Personal statement

I am a Lecturer in Social Policy at the Strathclyde School of Social Work and Social Policy. My research on health inequalities focusses on the social determinants of health in the UK, with a particular focus on west central Scotland. Most recently, my work has centred on housing, but more broadly my expertise is on the impacts of poverty, as well as processes of social and economic change, on health across the lifecourse. This includes examining the impacts of historical processes of socio-economic change, such as late 20^th century deindustrialisation, as well as more recent periods of fiscal austerity, on intergenerational and place-based health inequalities.

I am a qualitative researcher with expertise in participatory and creative methods. I have a particular interest in methods that encourage and enable participants to share and critically reflect on their experiences through research, both individually and collectively. This includes using participatory methods as part of more traditional research study designs, as well as in community-led action research. I have worked extensively with community and third sector organisation to design and deliver action-orientated research and evaluation on a range of social determinants of health.

A significant focus of my more recent work has been exploring the type and nature of evidence needed by policy-makers to intervene in the pathways between various social determinants of health and heath inequalities. This has involved working in partnership with various levels of government across the UK, as part of both SIPHER and the UK Policy Modelling for Health research consortia. I am particualarly interested in the ways in which qualitative research evidence can be effectively incorporated into policy decision-making processes and the impact this has on research participants (both through policy and the research itself).

Before coming to the University of Strathclyde, I worked at Glasgow Centre for Population Health for over ten years, where I carried out policy-facing research on the social determinants of health. Prior to this, I worked for a community-led organisation in Clydebank.