| Rob Ranzijn was awarded his PhD on 'Successful ageing:
Paths to psychological well-being in older adults' in October 1998. He joined the
School of Psychology as a Lecturer in May 1998. Since then he has taught Research Methods
in the undergraduate BA degree, Research in Counselling in the Master of Counselling
degree, and Social Perception and Cognition in the Honours program.
In association with Professor Gary Andrews from the Centre for Ageing Studies, he
successfully tendered to the Office for the Ageing for funding to perform research into
productive ageing. The project, titled 'Ageing and the economy in South Australia:
Costs and benefits', involves a team of researchers and collaborators from the
University of South Australia, the Flinders University of South Australia, the University
of Adelaide, and the Council on the Ageing. It is anticipated that this project will be
completed in August 1999.
Rob Ranzijn is currently in the process of developing a SPIRT application to the ARC
for a large three-year research project into issues in ageing in Aboriginal communities.
The project will have two main focus. It will try to identify the constraints and barriers
to successful ageing in this group of older adults. The other main focus is on
intergenerational involvement, the relationships between aboriginal older people and
younger generations. It is hoped that elements of this involvement may inform the
development of a model of a 'Society for all Ages' in the wider community, which is one of
the aims of the United Nations International Year for Older Persons.
The SPIRT application will include funding for a PhD scholarship for an aboriginal
person and aboriginal research assistants. It is envisaged that the one of the outcomes of
the project will be trained indigenous researchers who can then continue to work towards
the advancement of aboriginal people.
In 1999 Rob will commence work on the development of an ARC grant application for
funding for research into the competencies of older people. This work is emerging out of
the Productive Ageing project, which has identified some of the barriers to full
participation of older people in the work-force, one of which is the perception of older
workers as being less competent than younger people.
His other research interests include ongoing work on psychological well-being and
statistical advances in causal analysis with longitudinal data using structural equation
modelling.
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