Dr Jane Rich

What are your research interests?

  • Mental Health and Wellbeing
  • Workplace Health and Safety
  • Gender and Health

Why did you get into research?

I love learning and communicating. I think health research is an incredibly important aspect of all of our lives. To be able to contribute to this is very rewarding. 

What would be the ultimate goal for your research?

To highlight the importance and fragility of our own mental health and wellbeing, to constantly remember the relationship between mental health and physical health and to conduct research in the most holistic way possible so as to incorporate the environment, the physical and the emotional in our assessments of human health.  

Biography

Dr Jane Rich is a health qualitative researcher with the Centre for Resources Health and Safety and the Centre for Rural and Remote Mental Health. 
She has a background in Human Geography and Public Health. Jane's research interests explore how human health and well-being is linked with the environment. Jane works in a variety of areas currently including; rural and remote mental health, chronic disease and mental health, health service model evaluation, qualitative study designs and supervises PhD students. 

Dr Rich has a background in Human Geography and Public Health. For 8 years she worked on the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health. Jane's PhD research drew on innovative methods to explore women's experiences of drought in Australia. Jane's research interests explored how human health and well-being is linked with the natural environment. 

Her analytical expertise ranges a spectrum of qualitative methods. Dr Rich has conducted Content, Thematic, Narrative and Longitudinal qualitative analyses. She has also conducted mixed methods analyses, linking both qualitative and quantitative data together for a holistic approach to research. For example, in her PhD interviews were linked with geo-coded national rain fall data. She has advanced skills in using computer assisted software tools for qualitative analysis (Leximancer and Nvivo) as well as experience with manual processes.

Future Focus

Ensuring workplaces understand the important of employee wellbeing, particularity in those industries where there are unique challenges or risks to employee safety or mental health.

Specialised/Technical Skills

  • Analytical expertise ranges a spectrum of qualitative method
  • Content, Thematic, Narrative and Longitudinal qualitative analyses
  • Mixed methods analyses, linking both qualitative and quantitative data together for a holistic approach to research
  • Advanced skills in using computer assisted software tools for qualitative analysis (Leximancer and Nvivo)
  • Interviews, focus groups and analysis with existing data sets including free-text comments from surveys 
  • Qualitative methodologies and service evaluation

Affiliations