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The purpose of this paper is to measure the levels of psychological distress in adults entering Western Australia (WA) as refugees through the Australian Humanitarian Programme. To determine if the introduction of mental health screening instruments impacts on the level of referrals for further psychological/psychiatric assessment and treatment.

Participants were 300 consecutive consenting refugee adults attending the Humanitarian Entrant Health Service in Perth, WA. This service is government funded for the general health screening of refugees. The Kessler-10 (K10) and the World Health Organisation’s post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) screener were the principal outcome measures used.

Refugees had a high rate of current probable PTSD (17.2 per cent) as measured with the PTSD screener and mean K10 scores were significantly higher than general population norms. The K10 showed high accuracy for discriminating those with or without probable PTSD. Being married and having more children increased the risk of probable PTSD. In regard to region of origin, refugees from Western and Southern Asia had significantly higher scores on both screeners followed by those from Africa with those from South-Eastern Asia having the lowest scores. Referral rate for psychiatric/psychological treatment was 18 per cent compared to 4.2 per cent in the year prior to the study.

This study demonstrates increased psychological distress including a high rate of probable PTSD in a recently arrived multi-ethnic refugee population and also demonstrates significant variations based on region of origin. In addition, it supports the feasibility of using brief screening instruments to improve identification and referral of refugees with significant psychological distress in the context of a comprehensive general medical review.

This was an Australian study conducted in a non-psychiatric setting. The outcomes of this study pertain to refugee mental health assessed in a general health setting. The implications of the study findings are of far reaching relevance, inclusive of primary care doctors and general physicians as well as mental health clinicians. In particular the authors note that the findings of this study are to the authors’ knowledge unique in the refugee mental health literature as the participants are recently arrived refugees from diverse ethnic groups.

The purpose of this project was to determine if consumers of Older People’s Mental Health (OPMH) recovering from depression and/or anxiety would benefit, in terms of a reduction in symptomatology and an increase in overall quality of life, from a group program approach.

The Active & Healthy Group Program was developed drawing on evidenced-based psycho-education, psychotherapy, cognitive behavioural therapy and research on the effects of diet and activity on well-being. The program consists of six weekly sessions, each consisting of 50 min of psycho-education followed by physical and social activity of similar duration. Pre-and post-testing was undertaken using the Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS), Kessler 10 (K10) and European Health Interview Survey-Quality of Life-8 Item Index. In addition, participants completed a qualitative post-group survey focussing on their evaluation of the group, strengths and suggested improvements. The pre- and post-group measures were subjected to statistical analysis.

According to pre- and post-test measures, the majority of group participants showed significant reductions in depressive symptoms and psychological distress (GDS and K10). This aligned with an overall increase in measures of quality of life (WHO QOL 8).

This paper contributes to the emerging evidence that older people are often open to education and change, given a friendly non-confrontational environment where evidence is presented that challenges the negative stereotypes so often put forward about old age. Given the nature of the outcomes, Active & Healthy, perhaps, has the potential to impact on service transformation to incorporate group work of this type as a valuable adjunct to core service provision.

Risky alcohol use can reduce productivity at work and impact employees’ mental health and wellbeing. Several risk factors converge in male-dominated industries, which can increase risky drinking and deteriorate mental health. This paper aims to explore the prevalence of risky drinking and psychological distress in a male-dominated industry compared with that in the general population.

Data were collected from four manufacturing sites in Australia. In total, 450 workers were invited to participate in a survey that measured drinking behaviours using AUDIT-C and psychological distress using the K10, along with demographics including age, gender, job role and ethnicity. The observed outcome measures were compared with general population data available through publicly available data sets.

Surveys were returned by 341 employees, of which 319 completed AUDIT-C. AUDIT-C and K10 scores were significantly correlated (R = 0.31, p < 0.0001). Hazardous drinking was more prevalent among workers than in Australian general population (66.1% vs 23.6%). Binge drinking was greater among workers than in the general population (25.4% vs 26.5%). The difference was higher among female workers than among male workers (35.1% vs 10.8%).

The findings of this study show a significantly greater risk of alcohol-related harm among workers in male-dominated industries compared with that in the general population. This risk is more pronounced among women, who also experienced greater rates of moderate and high psychological distress compared with those experienced by the general population. A fitness-for-work approach is proposed to minimise alcohol-related harm among workers in male-dominated industries. Moreover, male-dominated industries are proposed to consider the interconnectivity of other workplace health and safety factors.

This was a cross-sectional study to assess the psychological response to quarantine during COVID-19 pandemic and knowledge level about the disease among inmates of a Custodial Center in Enugu, Nigeria. A total of 66 new prison inmates were assessed for psychological distress using the Kessler Psychological Distress Scale (K10); and inmates’ knowledge about COVID-19 using a COVID-19 Knowledge Questionnaire developed by the researchers.

Participants had a mean age of 28.39±8.71 years; 63 (95.5%) were male inmates and 3 (4.5%) were female inmates. Sixty-one (92.4%) were awaiting-trial inmates, 43 (65.1%) had psychological distress, and 35 (53%) had completed at least secondary school. COVID-19 questionnaire mean score was 3.82±3.33. Thirty-one (21.8%) had adequate knowledge of COVID-19 (7-10 score), while 35 (53%) and 10 (15.2%) had poor (0-3) and average (4-6) knowledge, respectively. Adequate COVID-19 knowledge level was significantly higher among those that completed at least secondary school (48.6%) than those who did not (12.9%). Though not statistically significant, adequate COVID-19 knowledge level was commoner among those without psychological distress (43.5%) than those with psychological distress (25.6%).

Considering responses to specific questions contained in the questionnaire, knowledge about some questions was relatively high. For example, a majority of the participants 45 (68.2%) correctly responded that death can be a complication of COVID-19; whereas half of them 33 (50%) correctly responded that regular hand washing with soap and water can help prevent the spread of the disease. Nevertheless, responses to some questions showed poor knowledge about the disease as 18 (27.3%) correctly answered that COVID-19 can affect the lungs, while 20 (30.3%) correctly responded that COVID-19 is caused by a virus.

Our study highlighted the need to have all quarantined persons educated about the disease for which they are being quarantined. It also provided the opportunity to raise awareness of COVD-19 among the inmates.

Many university students in the UK experience mental health problems and little is known about their overall mental health literacy and help-seeking behaviours. The purpose of this paper is to ascertain levels of mental health literacy in UK university students and to examine whether mental health literacy is associated with better mental health outcomes and intentions to seek professional care.

A total of 380 university students at a university in the south of England completed online surveys measuring multiple dimensions of mental health literacy, help-seeking behaviour, distress, and well-being.

Mental health literacy in the students sampled was lower than seen in previous research. Women exhibited higher levels of mental health literacy than men and postgraduate students scored higher than undergraduate students. Participants with previous mental health problems had higher levels of mental health literacy than those with no history of mental health problems. Individuals were most likely to want to seek support from a partner or family member and most participants indicated they would be able to access mental health information online. Mental health literacy was significantly positively correlated with help-seeking behaviour, but not significantly correlated with distress or well-being.

Strategies, such as anonymous online resources, should be designed to help UK university students become more knowledgeable about mental health and comfortable with seeking appropriate support.

This study is the first to examine multiple dimensions of mental health literacy in UK university students and compare it to help-seeking behaviour, distress, and well-being.

Prisoners experience high rates of chronic physical health problems, poor mental health and high rates of substance misuse. However, little is known about what happens to prisoners after release from custody, except that many re‐offend and a disproportionate number die from drug overdose, suicide, accidents and other causes. Using a prospective design, 160 prisoners in Queensland, Australia were interviewed prior to release then 1 and 4 months post‐release. Most prisoners had a history of substance misuse and many reported poor mental health pre‐release. The prevalence of these problems was also high post‐release and there was a high degree of continuity of impairment. These findings add support to calls for (a) population‐level pre‐release planning and post‐release support for prisoners returning to the community, and (b) screening and targeted intervention for those most at risk of poor post‐release outcomes.

This research is based on the idea that interior elements leave a wide variety of impressions on their occupants and that some interiors are likely to have more positive impressions than others. These impressions are especially prevalent when an individual cannot leave their homes for extended periods. The architectural elements of an interior where people are isolated can mitigate the adverse psychological effects.

The study was conducted by surveying individuals under lockdown because of the COVID-19 pandemic. A total of 140 participants completed three different scales (GAD-7, K10, FTB Scale) to measure mental health problems often experienced in isolated and confined environments. Their responses were then associated with the interior environments of the participants.

Statistically significant relationships were identified between the reported interiors and the results of the psychological evaluations. The level of psychological distress was associated with Volume and Visual Variety factors. Susceptibility to generalized anxiety disorder was associated with Visual Variety and Airiness factors. Finally, free time boredom was associated with Volume, Visual Variety, and Airiness factors. The Furniture and Clutter factor did not significantly contribute to any of the psychological evaluations.

