3MT entry summaries

WINNER AND PEOPLES’ CHOICE, School heat

3MT^® title

Capacity and treatment refusal: how law does and should deal with the case of anorexia nervosa?

Thesis title

Capacity and treatment refusal: how law does and should deal with the case of anorexia nervosa?;

Summary

My thesis investigates a difficult issue for capacity law: the adult with anorexia nervosa (anorexia) who refuses feeding treatment. The way the law currently works means that anorexia patients may always be denied the right to refuse treatment, including in situations in which this denial can be considered cruel and discriminatory. Using a critical analysis of the legal concept of capacity - including a case study - I will develop an argument as to how an anorexic patient's capacity should be assessed by the law, incorporating an increased recognition of their rights and interests.

WINNER, School heat

3MT^® title

Addressing climate change causes and effects

Thesis title

Addressing climate change causes and effects on agriculture, land use, and energy: case studies of South Asian economies

Summary

The relationship amongst climate change, agriculture, land use, and energy are multi-directional and complex. The causes and effects of climate change create ecologically unbalanced economic growth in the world putting developing regions in particular at high risk. Thus the key challenge is to feed a massive population while preserving the environment and ensuring an ecologically balanced economic growth path. This thesis examines the use of a variety of policy interventions in addressing climate change causes and effects on agriculture, land use, and energy sector.  The study consists of three empirical papers using the computable general equilibrium modelling to focus on a comparative analysis of different countries in South Asia using policy scenarios aimed at tackling various aspects of climate change.

PEOPLE’S CHOICE WINNER, School heat

3MT^® title

Retreat. Restore…refresh

Thesis title

Exploring the role of corporate retreats in restoring directed attention

Summary

The capacity of employees to focus attention on work tasks is becoming progressively endangered and diminished due to information overload and increased competing demands. As focusing attention is crucial in order for employees to be able to perform tasks competently, organisations have a responsibility to restore and not merely deplete this resource. Attention Restoration Theory posits that restorative environments effectively replenish fatigued cognitive faculties. This research will explore whether retreats designed for religious workers improve mental and social wellbeing. Three questionnaires will be completed by participants (before, during and after the retreat) along with 25 participants completing follow-up interviews.

3MT^® title

Size really does matter!

Thesis title

Essays in event legacy and leverage

Summary

Events are viewed by destination marketers as seed capital that can be used to generate tourism benefits. However, much of the research around developing tourism leveraging strategies have been developed around mega-events and apply them to small scale events. However, contingency theory suggests that not all strategies can be equally applied to organisations of different sizes. Therefore, it is unlikely that tourism leveraging strategies developed for mega-events such as the Olympic Games can be equally applied to smaller events. This study therefore examines the applicability of leveraging strategies developed around mega-events on small-scale events.

RUNNER-UP WINNER, School heat

3MT^® title

Smuggling of unaccompanied minors: protection vs deterrence

Thesis title

Smuggling of Unaccompanied Minors: Protection, Deterrence, and the Effectiveness of International and Domestic Legal Frameworks

Summary

My PhD examines the smuggling of unaccompanied minors. It explores the causes, levels and characteristics of the phenomenon and analyses relevant international and domestic laws and practice in five selected jurisdictions, being Australia, Austria, Italy, South Africa, and the United States. The goals of my PhD are to document and analyse the phenomenon at global and national levels, examine existing laws and other measures aimed at preventing and combating the smuggling of unaccompanied minors, and develop strategies and recommendations for law reform in order to ensure the protection and humane treatment of minors in the irregular migration process.

3MT^® title

Exploring relationships between Chinese tourists' cultural values and engagement in nature-based activities

Thesis title

The influence of Chinese cultural values and environmental attitudes on behaviour in nature-based tourism contexts

Summary

China has become the second largest source market of international visitors to Australia. The most important drivers of Chinese visitor demand are Australia's natural resources. The popularity of these natural settings has created substantial interest in understanding the values, attitudes and behaviours of nature-based tourists. Chinese cultural values have unique characteristics and dimensions. However, most of the discourse on tourist behaviour in natural settings has focused on Western attitudes and values about the relationships between humans and the environment. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to investigate how Chinese cultural values influence Chinese tourists' environmental attitudes and behaviours.

WINNER, School heat

3MT^® title

The Food, the Bad and the Ugly

Thesis title

Buyonics: Predicting Consumer Channel Choice Preference

Summary

Plunging share prices, dramatic market share shifts and the worst losses in corporate history would not normally be expected in a mature, defensive sector, yet this is the current scenario in food retail.

A plethora of new smaller format stores crowd high streets, stations and garage forecourts; discounters are upping the ante; online grocery languishes with 5% market share, and the consumer is shifting away from long entrenched shopping habits.

This thesis examines the motivating and situational factors driving contemporary grocery channel choice to develop a comprehensive, integrative and predictive model of channel choice amongst five primary grocery channel formats.

3MT^® title

Playing up: alcohol in community sport clubs

Thesis title

Playing Up:  Minors negotiating alcohol consumption settings in senior teams in community sport clubs

Summary

With up to 30% of some senior community sport club teams being made up of under 18-year-old players, it is important that we consider the alcohol consumption culture of sport clubs. Minors are having to negotiate alcohol consumption rituals and norms as a part of senior sport teams. It is important that we understand which alcohol consumption behaviours and rituals in the sport club have greatest effect on the decision to consume alcohol or not. By understanding this we can create community sport club settings that allow minors to participate in senior sport teams without feeling pressure to consume alcohol.

3MT^® title

Using Power to get your way at work: Does gender matter?

Thesis title

Predicting rewards and punishments at work: The role of stereotype beliefs and sources of interpersonal power

Summary

In spite of academic research and social change efforts, women continue to be under-represented in positions traditionally associated with social, economic and political power within the Western world. Existing research has largely focused on institutional barriers such as care responsibilities, and hours of work, or on psycho-social factors such as organisational commitment, and leadership aspirations. This work extends these areas of research by drawing on stereotyping frameworks of social psychology, combined with management theories of behaviour to explore the ways in which the (in)compatibility between expectations of power seeking behaviour and gender can have implications for social and economic measures of career outcomes for both men and women.