Participate in research studies

Flinders University researchers are exploring the experiences, knowledge and attitudes of psychologists when providing care to people with insomnia.

If you are a registered psychologist currently working in Australia, your ideas and experiences could help shape new models of care for people with insomnia.

Participation involves a 30-60 minute video conferencing or telephone interview.

To express your interest:

This project will investigate the psychological empowerment of child protection practitioners (anyone who works in a role that offers support to vulnerable children) and its influence on how practitioners engage with systemic innovations.  

Psychological empowerment refers to an individual’s sense of meaning, impact, self-determination and competence in relation to their work role.

These factors may impact how practitioners respond to changes introduced into the system, such as state reforms. This project is supported by Flinders University, College of Education, Psychology, and Social Work.

In this two-part study you must complete both parts successfully within 24 hours to receive your payments.

For Part 1, you will study 3 magazine-style articles. The next morning you will receive a code for a $5 Woolworths Gift Card for completing Part 1. If you are eligible, you will also receive a link to Part 2. You must complete Part 2 within 24 hours of Part 1. For Part 2, you will study 3 more articles and then your memory for all 6 articles will be tested using multiple-choice questions.

Note, only people with a Flinders University login can participate in this survey.

The study will involve thinking about a negative event in your life.

We strongly suggest that if you believe you may be overly distressed by thinking about a negative event that you DO NOT participate in this experiment.

What happens during the study?

Participants can choose to either do a face-to-face or an online experiment. Participants will be asked to pay attention to any thoughts about their negative autobiographical event and complete a series of relevant questionnaires and a daily diary for a one-week period.

How long will it take?

Approximately 2 hours over the course of a week.

Register your interest

Register your interest via the email below and you will be contacted with more information about the study.

Find out more about our current PTSD treatment trials.

The study will involve thinking about a negative event in your life.

We strongly suggest that if you believe you may be overly distressed by thinking about a negative event that you DO NOT participate in this experiment.

What happens during the study?

Participants can choose to either do a face-to-face or an online experiment. Participants will be asked to pay attention to any thoughts about their negative autobiographical event and complete a series of relevant questionnaires, thought monitoring and a computer task.

How long will it take?

The face-to-face experiment will take an hour to complete. The online experiment will take less than 40 minutes to complete.

Register your interest

Register your interest via the email below and you will be contacted with more information about the study.

Find out more about our current PTSD treatment trials.

This survey will help us discover how COVID-19 has affected people living in different areas of South Australia.

It asks questions about your activities, your work, and your living situation. By asking questions about more than just health, we can get a better idea of how well people are really doing.

We hope this information can help improve the lives of South Australians both during and after COVID-19.

This study will explore how end-user characteristics influence levels of digital readiness, by looking into the relationship between technological experience, digital skills and digital health literacy levels from within a sample of the Australian population. This research will attempt to understand if digital health literacy levels impacts how end-users are able to successfully use, access and understand online health information resources.

We are aiming to find out what are the levels of digital health literacy in a group of people taken from the general population, if specific characteristics influence how easy or how difficult it is to use health information websites and to try and find out if there are specific features of website design that could help improve the experience for everyone accessing and using these types of online resources.

You are invited to complete an anonymous online survey about how, where and why you use the internet for your everyday needs. The survey will ask some demographic questions that will provide some categories for analysis of the survey data. We will then ask you about your internet behaviour generally, attitudes towards technology and how you look for online health information.

You also will be asked to participate in an online activity that will require you to follow a link to a different website and to complete a task that will involve you ‘dragging and dropping’ words into categories. This activity will allow us to compare how individuals with different characteristics complete the same task and if, or how it is done differently.

The survey and activity should take approximately 30 minutes to complete, and please forward the details to anyone you think might want to participate.

If you have any questions or would like to request a paper copy of the survey, please email Amanda Adams: amanda.adams@flinders.edu.au

This project aims to find out what motivates shopping behaviour. If you agree to participate in the research study, you will be asked to complete an online study, respond to questions about your shopping behaviour and complete an applied shopping task.

Note, only people with a Flinders University login can participate in this survey.