The study was performed in response to the severe lockdown measures taken in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It successfully highlighted the need for a rethinking of interior design approaches regarding the design for isolated and confined environments.

Being an efficient mechanism for the value of money, public–private partnership (PPP) is one of the most prominent approaches for infrastructure construction. Hence, many controversies about the performance effectiveness of these delivery systems have been debated. This research aims to develop a novel performance management perspective by revealing the causal effect of key performance indicators (KPIs) on PPP infrastructures.

The literature review was used in this study to extract the PPPs KPIs. Experts’ judgment and interviews, as well as questionnaires, were designed to obtain data. Copula Bayesian network (CBN) has been selected to achieve the research purpose. CBN is one of the most potent tools in statistics for analyzing the causal relationship of different elements and considering their quantitive impact on each other. By utilizing this technique and using Python as one of the best programming languages, this research used machine learning methods, SHAP and XGBoost, to optimize the network.

The sensitivity analysis of the KPIs verified the causation importance in PPPs performance management. This study determined the causal structure of KPIs in PPP projects, assessed each indicator’s priority to performance, and found 7 of them as a critical cluster to optimize the network. These KPIs include innovation for financing, feasibility study, macro-environment impact, appropriate financing option, risk identification, allocation, sharing, and transfer, finance infrastructure, and compliance with the legal and regulatory framework.

Identifying the most scenic indicators helps the private sector to allocate the limited resources more rationally and concentrate on the most influential parts of the project. It also provides the KPIs’ critical cluster that should be controlled and monitored closely by PPP project managers. Additionally, the public sector can evaluate the performance of the private sector more accurately. Finally, this research provides a comprehensive causal insight into the PPPs’ performance management that can be used to develop management systems in future research.

For the first time, this research proposes a model to determine the causal structure of KPIs in PPPs and indicate the importance of this insight. The developed innovative model identifies the KPIs’ behavior and takes a non-linear approach based on CBN and machine learning methods while providing valuable information for construction and performance managers to allocate resources more efficiently.

This study aims to examine mental health amongst two cohorts of single mothers in Australia before and after major social welfare reforms, which limited single parents’ access to welfare payments to encourage labour market participation.

The study analyses The Australian Longitudinal Study on Women’s Health, which surveyed 9,145 women born in the 1970s in 2003, and 8,346 women born in the 1990s in 2019.

Compared with other women of similar age, single mothers reported a higher prevalence of depression, anxiety, self-harm and suicidal thoughts and lower levels of mental health, although the magnitude varied between age groups and cohorts. This difference disappeared after controlling for socio-demographic characteristics. Mental health of single mothers improved relative to that of other women between cohorts (1970s cohort surveyed in 2003, aged 25–30 versus 1990s cohort surveyed 2019, aged 24–30) and within the same 1970s cohort (surveyed 2003 and 2018), all else equal. Single mothers from the 1970s cohort aged 40–45 years and those in the 1990s cohort aged 24–30 years old were more qualified and held better jobs than the 1970s cohort at aged 25–30. Stress-related to money, ability to manage on available income and experiencing domestic violence were negatively associated with mental health across all cohorts and ages. Social support had a strong positive association with mental health.

The study suggests low welfare payment to encourage greater labour market participation is associated with financial distress linked to poor mental health.

This study aims to investigate the behaviour of soft lattices, i.e. lattices capable of reaching large deformations, and the influence of the printing process on it. The authors focused on two cell topologies, the body-centred cubic (BCC) and the Kelvin, characterized by a bending-dominated behaviour relevant to the design of energy-absorbing applications.

The authors analysed the experimental and numerical behaviour of multiple BCC and Kelvin structures. The authors designed homogenous and graded arrays of different dimensions. The authors compared their technical feasibility with two three-dimensional-printed technologies, such as the fused filament fabrication and the selective laser sintering, choosing thermoplastic polyurethane as the base material.

The results demonstrate that multiple design aspects determine how the printing process influences the behaviour of soft lattices. Besides, a graded distribution of the material could contribute to fine-tuning this behaviour and mitigating the influence of the printing process.

Despite being less explored than their rigid counterpart, soft lattices are now becoming of great interest, especially when lightweight, wearable and customizable solutions are needed. This study contributes to filling this gap.

Only a few studies analyse design and printing issues of soft lattices due to the intrinsic complexity of printing flexible materials.