Research

Understanding People, Society, and the Ocean

At Ocean in Minds, research begins with a simple question:

How can we strengthen the relationship between people and the ocean?

While scientific knowledge is fundamental to understanding marine environments, sustainable ocean futures also depend on people—their identities, values, cultures, institutions, experiences, and ways of thinking.

Ocean in Minds explores these human dimensions of the ocean and their connections with governance, policy, education, sustainability, and social change.

The platform embraces interdisciplinary perspectives that connect marine and environmental sciences with the social sciences, humanities, governance, and public policy. By bringing together different ways of understanding people and the ocean, Ocean in Minds seeks to contribute to wider conversations about inclusive, resilient, and sustainable approaches to ocean stewardship.

Research Themes

Current areas of interest include:

• Ocean Governance
• Maritime Identity
• Ocean Mindsets and Social Change
• Coastal Communities
• Marine Policy
• Sustainability and the Blue Economy
• Human Dimensions of the Ocean
• Interdisciplinary and Transdisciplinary Research
• Australia and Indonesia in the Indo-Pacific Context

Current Research

A formal academic journey may reach a particular milestone or conclusion, but research does not necessarily end with a degree, thesis, project, or publication. Ideas can continue to grow as they encounter new places, communities, perspectives, evidence, experiences, and questions.

Ocean in Minds provides a space for that continuing intellectual journey. It allows ideas developed through formal academic research to be revisited, communicated more widely, connected with emerging conversations, and explored beyond their original boundaries.

Rather than treating research questions as complete, Ocean in Minds remains open to their continued development and to discovering how they may connect with different social, cultural, geographical, and policy contexts.

Current areas of inquiry explore how social and cultural perspectives influence the ways individuals, communities, and institutions understand and relate to the ocean. This continuing exploration includes two complementary areas of research and conceptual development:

Maritime Identity Development (MID) – exploring how relationships with the ocean can contribute to the formation, development, and strengthening of maritime identity across individuals, communities, and broader social contexts.

Social Mindset Restructuring (SMR) – an evolving conceptual framework exploring how social and cultural mindsets may change over time and how such changes may contribute to more inclusive, collaborative, and sustainable relationships between people and the ocean.

These areas remain open to further development, application, dialogue, and refinement as new perspectives and contexts are encountered. Ocean in Minds therefore presents them as part of an ongoing research journey rather than as final or universally established explanations.

Research Communication

One purpose of Ocean in Minds is to communicate research and research-informed thinking beyond academic audiences.

Research-related posts may translate academic ideas into more accessible language, reflect on published research, explore emerging concepts, connect research with contemporary issues, or consider how ideas might relate to different communities and contexts.

These posts are intended for public engagement and knowledge sharing. They should not be understood as substitutes for formal academic publications.

Where work is prepared for academic publication, it will follow the appropriate scholarly standards and processes, including relevant methodological, ethical, citation, peer-review, and publication requirements.

Ocean in Minds will also seek to distinguish carefully between published research, research-informed reflection, personal interpretation, and ideas that are still developing. Where appropriate, the academic literature, reports, data, and other sources informing a discussion will be acknowledged so that readers can explore them further.

In this way, Ocean in Minds creates room for research to travel beyond academic spaces while respecting the standards and responsibilities of academic scholarship.

Looking Forward

As Ocean in Minds grows, this page will gradually bring together research projects, publications, presentations, collaborations, research-informed reflections, and emerging ideas that contribute to understanding the human dimensions of the ocean.

The direction may also widen as new questions, places, communities, disciplines, and perspectives become part of the conversation.

Research is viewed here not simply as a process of producing a final piece of knowledge, but as an ongoing journey of questioning, learning, connecting, and communicating.

A formal academic chapter may conclude, but curiosity does not have to end with it.

Ocean in Minds is a space for that curiosity to continue growing.