yet there is a paucity of research examining the use of these according to the World Health Organization's (WHO) '5 Moments for Hand Hygiene'. As a part of the process of developing a video-based monitoring system (VMS) capable of measuring hand hygiene compliance against the 5 moments criteria this paper reports methodological and technical issues that might arise from the use of a VMS for auditing in clinical practice. In-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted with 27 Australian content experts in hand hygiene auditing and infection prevention to explore their responses to proposed VMS auditing approaches. Transcripts were analyzed using thematic and content analysis. Technical and methodological considerations for the use of VMS were interrelated and included concerns surrounding privacy, footage security, fears of surveillance and the potential for medico-legal consequences. Additionally, possible detrimental impacts on healthcare worker (HCW) -patient relationships, issues of cost versus benefits, HCW and patient safety and changes to feedback were also identified. The primary methodological and technical issues to overcome in order to implement VMS for hand hygiene auditing in clinical practice, centered upon issues of acceptability to patients and health professionals, privacy, consent and liability. COREQ.

Facebook-Based Social Marketing to Reduce Smoking in Australia's First Nations Communities: An Analysis of Reach, Shares, and Likes.

BackgroundFacebook is widely used by Australia’s First Nations people and has significant potential to promote health. However, evidence-based guidelines for its use in health promotion are lacking. Smoking prevalence among Australia’s First Nations people is nearly 3 times higher than other Australians. Locally designed programs in Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services (ACCHOs) to reduce smoking often use Facebook.ObjectiveThis study reports on an analysis of the reach and engagement of Facebook posts with smoking prevention and cessation messages posted by ACCHOs in the Northern Territory, Australia.MethodsEach service posted tobacco control content at least weekly for approximately 6 months. Posts were coded for the following variables: service posted, tailored First Nations Australian content, local or nonlocally produced content, video or nonvideo, communication technique, and emotional appeal. The overall reach, shares, and reactions were calculated.ResultsCompared with posts developed by the health services, posts with content created by other sources had greater reach (adjusted incident rate ratio [IRR] 1.92, 95% CI 1.03-3.59). Similarly, reactions to posts (IRR 1.89, 95% CI 1.40-2.56) and shared posts (IRR 2.17, 95% CI 1.31-3.61) with content created by other sources also had more reactions, after controlling for reach, as did posts with local First Nations content compared with posts with no First Nations content (IRR 1.71, 95% CI 1.21-2.34).ConclusionsFacebook posts with nonlocally produced content can be an important component of a social media campaign run by local health organizations. With the exception of nonlocally produced content, we did not find a definitive set of characteristics that were clearly associated with reach, shares, and reactions. Beyond reach, shares, and likes, further research is needed to understand the extent that social media content can influence health behavior.

Home and Away vs Netflix: Inter-generational and Intersectional Asian Australian Viewing Patterns

ABSTRACT This article presents findings from interviews conducted with first and second-generation Asian Australian audience members as part of a project on the histories of television and migration in Australia. The data presented here is (a) testament to the agency of migrants in choosing what to watch beyond what might be expected on the basis of primordial markers such as ethnicity, and shows that factors such as generation of migration and education status play a significant role; and (b) differences in patterns, as well as influences between generations within a family unit. This means that the influence of cultural elements from parents or grandparents’ generations, as well as the impact of technology on younger viewers appears to be more marked. Additionally, in the case of the first generation, there is a noticeable desire to watch mainstream Australian content (such as Home and Away), where this usually changes to a longing to be ‘represented’ for subsequent generations. These trends, while not based on a representative sample, give us an indicative glimpse into shifts in migrant media cultures, and reinforce the need for an intersectional approach to audience studies. What this analysis contributes is the importance of foregrounding the relationality of viewing practices, especially in a migrant family setting.

Parliamentary Rights Scrutiny and Counter-Terrorism Lawmaking in Australia

This paper evaluates the impact of pre and post-enactment scrutiny of Australia’s counter-terrorism laws enacted from 2001 until 2018. Parliamentary scrutiny of rights-engaging laws is particularly critical in the Australian content, as Australia relies on a parliamentary model of rights protection at the federal level. The evaluation framework employed in this Paper considers a range of evidence to provide a holistic account of the impact of legislative scrutiny on the content, development and implementation of Australia’s counter-terrorism laws. This includes consideration of the legislative impact of scrutiny on the content of the law, the role scrutiny plays in the public and parliamentary debate on the law, as well as the hidden impact scrutiny, may be having on policy development and legislative drafting. The results are surprising. This study finds that parliamentary rights scrutiny, particularly by parliamentary committees, has had a rights-enhancing (although rarely rights-remedying) impact on the counter-terrorism laws. Further, this research finds that the hidden or behind-the-scenes impact of parliamentary scrutiny provides a particularly fertile ground for improving the rights-protecting capacity of the Australian legislative scrutiny system. These findings and the evaluation framework employed in this Paper have application and benefits for other jurisdictions seeking to understand and improve the quality of their legislative scrutiny regimes.

