Miri Kurz at Deakin University in Melbourne

In October 2024, I had the opportunity to spend three weeks at the School of Exercise and Nutrition Sciences at the Institute for Physical Activity and Nutrition at Deakin University in Melbourne, Australia. My supervisor during this time was Dr. Anne Turner, who is a stress physiologist whose research focuses on the toll that prolonged exposure to stress can take on psychological and physiological health, and interventions to counteract this damage.

She has also worked on several systematic reviews, so we decided it would be beneficial for me to work on my systematic review during my time in Australia. The work looks at the influence of acute stress on body movement, which is very relevant to D03 as we are aiming to increase the understanding of how to measure stress in an unobtrusive, non-contact way, and this potentially involves body movement.

During my research visit, I was able to benefit from Dr. Anne Turner’s expertise as well as the resources provided by Deakin University, such as free consultations with a librarian to work through the different steps of a systematic review. At least once a week the team met for a writing club and coffee afterwards, which was a great opportunity for me to continue writing the background of my review and also feel part of the team.

As well as working on my own projects, I also volunteered to collect data on children and their eating habits, and was given a tour of the Institute’s facilities. Luckily, there was still plenty of time to explore Melbourne. On my first weekend, I explored the city centre and went to see one of my favourite bands in the evening. On the second weekend, I spontaneously bought a ticket for the half marathon and was able to discover new corners of the city. After my research visit, I stayed in Australia for another three weeks and travelled up the east coast, which included a lot of nice places and people.