The study investigates the relationship between music, mood, and food preferences. Participants will listen to music, complete some cognitive tasks, and make a number of food selections.

Participants will also complete a few questionnaires (including questions about dieting behaviour and self-regulation).

Note, only people with a Flinders University login can participate in this survey.

This project aims to:

1. Examine how a concussion affects sleep in the days following the injury.
2. Examine whether sleep disruption is present in people suffering from the lingering effects of concussion (post-concussion syndrome, or ‘PCS’).  

In order to help us better understand how concussion affects sleep, sleep will be measured in a group of people how have experienced a concussion with in the previous 7-days, and again 6-weeks after the concussion. The results from this group will be compared to age, gender, and fitness matched people who have not experienced a concussion before.

If you agree to participate, regardless of whether you have experienced a concussion or not, you will be asked to undertake two (2x) overnight sleep studies in your home (known as polysomnography), as well as a concussion assessment. You will also be asked to wear a research grade activity tracker for 2 weeks following both sleep studies.

To participate in this study, or find out more, please email:

This project will investigate comparative opinions, views and perceptions of consumers when they search, read or view news in traditional and social media, about companies or organisations in a crisis. The context is COVID-19 crisis and government communication on social media/traditional media. This project aims to cross investigate media sources and response channels, for exploring crisis communication believability with the digital age consumer through social media/traditional media.

If you agree to participate in the research study, you will be asked to respond to questions regarding your views about current COVID-19 crisis communication by government in social media/traditional media.

The survey will take about 15 minutes and participation is entirely voluntary.

Please use the link below to access the information sheet for the study. If you wish to participate after reading the information, click through to complete the questionnaire.

If you have any questions, please email akhi0005@flinders.edu.au

We are looking at the end-of-life needs of people with long-standing physical disabilities, such as Cerebral Palsy, spinal cord injury or acquired brain injury. We would like to better understand what their physical, social and emotional needs were, as well as what your needs were as a family member. We define end-of-life as within the last 12 months of the person’s life.

This research will be important in making sure that end-of-life care for people with long-standing physical disability is meeting their needs. We also need to provide  information for family members and service providers about these needs.

We will be conducting one-on-one interviews with family members which are expected to last about 60 minutes over the phone or via a videoconferencing platform, such as Skype.

Participate by contacting Dr Irene Belperio

We know that drinking alcohol increases the risk of breast cancer, but we don’t understand how the environment influences alcohol use, particularly for women. 

We need your help to collect screenshots of alcohol advertising on social media and websites.

This will help researchers from Flinders University to understand the exposure and type of alcohol advertising that is present in the online environment.

It takes about 5 minutes to upload the photograph or screenshot and answer a few questions.

This will be the first study to explore the impact of COVID-19 on youth sport in South Australia. The spread, mortality rate and global impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has forever impacted sport in the lives of children and young people. In line with “social distancing” principles as stipulated by the Australian Government, there is a significant risk that sporting clubs and organisations may cease to exist in the event of a long-term hiatus. It also means that a generation of young people may be lost to sport because of the global disruption to sport. We already know that sport dropout rates for adolescents is high. It is higher among girls. This is concerning given that participation in sport plays a key role in a healthy lifestyle and youth sport is a recognised government priority.

The aim of this project is to investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on South Australian sport from the perspective of youth participants (15-18 years) and key stakeholders (sporting leaders such as CEO’s, presidents and parents).

Participate by taking the survey (about 10 minutes)

Adelaide Institute for Sleep Health researchers are seeking individuals to participate in new home-based treatment studies for insomnia.

This study will assess whether certain characteristics and behaviours help to explain the link between social media use and eating disorder risk in young people. It will also investigate young social media users’ thoughts on whether and how using social media impacts on how they think and feel about their appearance.

You will be asked to complete online questionnaires relating to demographics, social media use, perfectionism, self-objectification, appearance comparison, self-criticism, body image, and disordered eating. You will also be asked several questions about your opinion on whether and how using social media affects your thoughts and feelings about your appearance.

The total study will take approximately 30 minutes of your time.