Creative destruction in the screen industries and implications for policy

This article traverses aspects of a personal journey of a humanities scholar, trained in traditional disciplines of textual analysis and aesthetic appreciation, working with evolutionary economics. Reflecting on a 2008 article for the Journal of Cultural Economics that hypothesised the importance of social network markets as a new definition of creative industries, the article notes how remarkably this had come to pass, with the emergence of social media entertainment. This new industry is based on previously amateur creators engaging in content innovation and media entrepreneurship across multiple social media platforms to aggregate global fan communities and incubate their own media brands. The implications of social media entertainment for screen policy, both through cultural and industry agency support and through regulation and programme innovation, are explored internationally as well as in the context of the current Australian Content and Children’s Review.

Applying a Midwifery Lens to Indigenous Health Care Delivery: The Contribution of Campus Learning and Rural Placements to Effecting Systemic Change.

Increasing cultural safety in health settings is essential to address stark health disparities between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. Respect for cultural knowledge, better communication, and recognition of racism as a determinant of health are required for improved service delivery. How this knowledge is acquired in health professional training and translated to clinical settings is poorly understood. Impacts of an innovative Indigenous health unit and remote clinical placements on knowledge acquisition and attitude change were explored among midwifery students to inform cultural competency initiatives in health professional training. A multiphased, mixed methods research design used surveys, observations, and interviews. Qualitative analysis was strengthened through triangulation with quantitative data. A unit conceived with substantial Indigenous Australian input and which privileged these voices enhanced knowledge and shifted attitudes in a positive direction; however, immediate gains diminished over time. Remote placements had a profound effect on student learning. Exposure to Indigenous Australians in classrooms and communities, and the self-reflection generated, helped dispel stereotypes and challenge assumptions based on limited cultural knowledge and contact. Optimization of receptivity to Indigenous Australian content and opportunities for remote placements contributed to students' developing cultural capabilities with implications for all health professional training. Whether this heightened awareness is enough to address institutional racism identified in health service delivery remains unanswered. The focus must include those established health practitioners and administrators who influence organizational culture if real systemic change is to occur. Given appropriate on-going support, graduates can play a vital role in expediting this process.

Australian screen studies: pedagogical uses of Australian content in tertiary education

ABSTRACTAustralian screen studies courses, including ‘Australian Cinema’, ‘Australian National Cinema’, ‘Australian Film’, and ‘Australian Film and Television’, among others, have long been offered in the creative arts, education, humanities and social sciences in Australian higher education. At the core of these courses’ curricula is viewing and studying movies, documentaries, and television programmes. However, despite recent research into broad curriculum models, there has been limited scholarly examination of pedagogical practices regarding the use of Australian screen content for teaching and learning purposes in these courses. The research investigates three key issues: how coordinators source and deliver Australian content for screening programmes; the views of the coordinators in relation to the relevance of an institutional film canon for pedagogy; and the coordinators’ perspectives on the importance of Australian screen history and the role it plays in pedagogy and curricula. The findings are drawn from 10 semi-structured interviews with the principal coordinators of undergraduate Australian screen courses at a range of universities across those states and territories that did offer undergraduate Australian screen courses.

Koalas, Kiwis and Kangaroos: The Challenges of Creating an Online Australian Cultural Dictionary for Learners of English as an Additional Language

This article reports on an online cultural dictionary for learners of English as an Additional Language (EAL) in Australia. Potential users studying English for academic purposes in an Australian university pre-entry program informed each stage of the dictionary's creation. Consideration was given to the need for such a dictionary; terms to be included; information necessary for each entry (including audio and visual material); use of a limited defining vocabulary; example sentences; notes on each term's usage; and evaluation of user feedback once the dictionary had been launched online. Survey data indicate that users particularly value the dictionary's ease of use, example sentences, and specifically Australian content (including pronunciation given in an Australian accent). It is suggested that more entries be added, and that cultural dictionaries be created for other varieties of English, as well as for other languages.

