Dr. Lauren Zeuschner

Position: Lecturer
Study area: Social work, Community and Human Services
Location: Mt Helen Campus, Room H243
Email: l.zeuschner@federation.edu.au
ORCID ID: 0000-0001-7533-8100

Qualifications

Doctor of Philosophy - Federation University Australia - 2022

Master of Social Work (Qualifying) - Federation University Australia - 2017

Bachelor of Social and Community Welfare - Monash University - 2012

Teaching

Courses

  • Master of Social Work (Qualifying)
  • Bachelor of Community and Human Services
  • Bachelor of Social Work
  • Graduate Certificate in Social and Community Services

Units

  • Professional Social Work Practice (MSWPG7102)
  • Contemporary Social Work Theories and Practice (MSWPG7201)
  • Interpersonal Communication for Professional Practice (CHSUG1002)
  • Models of Case Management (CHSUG2004)
  • Foundations of Social Work Theory (MSWPG7101)

Biography

Lauren joined Federation University in 2017, initially as a sessional lecturer and tutor before commencing fulltime in 2022.

Lauren is a qualified social worker, who entered the world of academia after spending many years in direct practice. As part of her Master’s degree Lauren undertook a research placement at a family violence service for women, which sparked her passion for collaborative social work research. This led into Lauren’s doctoral research, which she completed through an academic-industry research partnership in the Ballarat region, in collaboration with the family violence team at a child and family services agency. Lauren conducted a feminist interpretative phenomenological analysis of women’s lived experiences of their partners’ referral to a men’s behaviour change program. This research encapsulated Lauren’s passion for ensuring everyday processes within a service setting are informed by the knowledge and experiences of the people who are most affected by those services.

Research interests

  • Feminist qualitative exploration of lived experience.
  • Opportunities that contribute to the growth of nurturing communities and innovative, client informed services and systems.

Supervision

Current students:

Michelle Rossi – “The lived experience of parenting a young child and undertaking social work placement: an international student perspective.” Doctor of Philosophy (Associate Supervisor)

Annette Pyatt – “Economic recovery from family violence.” Doctor of Philosophy (Associate Supervisor)

Deepa Jacobs – “Culturally Informed Coping Mechanisms among Migrant Indian Parents (IIP) of Intellectually Disabled (ID) Children in Melbourne, Australia.” Doctor of Philosophy (Associate Supervisor)

Jonathan Muromba – “Care coordinators` vision for services improvement.” Graduate Certificate – Research (Honours equivalent) (Principal Supervisor).

Publications

Zeuschner, L., & Camilleri, M. (2025). Insight from women on the lived experience of their partners' referrals to men's behaviour change programs. Violence Against Women, https://doi.org/10.1177/10778012251338487

Zeuschner, L. (2022). Women's lived experiences of their partners' referral to a men's behaviour change program: A feminist interpretative phenomenological analysis [Doctoral dissertation, Federation University Australia]. https://primoapac01.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/f/13o3vsv/UB_VITAL16430

Conference presentations

Sadowski, C., & Zeuschner, L. (2025). Lived experience research as it was intended: Two Australian phenomenological case studies [Paper presentation]. 9th World Conference on Qualitative Research 2025, Krakow, Poland.

Martin, J.& Zeuschner, L. (2024).Women farmers: Innovation and intuition during drought in Australia [Paper presentation]. 10th International Conference on Social Work in Health and Mental Health 2024, Melbourne, Australia.

Zeuschner, L. (June 2023). Bringing the lived experiences of family violence survivors into view: the value in employing feminist interpretative phenomenological analysis to enhance service users' participation in research. International Conference on Practice Research in Social Work 2023, Aalborg, Denmark.

Zeuschner, L., Goff, R., & Cooper, K. (June 2023). Opportunities and challenges within a place-based research collaboration in Australia: Reflections on methodology. International Conference on Practice Research in Social Work 2023, Aalborg, Denmark.

Cooper, K., Goff, R., Hunt, M., Zeuschner, L., & Sadowski, C. (2022, November). Visioning forward: Embedding collaborative research methodologies in early career social work and human services research [Paper presentation]. Australia and New Zealand Social Work and Welfare Education and Research (ANZSWWER) symposium 2022, Melbourne, Australia.

Cooper, K., Irvin, L., Boyce, W., & Camilleri, M. (2018, November).  Research for change: What does doctoral research add to Area Partnerships? And what do Area Partnerships add to doctoral research? [Conference session]. Children and Youth Area Partnerships Conference, Ballarat, Australia.

Irvin, L. (2017, July). Women’s lived experience of their partner’s referral to a behaviour change program [Poster presentation]. Federation University Higher Degree by Research Conference, Ballarat, Australia.

Irvin, L., & Clarke, A. (2013, November). Building connections through alternative programs [Conference session]. Family Relationships Services Australia (FRSA) Annual National Conference, Canberra, Australia.

Please note: Lauren has also published under the surname ‘Irvin’

Industry reports

Bain, K., Crouch, Z. Fitzpatrick, B., McDougall, J., Martin, J., Shea, D., Sweeney, P., Vance, K., Zeuschner, L. (2024). Reframing the drought narrative: Personal accounts. Federation University Australia. https://doi.org/10.35843/RTDNPA23

Martin, J., Sadowski, C., Zeuschner, L. (2022) Service User Knowledge Capture Project, commissioned report for Women’s Health Grampians/Central Highlands Integrated Family Violence Committee.

Funded research

Towards an ecofeminist higher education pedagogy: Exploring the perceived link between violence against women and non-human animals (2024) ($4,727.00 internal funding – ECR Seed Grant). Researchers: Dr Lauren Zeuschner and Dr Cassie Pedersen

Using photovoice to explore the impacts of drought on young farmers (2024) ($24,600.00external funding – Perennial Pasture Systems | Girls in Grass). Researchers: Professor Jenny Martin and Dr Lauren Zeuschner)

Service User Knowledge Capture Project (2022) ($21,462 external funding – Central Highlands Integrated Family Violence Committee). Researchers: Professor Jenny Martin, Dr Christina Sadowski, and Dr Lauren Zeuschner

Associations

  • Australian Association of Social Workers
  • Golden Key International Honour Society