30 Jan JSGS Population Health Policy Lab is Funding Cutting Edge Active Living Research

Posted at 15:41h in Research by
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The Population Health Policy Laboratory (PHPL) at the Johnson Shoyama Graduate School of Public Policy at the Universities of Regina and Saskatchewan is seeking competitive applications for Masters, Doctoral and Post-Doctoral degrees from candidates interested in conducting cutting-edge active living research using ubiquitous tools such as smartphones.

PHPL is currently implementing SMART, which is a mobile health and citizen science methodological platform for active living surveillance, integrated knowledge translation, and policy interventions.

As part of the SMART Platform, researchers at PHPL are engaging with citizen scientists via their smartphones to implement multiple studies with varied study designs (e.g. cross-sectional, longitudinal, randomized trials) across different jurisdictions. The SMART Platform provides the flexibility to engage with participants (i.e., citizen scientists) in real-time to capture rich data on active living. The studies utilize mixed-methods approaches to understand not just the quantity of physical activity, but also where, when, how, and more importantly, why populations are active and/or sedentary. This ability to collect comprehensive active living data is achieved by triangulating traditional surveys with ecological momentary assessments deployed via smartphones and mobile sensors, including global positioning systems, accelerometers, pedometers, and WIFI networks.

Successful candidates will be provided funding to complete their research during full time enrolment (2 years for Master’s and Post-Doctoral candidates and 4 years for Doctoral candidates).

Interested candidates should contact Dr. Tarun Katapally: Tarun.katapally@uregina.ca or Tarun.katapally@usask.ca. To find out more about the SMART Platform, you can directly contact the SMART Team at smart.study@uregina.ca

Funding for the SMART Platform is provided by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Saskatchewan Health Research Foundation