Please use the link below to access the letter of introduction and information sheet for the study. If you wish to participate after reading this information, click through to complete the questionnaires after reading those documents.

If you have any questions please email madelaine.devalle@flinders.edu.au

The aim of the project is to identify markers in blood that reflect the activity of important proteins that are involved in determining a person’s exposure to drugs. 

The extent and duration to which an individual is exposed to any drug is a key factor in determining the effectiveness of the drug and how well the drug is tolerated; insufficient exposure may lead to a loss of effectiveness “therapeutic failure”, while excessive exposure may cause “adverse effects” and reduce tolerability.

If you decide to be involved in this study you will be asked to:

• Attend the study site for about 7 hours on three occasions over two weeks (on Study Days 1, 8 and 15).
• Attend the study site for about 15 min on another 4 occasions over the same two weeks.
• Undergo an evaluation at the first visit which will include an interview, measurement of blood pressure and other vital signs, and an examination of your heart (including an ECG) and lungs.
• During each full visit (Day 1, 8 and 15) take small oral doses of a commonly used sedative drug (midazolam), and a cholesterol lowering drug (pravastatin).
• During each full visit (Day 1, 8 and 15) have an intravenous cannula inserted. This will usually be over the elbow crease, from which blood will be drawn (in total approximately 150mL or 10 tablespoons of blood will be removed over the course of each 6 hour visit).
• During each short visit (Days 3,5, 10 and 12) have a single blood sample collected via a small needle.
• During each visit, a urine and saliva sample will be collected.
• Over a 14 day period between the 1st and 3rd study visits (Days 1 to 14) take a daily dose of rifampicin (an antibiotic drug that induces expression of the enzyme of interest in the current study). The chosen dose (600mg daily) is a standard dose for a typical adult being treated for an infection.
• At the commencement of each study visit a pregnancy test will be conducted. If at any time a pregnancy test reveals a confirmed positive result, exposure to any study medication will be reported in accordance with ICH GCP practices.
  In addition, the first thirteen participants enrolled in this study will be undertake a sub-study that involves two additional full study visits (Day -1 and Day 14).
• During each additional full visit (Day -1 and 14) a medical doctor will administer a small intravenous dose of a commonly used sedative drug (midazolam).
• During each full visit (Day -1 and 14) have an intravenous cannula inserted. This will usually be over the elbow crease, from which blood will be drawn (in total approximately 150mL or 10 tablespoons of blood will be removed over the course of each 6 hour visit).

What is the study about?

This project aims to assess how people process conflict in real-life relationships.

Who can participate?

Anyone currently in a relationship whose partner is also willing to participate.

What happens during the study?

Participation commences when either you or your relationship partner feels in some way wronged by the other. The wronged partner will log onto a website and fill in a survey about the event. The wronged partner will also provide some details to prompt the partner about the event, who is then asked to complete a survey about this. You will each, individually, fill in a survey every 2 days, totalling 4 surveys. The surveys will ask about your thoughts and feelings regarding the event, and about your partner and yourself.

How long will it take?

Each survey will take approximately 20 minutes, totalling 80 minutes for all 4 surveys. A monetary reimbursement for your time spent to participate in this study will need to be collected at Flinders University (details provided upon completion). For more information, and to provide informed consent

For further information and to provide informed consent

Flinders University is looking for people who have had an abortion in the last 12 months to share their experiences of accessing health services. Understanding experiences of talking to health professionals about contraception and unwanted pregnancy can help us to improve the way people are supported to decide for themselves if and when to have children. This study is also wanting to hear how the COVID-19 pandemic might have affected how people access contraception and abortion services.

You can participate if:

• you have had an abortion in South Australia in the last 12 months
• you are currently over 18 years old.

By taking part in this study, you will be asked to complete:
A short 5-10 minute online questionnaire.

On completion of the questionnaire you will have the option of volunteering to take part in a 40-60 minute telephone or Zoom interview.

For further information and contact

For further information about this project, including aims and benefits of the project, data storage and remuneration, please see the Participant Information Sheet at the web link below.