The University of Queensland Archives

Program Overview

This XSeries Program has been designed to influence, empower and educate a wider population to improve the health and healthcare of people with intellectual disability.

Worldwide, 60+ million people with intellectual disability experience poor health, die prematurely and receive inadequate healthcare. You will gain an understanding of the barriers and enablers for people with intellectual disability, their families, and their healthcare providers.

In our courses, you will learn about best practice in the field of intellectual disability healthcare and gain knowledge to improve health outcomes for this disadvantaged group.

What you will learn

What is the experience of people with intellectual disability around the world, what barriers do they face, and how do they overcome these?
What are their healthcare needs and how can good health be promoted?
What health conditions do they commonly experience and how can these be assessed and managed?
What influence do other factors such as ageing and epilepsy have on their health?
What mental health issues do they have and how can these be recognised and managed?
What are some of the ethical and legal issues that are of particular relevance to them?

Program class list

Learn, from personal stories, the daily life and challenges faced by those with intellectual disabilities.

Learn how to help those with intellectual disability achieve better health.

Gain an understanding of mental health issues and ethical decision-making for people with intellectual disability.

Meet your instructors

Miriam Taylor

Miriam is the former Education Coordinator at the Queensland Centre for Intellectual and Developmental Disability in the School of Medicine at the University of Queensland. She has a wealth of educational design experience for multi-users including people with intellectual disability, their families, disability organisations and health practitioners. Miriam has established an ongoing international collaboration with and is an invited contributor to the first World Disability Report for the World Health Organisation.

Nicholas Lennox

Nick is the former Director of the Queensland Centre for Intellectual and Developmental Disability at the University of Queensland. He is a researcher, educator, advocate and clinician and has specialised in the health of adults with intellectual disability since 1992. He is trained in general practice, and has developed interventions to improve the health of people with intellectual disability.

About This Course:

This health course will focus on the mental health issues of people with intellectual disability.

You will learn about the complexities of diagnosing mental health issues in people with intellectual disabilities and the types of disorders, assessments, screenings, and treatments used. There will also be a special focus on the legal and ethical complexities in health practice with patients who often require substituted consent.

This course is open to anyone, but will be of particular relevance to those in the field of advanced medical, allied health, and disability. It can also be used as workforce education for professionals who are interested in mental health.

What You’ll Learn:

mental health issues and disorders
mental health assessments and screenings
challenging behaviors
treatments
legal and ethical issues

XSeries Program in Intellectual Disability Healthcare

Understand the barriers and enablers

Through My Eyes - Intellectual Disability Healthcare around the World

Well and Able - Improving the Physical Health of People with Intellectual Disability

Able-Minded - Mental Health and People with Intellectual Disability

3 Courses 4 Months 1 - 2 Hours per week

Complete Program $159.30

Program Details

Meet Your Instructors:

Nicholas Lennox

Nick is the former Director of the Queensland Centre for Intellectual and Developmental Disability at the University of Queensland. He is a researcher, educator, advocate and clinician and has specialised in the health of adults with intellectual disability since 1992. He is trained in general practice, and has developed interventions to improve the health of people with intellectual disability.

Miriam Taylor

Miriam is the former Education Coordinator at the Queensland Centre for Intellectual and Developmental Disability in the School of Medicine at the University of Queensland. She has a wealth of educational design experience for multi-users including people with intellectual disability, their families, disability organisations and health practitioners. Miriam has established an ongoing international collaboration with and is an invited contributor to the first World Disability Report for the World Health Organisation.

About This Course:

This health course will examine the specific physical health issues that affect people with an intellectual disability including, oral health, syndrome specific health issues, health communication, especially for non-verbal patients, sexual health, and interactions between tertiary and primary healthcare systems. There is a special section on complex care including issues associated with aging and spasticity, and the health impacts of epilepsy.

This course is open to anyone, but will be of particular relevance to those in the field of medical, allied health, and disability. It can also be used as workforce education for medical professionals in this field.

