Daughters and Dads earns global recognition in Sweden

Dr Ashton’s presentation showcased the impact of the study, ‘Feasibility of Daughters & Dads Cricket: A program targeting fathers to improve daughters’ engagement & skills in cricket’.

“It was an incredible honour to win the award and to showcase the immense impact of Daughters and Dads Cricket on the international stage,” Dr Ashton said.

“This was only possible thanks to the amazing Daughters and Dads team and program lead Professor Philip Morgan.

"Study findings demonstrated that the program was highly feasible with huge improvements in Daughters’ batting and bowling skills.

“We are excited to undertake the next step and evaluate this in a larger scale trial.”

The conference, hosted in Uppsala, Sweden, featured over 1300 delegates from 47 countries, with over 1000 conference papers and posters submitted.

The study was published in the International Journal of Sports Science and Coaching in May, and was co-authored by Professor Morgan, Associate Professor Narelle Eather, Dr Emma Pollock, Dr Myles Young and Miss Stevie-Lee Kennedy.

The feasibility study analysed a nine-week educational and training program featuring 34 daughters and fathers, and found that the program led to improvements in skill proficient, high levels of engagement with cricket and an intention to continue playing the game.

The program was facilitated in partnership with the Office of Sport NSW and Cricket Australia. Similar Daughters and Dads programs have been conducted in football with Northern NSW Football and Football NSW, and in basketball with Basketball NSW.

A separate presentation by Dr Anna Rayward (School of Education) at the ISBNPA conference, titled ‘Implementation and Scale-up of the Daughters and Dads Active and Empowered Program’, looked in detail at the sport-specific adaptations of the program.

Professor Morgan presented a symposium on the wider impact of the Centre for Active Living and Learning's ‘Healthy Dads Healthy Kids’ program, which examined how it has been adapted in countries and cultures across the globe. This included a presentation from Mr Jake MacDonald (Office of Indigenous Strategy and Leadership), who presented on the cultural adaptation processes of the Healthy Dads Healthy Kids program for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families living on Darkinjung Country.

The mission of the ISBNPA is to “stimulate and promote innovative and impactful research in behavioral nutrition and physical activity to improve human health and well-being worldwide”.