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PhD for Better food practices
Thursday, 5 November 2009SPH’s Nutrition lecturer and Master of Public Health Coordinator Lisa Schubert, has been awarded her PhD by the University of Queensland. Her thesis, entitled ‘Diet and Domestic Life in 21st Century Australia: An Exploration of Time and Convenience in Family Food Provisioning’, represents an investigation of dietary practices and household food strategies in ‘time-poor’ households.
The thesis reconceptualises trends in contemporary dietary practices, focusing on family households where time available for food provisioning is limited.
Dr Schubert’s research has advanced thinking about how food and nutrition policy makers can better understand the needs of those responsible for family food provisioning and those dependent on this food work.
“Contemporary evolution in food habits is occurring at the same time as we, as a society, are negotiating complex changes in gender roles, work patterns, family life and food systems.
“Increasingly convenience foods and services play a part in shaping family diets. This has happened not only because of the pressure of scheduling time for family food provisioning, but also because of the evolving concept of what constitutes ‘proper meals’,” said Dr Schubert.
Dr Schubert encourages public health researchers to understand the new practices in food consumption to better support the target audience.
“We need to attempt to understand the big picture, and how all this comes to bear on everyday decision making, if we are going to succeed in addressing some of the public health nutrition issues that we are now facing.
“Having come from a background in community nutrition work, I brought to academe an interest in promoting more socially engaged nutrition sciences and qualitatively-driven nutrition research that could foreground the everyday aspects of food and eating and its related social processes.”
The PhD was conferred on the 16th of October 2009.
More information:
Dr. Lisa Schubert
Ph: 043 793 4693.
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