What You’ll Learn:

common health conditions
health assessments and health promotion
oral health
syndrome specific health issues
complex care associated with aging, epilepsy and spasticity

XSeries Program in Intellectual Disability Healthcare

Understand the barriers and enablers

Through My Eyes - Intellectual Disability Healthcare around the World

Well and Able - Improving the Physical Health of People with Intellectual Disability

Able-Minded - Mental Health and People with Intellectual Disability

3 Courses 4 Months 1 - 2 Hours per week

Complete Program $159.30

Program Details

Meet Your Instructors:

Nicholas Lennox

Nick is the former Director of the Queensland Centre for Intellectual and Developmental Disability at the University of Queensland. He is a researcher, educator, advocate and clinician and has specialised in the health of adults with intellectual disability since 1992. He is trained in general practice, and has developed interventions to improve the health of people with intellectual disability.

Miriam Taylor

Miriam is the former Education Coordinator at the Queensland Centre for Intellectual and Developmental Disability in the School of Medicine at the University of Queensland. She has a wealth of educational design experience for multi-users including people with intellectual disability, their families, disability organisations and health practitioners. Miriam has established an ongoing international collaboration with and is an invited contributor to the first World Disability Report for the World Health Organisation.

About This Course:

This health course focuses on the stories of people with intellectual disabilities around the world, as well as their families and supporters.

You will learn about the challenges and aid received in healthcare for people with intellectual disabilities, including their experience of specific syndromes and communication difficulties, and how they stay healthy.

Learners will also hear from family members as they discuss complex care, rare syndromes, early death, and planning for independence. The end of the course will focus on the history of treatment, the impact of rights’ movements on healthcare delivery, common health conditions, and health promotion.

This course is open to anyone, but will be of particular relevance to those in the field of advanced medical, allied health, and disability. This course can also be used as workforce education for medical professionals in this field.

What You’ll Learn:

Insights into the daily life of those with intellectual disabilities and their families
Challenges and obstacles experienced and how these are overcome
Specific healthcare needs and how to promote good health for people with an intellectual disability

XSeries Program in Intellectual Disability Healthcare

Understand the barriers and enablers

Through My Eyes - Intellectual Disability Healthcare around the World

Well and Able - Improving the Physical Health of People with Intellectual Disability

Able-Minded - Mental Health and People with Intellectual Disability

3 Courses 4 Months 1 - 2 Hours per week

Complete Program $159.30

Program Details

Meet Your Instructors:

Nicholas Lennox

Nick is the former Director of the Queensland Centre for Intellectual and Developmental Disability at the University of Queensland. He is a researcher, educator, advocate and clinician and has specialised in the health of adults with intellectual disability since 1992. He is trained in general practice, and has developed interventions to improve the health of people with intellectual disability.

Miriam Taylor

Miriam is the former Education Coordinator at the Queensland Centre for Intellectual and Developmental Disability in the School of Medicine at the University of Queensland. She has a wealth of educational design experience for multi-users including people with intellectual disability, their families, disability organisations and health practitioners. Miriam has established an ongoing international collaboration with and is an invited contributor to the first World Disability Report for the World Health Organisation.

About this course

This course systematically explores the effectiveness of the law and justice system from a psychological perspective. By experiencing a fictional case first hand, you will learn about the psychology of law and some of the misconceptions commonly held about criminal justice.

What you’ll learn

How to identify some of the myths about how the criminal justice system works from a psychological perspective
The empirical evidence that can inform our understanding of criminal justice
How to improve how justice is administered

Meet Your Instructors

Blake McKimmie

Associate Professor at The University of Queensland Blake won a Faculty Teaching Excellence Award in 2010 and a University of Queensland Teaching Excellence Award in 2016. He currently teaches a large introductory psychology course and a second year elective about psychology and law. His research focuses on jury decision-making including the influence of gender-based stereotypes and the influence of different modes of evidence presentation. He is also interested in group membership and attitude-behaviour relations and how group membership influences thinking about the self.

Barbara Masser

Professor, School of Psychology at The University of Queensland Barbara is a the inaugural Australian Red Cross Blood Services Chair in Donor Research and a Professor in the School of Psychology at the University of Queensland. She has over 80 papers, book chapters and reports examining applied social psychological problems. Barbara is Australia’s leading researcher examining the psychology of blood donation and she works with the Australian Red Cross Blood Service to promote effective donor recruitment and retention strategies

Mark Horswill

Professor, School of Psychology at The University of Queensland Mark is a professor in the School of Psychology at the University of Queensland. He has over 100 research publications examining how we can apply scientific psychology to address real world problems, such as road accidents, medical errors, and the unreliability of eyewitness testimony. His team developed the hazard perception test used in Queensland for driver licensing, as well as a patient observation chart that has been recommended for use in all Queensland hospitals, and is being piloted nationwide. He was voted to be the top three (out of approximately 2500) lecturers at the University of Queensland in the Lecturer of the Year competition run by UniJobs in 2009.

About this course

Have you ever wondered what causes mental illness, or why we react to stress the way we do? Or what to expect as you get older?

Clinical psychology is the study of psychological disorders and the treatments designed to improve the day-to-day lives of people suffering from them. The focus of the course will be on common psychological disorders, such as schizophrenia, and the symptoms of each. We will also discuss the underlying role of stress and how it affects people mentally and physically. We will also consider more general issues and theories around personality and intelligence.

You should take this course if you want to better understand psychological disorders and how we can treat them.

What you’ll learn

Common psychological disorders including anxiety, mood disorders and Schizophrenia
Treatments for psychological disorders
How stress affects us and how we cope
Theories about personality and intelligence
What normal ageing is

XSeries Program in Introduction to Developmental, Social & Clinical Psychology

Understand why we think and behave the way we do

Introduction to Social Psychology

Introduction to Developmental Psychology

Introduction to Clinical Psychology

Introduction to Psychological Research Methods

4 Courses 7 Months 1 - 2 Hours per week

Complete Program $356.40

Program Details

Unfortunately, learners from one or more of the following countries or regions will not be able to register for this course: Iran, Cuba and the Crimea region of Ukraine. While edX has sought licenses from the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) to offer our courses to learners in these countries and regions, the licenses we have received are not broad enough to allow us to offer this course in all locations. EdX truly regrets that U.S. sanctions prevent us from offering all of our courses to everyone, no matter where they live.

Meet Your Instructors

Blake McKimmie

Associate Professor at The University of Queensland Blake won a Faculty Teaching Excellence Award in 2010 and a University of Queensland Teaching Excellence Award in 2016. He currently teaches a large introductory psychology course and a second year elective about psychology and law. His research focuses on jury decision-making including the influence of gender-based stereotypes and the influence of different modes of evidence presentation. He is also interested in group membership and attitude-behaviour relations and how group membership influences thinking about the self.

Nancy Pachana

Professor at The University of Queensland Nancy Pachana is a practising clinical geropsychologist and neuropsychologist. Her research focuses on older adults and spans a range of clinical neuropsychological topics such as anxiety in later life, early assessment of dementia, and improving training in geriatric mental health service provision.

Vanessa Cobham

Senior Lecturer at The University of Queensland

Vanessa Cobham is a practising clinical psychologist. She is a Principal Research Fellow at the Mater Research Institute and a Senior Clinical Psychologist in the Child and Youth Mental Health Service in the Children’s Health Queensland Health and Hospital District. Her research focuses on child and adolescent psychopathology, the impact of natural disasters on children, adolescents and families, and the impact of disaster-related post-natal maternal stress on children’s development.

About This Course:

This course is part of the Leadership in Global Development MicroMasters program. In order to get the most out of this course, we recommend that you have experience working in the development sector or a strong interest in this area. We also recommend that you complete the other three courses that make up the Leadership in Global Development MicroMasters program: Leaders in Global Development, The Science and Practice of Sustainable Development, and Adaptive Leadership in Development.

There is a vast array of different arguments about what development is and how development can be achieved. A leader in development must be able to understand, appreciate, evaluate and broker between differing and sometimes conflicting perspectives and ideas.

In this course you will develop skills in critical thinking and analysis, while being introduced to some of the contemporary debates and current challenges facing development practice. The wide variety of topics covered will also give you a sense of the diversity of issues that development encapsulates. Learners are encouraged to reflect on their own ideas and practice, and share their perspectives with other learners and the course team.

Each module in the course focuses on a contemporary topic in the development field. Within each module you will engage with key readings that argue different perspectives on the same topic. Interviews with the author complement these readings. Some of the authors we interview include Philip McMichael (Cornell University), Doug Porter (Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs, Australian National University), Blessings Chinsinga (The University of Malawi), Naila Kabeer (London School of Economics and Political Science), and Rachel Glennerster, (The Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab, MIT).

