Research into the community impacts of climate disasters

A team of academics from Charles Sturt’s School of Psychology introduced a new assessment in 2024 for undergraduate and postgraduate subjects - PSY309 and PSY469 Qualitative Research Methods.

The teaching team implemented a new project, designed to be a genuine contribution to knowledge, something the teaching team have interest in researching, manageable for student assessment, not high risk ethically, and deliverable across 150 students and five cohorts. This concrete research task has been created around research undertaken in 2022 by academics from our School of Psychology that explored the direct experiences of young rural Australians, as a result of the catastrophic Australian Black Summer Bushfires that occurred in 2019/20.

The 2022 research involved young people making art and being interviewed, with quotes and art used to create an exhibition and booklet. The research question being addressed by PSY309 and PSY469 students is ‘How do climate visuals influence members of the public?’