Re-thinking ancillary: Australian screen content in education

The use of Australian screen content in Australian schools and universities is undergoing rapid change due to digital and online distribution capacity on the supply side and digital and online affordance embedded in student cultures. This paper examines the ways in which Australian screen content and its distribution are beginning to adapt to educational usage. Issues facing content rights holders, distribution companies and emerging digital platforms reflect broad-based digital disruption patterns. Learning opportunities that can coincide with the growth in uptake of Australian screen content in Australia's education sector are not immune to the challenges posed by emerging digital consumption behaviours and issues of sustainability. At the same time, the growth in the use of digital and online screen content learning resources, under current copyright conditions, poses significant increases in the underlying cost structure for educational interests. This paper examines the innovations occurring in both the supply and the demand sides of Australian screen content and the expanded learning opportunities arising out of emerging digital affordances. Precedents in the UK are explored that demonstrate how stronger connections can be forged between nationally produced film and media content and a national curriculum. While addressing recent issues arising out of the Australian Law Review Commission's inquiry into copyright in the digital economy, the purpose of this discussion is not to assess policy debates about fair use versus fair dealing. What is clear, however, is that independent research is required that draws upon research-based evidence with an aim to better understanding the needs of the education sector against the transformative shifts taking place in digital-based learning materials and their modes of delivery.

‘A Fine Healthy Place’

This paper presents a close reading of Australian local newspapers The Queenslander, The Week, and The Logan Witness. It argues that by representing triumph over local challenges these newspapers also constituted a late-nineteenth-century civilizing process. They played a vital role in generating community cohesion. Stability and civilization were represented to the target audience of families and entrepreneurs as ‘natural’ and appropriately embodied by colonizers. Embedding a sense of belonging established a ‘civilising (sic) goodness’ through disavowal of the displacement of indigenous peoples as familiar community practices were enacted. In this highly literate population newspapers, rather than books, provided local Australian content. A case study of the Lahey family, who arrived as South East Queensland became available for serious settlement in the early 1870s, personalizes the settlement ideology produced by local newspapers.

The Right Stuff? The Original Double Jay as Site for Youth Counterculture

The Right Stuff? The Original Double Jay as Site for Youth Counterculture

Mapping More Than Aboriginal Studies: Pedagogy, Professional Practice and Knowledge

As undergraduate curriculum is increasingly required to meet a range of intellectual, professional practice and personal learning outcomes, what purpose does Australian Aboriginal Studies have in curriculum? Most Australian universities are currently in the process of developing institution-wide approaches to Indigenous Australian content in undergraduate curricula. One Australian university began this task by mapping how, where and why Indigenous perspectives, issues and content are included in undergraduate curriculum. This article reports on the findings of the mapping of Indigenous content and approaches to teaching at the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS) and thereby contributes to a strengths-based approach to understanding the purpose of Indigenous perspectives and issues in undergraduate curricula.

Developing Indigenous Australian cultural competence: A model for implementing Indigenous content into curricula

Cross-cultural understanding has been identified as an important graduate capability crucial for global citizenry, and most universities now include cultural skills or competence within their generic graduate capabilities. However, cross-cultural education and pedagogy are specialised areas and few academics are equipped, or have the confidence, to teach in this area. As a consequence, cross-cultural graduate capabilities are rarely effectively measured or assured. Despite these challenges, the Australian higher education sector is increasingly being called upon to Indigenise its curriculum and develop graduates with Indigenous cultural competence (Australian Universities Guiding Principles for Developing Indigenous Cultural Competency, 2011). This paper describes the approach used to introduce a unit into Curtin University's School of Nursing and Midwifery, in partnership with Curtin's Centre for Aboriginal Studies, with the aim of developing graduate Indigenous Australian cultural competence. Pedagogical approaches are discussed and an analysis of quantitative and qualitative data from the University's online student feedback mechanism provided. Results show that although the unit has provided the majority of students with a strong start on their journey to developing Indigenous cultural competence a single course is not sufficient and, consistent with the literature in the field, resistance to compulsory Indigenous content is evident. The paper considers some of the complexities of teaching Indigenous Australian content within a contemporary Australian university. In doing so, the paper explores what Indigenous cultural competency might be and how it might be achieved providing a useful model with application to other disciplines.