"Man Up" Project

Professor Gregory Kolt from the School of Science and Health and Professor Anthony Maeder from the School of Computing, Engineering and Mathematics are part of a large team undertaking research into men’s physical activity and nutritional behavioural change. This project is supported by the Department of Health, Queensland.

‘Health and well-being is clearly linked to the everyday life and work experiences of all men and is becoming an increasingly important issue,’ says Professor Kolt. ‘Interventions delivered via the internet have emerged as a novel and popular promotion strategy with the potential for wide population reach, and could be a way to engage hard-to-reach groups such as middle-aged men. Although social media with a high degree of interactivity can be effective in communicating and producing behaviour change by promoting physical activity and healthy nutrition to the general population, the newer generation of web-based applications, including social networking websites, need to be studied to determine their effectiveness in terms of participant engagement and retention in physical activity and nutritional behaviour change.’

Based on a systematic review of current literature, this project will develop tailored e-health support materials for 2nd generation web-based applications including mobile-phones. These "apps" will be integrated into a community-based and supported intervention. Interest in workplace health and wellbeing on the part of community consortium members will provide an important conduit for the dissemination phase of the project which will take place after completion of the trial phase and involve the development of marketing plans to engage organisations in the launch of the program.

Health promotion programs can improve health and wellbeing, decrease medical and disability costs and reduce absenteeism from work. Increased general good health and fitness also improves mental alertness, morale and job satisfaction.

If you have an interest in working with top academics at UWS contact us at ip@uws.edu.au

The Research Consortium: Central Queensland University (administering institution), University of Western Sydney, the Australian E-Health Research Centre, and the CSIRO Centre for Human Nutrition. The research team is also supported by a variety of research, industry, government and non-government agencies.