Research Development Groups (RDGs)

What is a Research Development Group (RDG)?
RDGs develop out of individuals collaborating to develop a research funding proposal. Often, a group develops through shared expertise and interests or interdisciplinary work. Research Development Groups are the main drive for PHIRN activities with ideas and research questions being taken forward and developed into funding proposals. Below is a list of emerging or current RDGs. Further below is a section listing submitted grant applications and current funded studies.

Broad areas of interest
• Community and family influences on health and well being.
• Evaluation of national and local policy initiatives to promote health and well being.
• Peer approaches to adolescent health – tobacco control and sexual health.
• Tackling obesity by understanding the food environment – including school and community based food interventions.
• Tackling alcohol misuse – including adolescent binge drinking and preventing alcohol related violence.
Evaluating area based innovative policy or practice initiatives
• School-related health intervention research, looking at diet, general health promotion and health-promoting interventions as well as general well-being in schools.
• Environmental factors in health and well-being– how the built environment impacts on well-being and health, how it facilitates physical activity and how it offers access to healthy foods.
• Knowledge translation and evidence–based practice – how are research findings implemented in policy related decision making and how are these decisions and guidelines transferred into practice.

Emerging and current RDGs
1 . The use of ICT to promote children’s physical activity and harness related attitudes and ideas about it.
2 . Understanding Individual behaviour – and ecological approach to researching risky behaviours in young people?
3 . Evidence-based practice – how is research evidence used to inform policy related decision making related to well-being in young people (interested in both public health and educational policy)?
4 . Effectiveness of a school-based counselling service in promoting good mental health and a positive school ethos?
5 . What is the impact of leadership quality on school ethos and implementation/ outcome of health promotion?
6 . Exploring teaching styles in secondary education and their effect?
7 . Whole school approach to promoting health and well-being
8 . Resources invested and health outcome, following health promotion interventions i.e. healthy schools.
9 . Links between health outcomes and educational attainment, attitudes and behaviour (Healthy Schools)

Please contact the PHIRN team for further information on any of these groups.

Support from PHIRN for RDG development
The PHIRN co-ordinating team will support the development of RDGs, assist in project management and prompt to ensure that timelines are met. Through linkage with the rest of the R&D infrastructure in Wales and through links with the wider research community in the UK and internationally, PHIRN will act as a broker to identify and bring appropriate specialist expertise into RDGs.

Each RDG will have one individual responsible for their leadership, together with a deputy. RDGs could be of variable size, although normally less than 10 individuals. The main role of the RDG leader will be to drive the group forward towards research proposal submission and liaise with the PHIRN team regarding progress and support needs. Contact details of RDG leads will be posted on the website to provide opportunities for others to contribute to these groups.

If you

• have any questions about emerging RDGs,
• have a research idea you would like to discuss,
• are interested in leading or being involved in one of the RDGs listed or
• lead an existing group and seek additional contributions

please get in touch with us: Gabi Jerzembek (jerzembekg@cardiff.ac.uk; 02920 879161), Zoe Macdonald (macdonaldz@cardiff.ac.uk; 02920 76638) or Simon Murphy (murphys7@cardiff.ac.uk).

SUBMITTED BIDS
• Evaluation of a multi-component, family-based, lay-home-tutor intervention for reducing childhood obesity Potential funder: Food Standards Agency. Lead Applicant: Simon Murphy.

• Exploring the reciprocal relationship between the primary school and family food environments. Potential funder: Food Standards Agency. Lead Applicant: Simon Murphy.

• Supporting socially and emotionally vulnerable young people in schools: an evaluation of Barnardo’s Bounceback service. Potential Funder: WORD. Lead Applicant: Jeremy Segrott, Cardiff University.

• Cluster randomised controlled trial to test the effectiveness of an educational intervention to promote hand washing in reducing absenteeism in primary schools. Potential Funder: Research for Patient Benefit Programme (NHS – National Institute for Health Research). Lead Applicant: Rona Campbell (University of Bristol)

• Young people and representations of alcohol in the media. Potential funder: Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Lead Applicant: Norma Daykin (University of Bristol).

• Preventing Substance Misuse: Randomised Controlled Trial of the Strengthening Families 10-14 UK Programme. Potential Funder: National Prevention Research Initiative Phase 3. Lead Applicant: Laurence Moore (Cardiff University).

FUNDED STUDIES
•Evaluation of Parents Plus interventions offered by Flying Start, Cardiff. Welsh Assembly Government. Principal Investigator: Gabi Jerzembek, Cardiff University.

•Evaluation of an innovative environmental approach to reducing alcohol misuse and social diosorder. Medical Research Council. Principal Investigator: Simon Moore, Cardiff University.

•Secondary data analysis of data from evaluation of Free School Breakdfast Initiative. National Prevention Research Initiative. Principal Investigator: Laurence Moore, Cardiff University.

•Public Health Research Centre of Excellence. Centre for the Development and Evaluation of Complex Interventions for Public Health Improvement (DECIPHer). UK Clinical Research Consortium. Principal Investigator: Laurence Moore, Cardiff University with University of Bristol and Swansea University.

•Developing Health Challenge Newport as a resource for rigorous evaluation of community based health initiatives. Welsh Assembly Government, Principal Investigator: Rachel Clark, Cardiff University.

•Family approaches to substance misuse prevention. Alcohol Education Research Council. Principal Investigator: Jeremy Segrott, Cardiff University.

•Evaluation of the Cooking Bus Scheme. Welsh Assembly Government. Principal Investigator Jeremy Segrott, Cardiff University.

•Neighbourhood, social deprivation and mental health: the mediating role of social cohesion. Welsh Assembly Government. Principal Investigator: Eva Elliott, Cardiff University.

• Randomised controlled trial of Welsh National Exercise Referral Scheme (NERS). Welsh Assembly Government. Principal Investigator: Dr Simon Murphy, Cardiff University.

• Research into the impact of smoke-free legislation in Wales. Welsh Assembly Government. Principal Investigator: Professor Laurence Moore, Cardiff University.

• Social network analysis of the dynamic relationship between adolescent smoking behaviour and peer influence. Medical Research Council. Principal Investigator: Professor Laurence Moore, Cardiff University.

• The prevention of socioeconomic inequalities in health behaviour in adolescents in Europe. European Commission. Principal Investigator: Professor Laurence Moore, Cardiff University.

• Preventing disease through opportunistic, rapid engagement by primary care teams using behaviour change counselling. National Prevention Research Initiative. Principal Investigator Professor Chris Butler, Cardiff University.

• Researcher development Award for PhD research on Families, Households and Health Improvement. Department of Health and Welsh Assembly Government. Principal Investigator: Sarah MacDonald, Cardiff University

• Evaluation of the Welsh Network of Healthy Schools Schemes. Welsh Assembly Government. Principle Investigator: Dr Michael Shepherd, Cardiff University

• Feasibility Study for a Schools-Based, Peer-Led, Drugs Prevention Programme, based on the ASSIST Programme. Medical Research Council. Principal Investigator: Professor Mick Bloor, Glasgow University

• Feasibility study to develop and evaluate a peer-led intervention to increase physical activity and healthy eating. Department of Health. Principal Investigator: Professor Rona Campbell, University of Bristol.