Kurt Piron
Kurt is a father, husband and third-generation commercial-industry carpenter who is currently balancing these roles while completing a research PhD at Griffith University's School of Applied Psychology. Kurt has co-authored publications with his academic supervisor, Professor Grant Devilly, on the effects of alcohol policy changes on substance use and violent crime in Australian night-time entertainment districts. They are currently co-developing a new scale to measure emotional and behavioural responses to verbal sparring banter. Kurt has firsthand experience of the high rates of mental ill health and suicide in blue-collar industries and has observed a cultural shift in workers’ attitudes toward these challenges. These experiences have, in part, shaped his current path in suicide prevention research. In 2021, he was awarded the Suicide Prevention Research Fund PhD Scholarship. His doctoral project, The Apprentices Unearthed Project, is a large-scale, longitudinal survey study conducted with over 2,000 trade apprentices enrolled at TAFE Queensland. The project builds a theoretically informed evidence base on the drivers and protective factors of poor mental health and suicide, aiming to inform data-driven prevention strategies for this high-risk group.
Abstracts this author is presenting: