Event Report: Institute of Human Sciences Annual Conference / Kick-off Meeting of “Translational Studies for Inclusive Society” Project

On January 25th (Saturday), 2014, the Institute of Human Sciences annual meeting was held in the Soshikan Hall Conference Room at Ritsumeikan University. This event was also convened as a kick-off meeting of “Translational Studies for Inclusive Society”, an institute-wide project to be conducted this fiscal year. This project has been supported by a grant of MEXT^*1-Supported Program for the Strategic Research Foundation at Private Universities. Its aim is to create a focal point for practical research on comprehensive human services for an inclusive society.

Ⅰ. Poster Session

In the first part of this event, a poster session was held by the research staff of the project as well as researchers awarded for fiscal year 2013's Institute of Human Sciences Exploratory Research Project.
Fourteen posters displaying the results of a variety of research related to human sciences were put up around the venue, and attendees took part in vigorous question and answer sessions with the presenters concerning their contents. The guest speaker from the second part of the event, Professor Haluk Soydan, also participated in this session, and presenters could be seen explaining their research in English. For a summary of each presentation, please see the list below.
#download( /uploads/news_en/20/posterabstract.pdf ,Summary list download.(PDF:1.79MB) )　

Ⅱ． Keynote Speech “Evidence-based Practice in Human Services”

In the second part of the event, a keynote address entitled “Evidence-based Practice in Human Services” was given by Professor Haluk Soydan, who had been invited from the University of Southern California School of Social Work. Professor Soydan, who is a pioneer and leading figure in this field and who participated in the creation of the “Campbell Collaboration”, views “evidence based practice” as very important when it comes to human services, and as a result spoke about means of promoting the understanding and spread of this approach with references to his own experiences in Sweden and California. He was quite enthusiastic and in the end his address ran longer than planned, lasting more than ninety minutes. Simultaneous interpretation into Japanese was provided during his speech.
Professor Soydan spent a few days in Kyoto, and at a research seminar held at this University on January 27th he spoke about more concrete methods of evidence dissemination, and in particular “clearinghouses” that analyse/disseminate evidence related information, by drawing on the example of the California Evidence-Based Clearinghouse for Child Welfare (CEBC), a clearinghouse with which he was personally involved.

Ⅲ. Panel Discussion “Creating the New Vision of Translational Studies for Inclusive Society”

In the third part of the event, after a teabreak that doubled as an opportunity for participants to exchange information about their research, “Translational Studies for Inclusive Society” team leaders conducted a panel discussion on the theme of “Perspectives on of Translational Studies for Inclusive Society”.
Project leader Professor Mitsuyuki Inaba started things off by explaining what an “inclusive society” is and introducing the structure of the project, and each team leader then gave a report. These reports showed that this project was a coming together of researchers from various fields across diverse aspects of its implementation, including research methodology, various forms of support for an inclusive society (proactive support, escorted support, restorative support), and fundamental research concerning the project as a whole.
Regarding the content of the panel discussion, Professor Soydan, who had been listening intently, commented that it was a very extensive and interesting project and that going forward he was particularly excited to see how its findings would be concretely implemented.

　

Supported by MEXT-Supported Program for the Strategic Research Foundation at Private Universities, 2013-2015