What You’ll Learn:

• To identify the key arguments in academic papers
• To identify different methodological and conceptual approaches to research
• To compare and contrast different perspectives in development
• To evaluate the merits of different arguments
• To apply these different perspectives to practice and discuss their implications

Meet Your Instructor:

Mark Moran

Professor and Chair of Development Effectiveness, Institute for Social Science Research at The University of Queensland Mark has a unique background of technical and social science research with a degree in civil engineering and a PhD in geography and planning. He is closely affiliated with the Aboriginal Environment Research Centre. His career spans across academia, nonprofits, government and consultancy.

About This Course:

This course is part of the Leadership in Global Development MicroMasters program. In order to get the most out of this course, we recommend that you have experience working in the development sector or a strong interest in this area. We also recommend that you complete the other three courses that make up the Leadership in Global Development MicroMasters program: Leaders in Global Development, The Science and Practice of Sustainable Development and Critical Development Perspectives.

Being a leader in development means working in complex and challenging contexts. Projects rarely run as planned, and managers need to be flexible and adaptive in their approach.

This course will teach you the skills to tackle complex problems in developing – and developed – countries. You will learn how problems in development contexts are always complex – no matter how simple they may appear at first. You will learn strategies for how to dig deeper into the problem and come up with solutions that address the real issues. You will learn techniques and practical tools for understanding local context, and ways to lead effectively. This course will also expose you to the disconnect between policy and practice.

To complement our lecture videos, and enhance your learning, we have included interviews with real world, experienced and development practitioners. Some of the practitioners we interview include: David Booth, Alina Rocha Menocal, Arnaldo Pellini and Louise Shaxton from the Overseas Development Institute; Scott Guggenheim (AusAID-Indonesia Partnership Program); and Jaime Faustino (The Asia Foundation).

Uncertainty is a way of life in development, and leaders need the skills to adapt and excel in this space. Join us to learn effective strategies for being an adaptive leader in development.

What You’ll Learn:

To appreciate the fundamental mismatch between policy and practice in development
To understand the importance of having context, and in finding local solutions to local problems
Skills in adaptive development practice, in the cycles of experimentation, learning, iteration and adaptation
To discern strategies to overcome political challenges and broker new collaborations
To comprehend how to measure progress and manage performance when working adaptively
To diffuse results from practice, by taking them to scale and influencing policy

Meet Your Instructors:

Mark Moran

Professor and Chair of Development Effectiveness, Institute for Social Science Research at The University of Queensland Mark has a unique background of technical and social science research with a degree in civil engineering and a PhD in geography and planning. He is closely affiliated with the Aboriginal Environment Research Centre. His career spans across academia, nonprofits, government and consultancy.

Jodie Curth-Bibb

Teaching and Research Fellow, Institute of Social Science Research at The University of Queensland Dr Jodie Curth-Bibb is an experienced program manager with The University of Queensland International Development with a 10-year track record in research and evaluation in development programs.

Sarah Glavey

Research Manager, Global Health Projects at Trinity College Dublin Sarah Glavey is research manager of global health projects at Trinity College Dublin including NOURISH a multidisciplinary consortium of researchers investigating the intersection and impact of nutrition, food security and HIV treatment outcome in Uganda.

Tim Grice

Honorary Senior Fellow, Sustainable Minerals Institute at The University of Queensland Dr Tim Grice is an Honorary Senior Fellow at The University of Queensland’s Sustainable Minerals Institute and Founding Director at Leapfrog International, a social impact company working for sustainable prosperity.

Program Overview

This psychology XSeries is an introduction to developmental, social, and clinical psychology so you can better understand the human mind and how it drives behavior.
You will learn about:

Psychological disorders and how they are treated
Why we act the way we do in certain settings and situations
How our bodies and minds develop from birth until later in life
Methods behind psychological research and how to interpret and report research

What you will learn

An understanding of human behaviour in social settings
An appreciation for how we develop over our lifespan
An introduction to common psychological disorders and how we treat them
An understanding of the benefits of systematic research, and how to conduct and report it

This XSeries consists of four courses. The first three courses can be taken in any order. We suggest taking Introduction to Psychological Research Methods last. Each course in this XSeries includes between 7 and 8 sections. You may wish to aim to complete 1 to 2 sections per week.

Courses

Learn why people think and behave the way they do in social settings.

Learn how we develop over our lifetime, including our ability to think, communicate, and form social attachments.

Learn about the principles underlying psychological therapy and the features and treatment of common mental disorders, including anxiety, depression and schizophrenia.

Learn how to plan, conduct and analyze psychological research and effectively communicate the results.