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When was the last time you went to a movie or a concert? How about a festival or play? In your free time, do you listen to music, read novels, take photographs, dance, paint or play a musical instrument?

Well, if you engage in any of these activities, you'll be glad to know it was time well spent. According to Christina Davies, the 2013 winner of the Convocation Matilda Award for Cultural Excellence and PhD candidate at the School of Population Health, "engaging in the arts for enjoyment, entertainment or as a hobby is good for your mental, social and physical wellbeing".

Christina's PhD paper "The Art of Being Healthy", published in BMJ Open , is the first internationally to look at the link between general population health and arts engagement. The paper is currently ranked in the top 2% of articles by attention (out of 2.3 million articles
across all journals) and won the Arts and Health Research Award for Excellence at the 2013 International Arts and Health Conference.

"In this study, arts engagement was found to make people feel happy," Christina said. "It helped to reduce people's stress and was an enjoyable activity to do with family and friends. The arts resulted in the creation of good memories, helped people make new friends and broadened their ideas and beliefs. The arts also had an impact on general knowledge and identity, and resulted in physical activity such as walking and performance-based movement."

"Given the significant pressure on our health system, the arts may hold the key to a new type of health promotion and healing," says Christina.

Thanks to the Convocation Matilda Award for Cultural Excellence, Healthway and a UWA PhD travel award, Christina has presented her PhD findings in Sydney, Melbourne, Texas and Rome. Christina has a background in psychology and health promotion and is also a qualified visual artist. Christina's supervisors are Professor Matthew Knuiman and Associate Professor Michael Rosenberg, senior academics in health promotion and public health.

For more information on the arts and health visit sph.uwa.edu.au/research/health-and-arts. For further information on the Convocation Postgraduate Research Awards and to see a video of Christina Davies talking about her award visit convocation.uwa.edu.au/prizes