Qualifications

• Doctor of Philosophy, Federation University  
• Master of Social Work (Qualifying), Federation University 
• Graduate Certificate in Education (Tertiary), Federation University 
• Bachelor of Social and Community Welfare, Monash University 

Areas of interest

• Lived experience and service‑user voice
• Inclusive communities and social justice
• Policy and service reform in social work and community services
• Feminist and qualitative research methodologies
• Group and community practice

Areas of expertise

Lauren has expertise in feminist qualitative methodologies such as Feminist Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis and Photovoice and has pursued innovative work in vegan eco‑feminist pedagogy. She has conducted research with victim‑survivors of violence, women farmers, and within community‑based contexts that foreground gender, power and marginalisation. 

Grants

• Beer, K., Martin, J., Zeuschner, L., Chihota, C., Orr, E., Archer, V., & Fernald, R. 2025-2028. ‘Strengthening qualification pathways to specialist family violence work’. DFFH. ($1,000,000) 
• Zeuschner, L., & Pederson, C. 2025-2026. ‘Towards an ecofeminist higher education pedagogy: Exploring the perceived link between violence against women and non-human animals’. ECR Seed Funding Grants. ($4,727) 
• Martin, J., & Zeuschner, L. 2024-2025. ‘Using photovoice to explore the impacts of drought on young farmers’. Southern Farming Systems. ($24,600) 
• Martin, J., Sadowski, C., & Zeuschner, L. 2022 – 2023. Service user knowledge capture project’. Women's Health Grampians. ($23,000) 

Awards

• 2025: Academic Staff Award for Living Our Values (Collaboration) 

Current

• PhD student, Federation University, ‘An existential inquiry into the lived experience of progressive disability,’ principal supervisor.
• PhD student, Federation University, ‘The lived experience of parenting a young child and undertaking social work placement: an international student perspective’, associate supervisor.
• PhD student, Federation University, ‘Culturally informed coping mechanisms among migrant Indian parents of intellectually disabled children in Melbourne, Australia’, associate supervisor.

Past

• Honours student, Federation University, ‘Care coordinators` vision for services improvement,’ principal supervisor.

• Critical and contemporary theory  
• Preparation for ethical and reflective practice 
• Group, community and collective action 

Specialist roles

• Postgraduate Course Coordinator, Social Work, Community and Human Services 
• Lecturer, Master of Social Work 
• Human Research Ethics committee member 

Professional association memberships

• Australian Association of Social Workers

• Zeuschner, L. (June 16, 2025). ‘They were justifying his actions’: what women say about men’s behaviour change programs. The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/they-were-justifying-his-actions-what-women-say-about-mens-behaviour-change-programs-259012  
• Zeuschner, L. (2025, July 2). Reporting on recent research: Women’s experiences of their partners referral to MBCPs. Ballarat Breakfast on ABC Radio. https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/ballarat-breakfast/breakfast/105473446?utm_content=link&utm_medium=content_shared  
• Ballarat Times. (July 21, 2025). Research aims to improve family violence intervention. https://timesnewsgroup.com.au/ballarat/news/research-aims-to-improve-family-violence-intervention/    
• Tolton, L., Zeuschner, L., & Bishop, J. (2025). Care through code: AI‑driven support tools for conflict and abuse [Paper presentation]. Narratives of Care Symposium 2025, Melbourne, Australia. 
• 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 [Paper presentation]. 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 [Paper presentation]. 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. 
• 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  
• Cooper, K., Zeuschner, 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.