Dr Laine Chilman | UniSC | University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Australia

Accessibility links

Dr Laine Chilman

BNurs QUT, MOccThy UQ, PhD UniSC

  • Lecturer, Occupational Therapy
  • School of Health
Email
Telephone
+61 7 5456 3436
Office location
SD-T-3-3.32
Campus
Sunshine Coast

Dr Laine Chilman is a full-time Lecturer in Occupational Therapy. She is committed to research that enhances children's lives by supporting parents. She investigates occupational therapy and parenting interventions that promote child development and wellbeing, particularly in terms of child behaviour, play, picky eating, and the vital support systems necessary for optimal development. Specifically, her interest in understanding and mitigating the impact of picky eating on families fuelled her to uncover innovative solutions for healthcare practices, including supporting parents through occupational performance coaching. Laine's work emphasises her dedication to co-design with First Nation communities and a lived experience perspective, which enriches the research process.

Laine is versatile, with experience in qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches. She recognises that each methodology brings unique insights depending on the research context. Over her career, Laine has been invited to speak at national conferences and local research forums, receiving the Occupational Therapy Australia Postgraduate student award whilst completing her PhD.

As a researcher, Laine embodies her values of objectivity, honesty, and openness, fostering a compassionate approach to her work. Furthermore, Laine's commitment to teaching and mentoring the next generation of practitioners and researchers shines through in her emerging publication record and honours student supervision. Laine has worked as an occupational therapist and registered nurse both in Australia and England. She is passionate about student learning and understands the importance of linking theoretical knowledge with clinical practice.

Awards and fellowships
  • Senior Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy (2022)
  • Occupational Therapy Australia QLD Division Postgraduate Student Award (2021)
Research grants

Grant/Project name

Investigators

Funding body & A$ value

Year(s)

Focus (of research grant)

Culturally Responsive Coaching Intervention for Paediatric Feeding Disorders: A
Pilot RCT Informed by First Nations Perspectives

Chilman, L., Frakking, T.

UniSC SPARK Professional Development:

$8,528.

2024

Adapting OPC to support multi-cultural contexts

Unlocking Precision Healthcare: Tailoring feeding disorder management for culturally diverse children to sustain improvements in health outcomes

Chilman, L., Burritt, L., Grant, T., Frakking, T., Marozza, A., Graham, F.

Prince Charles Hospital Foundation:

$37,709.00

 

2024-2026

Culturally responsive Occupational Performance Coaching (OPC) for feeding clinics

Occupational Performance Coaching: An Evidence-based Intervention for Priority Populations

Chilman, L., Meredith, P., Burritt, L., & Dixson, B

Internal grant scheme through UniSC Connect grant:

$9,600 

2023-2024

OPC from the perspectives of health professionals who support First Nations families

Exploring factors to support culturally appropriate healthy feeding practices for Australian First Nations families with young children.

Chilman, L., Meredith, P., Mudholkar, A., Wehnham, K.

Internal grant scheme through UniSC Launch Partnership Grant:

$25,350 

2022-2023

Exploring First Nations' feeding practices, cultural influences and strengths

Research areas

  • Picky eating
  • Occupational Performance Coaching
  • Cross-cultural knowledges
  • Knowledge and confidence of new graduate occupational therapists
  • Social determinants of health and support children with low socioeconomic backgrounds
  • Early childhood play and playgroups
  • Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD)
  • Parenting, feeding practices and family mealtimes
  • End of Life care
  • Psychosocial disability

Teaching areas

  • OCC102 Participation in Occupation
  • OCC201 Occupational Therapy Theory
  • OCC202 Therapeutic Skills
  • OCC212 Evaluation of Occupational Performance
  • OCC222 Neurological Causes of Occupational Dysfunction
  • OCC232 Foundational Placement Competencies in Allied Health
  • OCC301 Enabling Occupation: The Child and Adolescent
  • OCC312 Enabling Occupation: The Older Person
  • OCC432 Occupational Therapy Innovation
  • OCC442 Occupational Therapy Reasoning, Research & Evaluation (Project Pathway)
  • OCC452 Occupational Therapy Reasoning, Research & Evaluation (Research Pathway)

Dr Laine Chilman's specialist areas of knowledge encompass paediatric occupational therapy, focusing on childhood disordered eating, early childhood play, parenting and mealtimes, sharing of First Nations knowledges and occupational performance coaching.

More UniSC experts...

In the news

Parents the key to tackling kids’ picky eating: research findings
29 Apr

Five years of UniSC-led research into the pesky problem of picky eating by children suggests that therapists should focus more on empowering parents to ease family angst at the dinner table

Picky eating research aims to help family mealtimes
16 Sep 2021

New USC Australia research has identified the most common external factors likely to increase or decrease picky eating in children under 10