About the centre
The Centre for Healthy Sustainable Development (CHSD) conducts cross-disciplinary, inter-disciplinary, and trans-disciplinary research that links the UN Sustainable Development Goals to current, important, and complex policy issues in Australia and across the globe. Our focus is on the social factors, which are vital to understand, when addressing sustainable development. Our three main themes are: Health for All, Education for All, and Housing for All. Across research projects, we prioritise equity, inclusion and diversity. To ensure our research translates into meaningful action and innovation in the real world we explore multi-sector solutions that involve government (cross department), industry, non-government organisation (NGOs), and the wider community.
Associate Professor Clare Littleton,
Acting Deputy Centre Director
Associate Professor Littleton has an academic background in public health, communications and education. She has extensive experience working in high level health related roles, across NGO’s and the higher education sector, with a focus on teaching and research, health promotion, and communications. Associate Professor Littleton conducts research in the area of public health with a specific focus on children, social determinants of health, and public policy. Her research focusses on addressing complex policy issues through inter-disciplinary research, specifically public health and political science. Through her research she aims to bring about social change, address equity issues, and contribute to addressing the UN sustainable development goals.
Contact Associate Professor Clare Littleton for project partnerships or to learn more about our research centre.
Explore our areas of research
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Health for allIn this cluster we aim to contribute to reducing health inequities by tackling important and complex health policy issues of our time with the aim of improving health outcomes for all. Our research is linked to SDG Goal 3 Good Health and Wellbeing (SDG Goal 3) which aims to ‘ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages'.
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Education for allIn this cluster we aim to contribute to creating a society where, across the globe, all children, youth, and adults have equal access to quality education. We also explore the role of education as a vital component when tackling policy issues related to sustainable development, as education advances human capacity and empowers collective action to meet these challenges. Our research is linked to SDG Goal 4 Quality Education which aims to ‘ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all.
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Housing for allIn this cluster we aim to contribute to a more resilient and sustainable housing industry, and therefore more sustainable cities and communities. We do this by applying a multi-stakeholder approach where government and other sectors work together to find innovative solutions. By focusing on this area, we aim to explore innovative digital technologies that may provide solutions to housing shortages, including accessibility and affordability issues in Australia. Our research is linked to SDG Goal 11 which aims to ‘make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable. In particular we aim to address target 11.1 to ‘ensure access for all to adequate, safe and affordable housing and basic services and upgrade slums’.
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CollaborationCollaboration is the platform that underpins the three interdisciplinary research focus areas of the Centre; health, education and housing. By building on collaboration as our foundation, we link to SDG Goal 17 which aims to ‘strengthen the means of implementation and revitalise the global partnership for sustainable development’. To support the notion of partnership, our research is participatory and focuses specifically on innovative and multi-disciplinary forms of collaboration that are needed to address the socio-economic and environmental problematiques of health, education and housing.
Discover our live projects
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ARC Discovery Project: Rethinking Housing: Actor Network Analysis for Digital Collaboration“Rethinking housing” aims to understand persistent housing sector supply problems through analysis of digital collaborative practices. The housing sector has long been criticised for shortcomings in affordability, efficiency, quality, social and environmental responsiveness and appropriateness of offerings. This project expects to generate new knowledge for an emerging housing digital economy using interdisciplinary actor-network theory and data visualisation techniques.
Implementing equity-oriented antimicrobial resistance strategiesAnalysis of National antimicrobial resistance (AMR) policies and interviews with policy makers in Australia and Germany using a gender, health equity and social determinants of health lens. Members: Dr Clare Littleton is working on this project with Ms Victoria Saint and Professor Kayvan Bozorgmehr from School of Public Health at Bielefeld University, Germany.
Monitoring and Evaluation Framework: Impact21A research consulting project with strategic partner, Inclusion Foundation, which drives Impact21, a disability training program for young persons with Down Syndrome. Partnering with Inclusion Foundation over the past 18 months has provided the opportunity to plan, develop and validate a monitoring and evaluation framework.
Discover our partners
Our partnerships are national and international with organisations that align with our Be Good Principles. Partnerships are developed at an individual, group, centre and institutional level and align with our university research themes and build our reputation and profile.
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Institute of Integrated Infrastructure (III)The III is a community leader that catalyses, connects and critiques the knowledge and experience of integrated infrastructure thinking and methodologies within the Australasian property sector to drive continuous improvement and efficiency gains through the entire asset lifecycle. We educate, advocate and champion change in the property sector to deliver a sustainable, best-practice, forward-thinking industry to create healthy built environments.
Meet our researchers
Professor London is Deputy Vice-Chancellor Research at Torrens University Australia. She has published more than 200 peer reviewed
Dr Townsin undertakes research in Education and Health, and has a particular interest in intercultural communication and cultural
Dr Yue is a lecturer in Education. Her current research focuses on identifying the structural and agentic factors that affect international
Dr Philip Whiting
Dr Whiting FDIA MCSD is a leading researcher in the understanding and application of critical design thinking for innovation within future
Dr Roberto Azcui Aparicio
Dr Aparicio is a medical doctor with experience in clinical medicine, infectious disease management and program implementation,
Dr Scott Skipworth
Dr Skipworth researches the impact of the Internet of Things (IoT) on the embodied experience of the built environment, coining the term ‘Disseminating Embodiment’.
Dr Bok undertakes research in the interests of using futures research in creative and generative ways to achieve transformational impact in the contexts of complex problem situations.
Dr Pablo is a multidisciplinary researcher who uses interpretivist approaches, qualitative techniques and theories of socio-materiality,
Dr De Souza completed her doctorate at the National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore.
Dr Trish Powers
Dr Powers is a passionate educator and researcher in the field of Education. She has a background in Secondary Teaching and Event
Dr Selvanaayagam Shanmuganathan
Dr Shanmuganathan is a researcher, academician and trained medical doctor in the field of public health. Currently, he is a Public
Dr Ahsan specialises in the field of Business and Technology and has extensive managerial and technical experience. Over the years, he had the
Dr Fiona Chatteur investigates sustainability, e-learning, artificial intelligence, mixed methods research, and non-traditional research.
Dr Kadir with Psychology, Public Health and Social Marketing background works for health promotion through behaviour change.
Associate Professor Hannah is a health educator and researcher in Health Sciences.