Biography
David Coall is Senior Lecturer and coordinator of the Biomedical Science and Human Biology courses in the School of Medical and Health Sciences at Edith Cowan University. He also holds an Adjunct Research Fellow position in the Division of Psychiatry, School of Medicine at the University of Western Australia. His research focuses on the complex inter-generational influences on health and behaviour within families. He has two defined research programs within this field. The first uses evolutionary theory, particularly life history theory, as a framework to examine how the early environment impacts growth, development and reproduction with a focus on maternal factors that influence fetal and placental growth and development. The second examines the different roles grandparents play and how they impact family functioning, grandchild development and the health of the grandparents themselves. Over the past 10 years Coall has developed expertise in both theoretical and applied grandparent research through local and international collaborations. His work is now being translated into support services for people in low resource family situations. Currently the focus is on the health of grandparents raising their own grandchildren. David has developed and teaches a third year evolutionary medicine unit “Evolutionary Perspectives on Health and Disease” that is currently part of the Medical Science course at Edith Cowan University.