Well-being, Health and Social Care
Well-being, Health and Social Care is a wide ranging interdisciplinary grouping that aims to understand the social and policy issues surrounding health and illness, the processes of caring and the context of well-being and happiness through undertaking innovative theoretical and empirical research.
The Centre has strong links with other Research Centres within the School, including Child and Family and the International Centre for Public and Social Policy, with the School's Centre for Social Work and Centre for Trauma, Resilience and Growth.
Externally there are strong links with:
There is a particularly strong partnership with Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust (external site), the local provider of mental health services with whom we have a number of jointly funded ESRC PhD studentships.
The centre hosted the third international Qualitative Research on Mental Health conference (QRMH3) in 2010 and is due to host the fourth (QRMH4) in 2012.
The centre's interests and activities fall into three groupings:
Social care research
The social care research group focuses on the delivery of adult care by professional and non-professional staff working in health, local authorities and the Third Sector. Its members' disciplinary perspectives include sociology, social policy, nursing, social work and psychology. The School's social care research environment is enhanced by the Institute of Mental Health (IMH) founded and directed by Nick Manning. Several members of the research group currently work within the Collaboration for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care(CLAHRC) (external site) for Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire and Lincolnshire, on a full- or part-time basis.
Critical perspectives of health and social care
This grouping of interests and activities focuses upon theoretical formulations and research that concern social and political influences upon health and morbidity, and socially determined influences upon the conduct of health and social care such as the social construction of health knowledge, processes and practices of health care delivery and the organisation and management of health care services.
We run a series of monthly, term time, early evening seminars that are open to all. These usually feature a visiting speaker and offer an opportunity for a wide range of healthcare practitioners and academics to reflect upon these issues.
Current and recent research includes:
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The construction of knowledge around health and illness.
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Interactions between healthcare professionals and their clients.
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The changing context of medical contributions to mental health services.
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The construction of mental health difficulties by professionals and health care providers.
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User experiences and help-seeking behaviour in mental health services.
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Management of emotional distress in primary care.
Happiness and well-being
There is a small but developing interest and expertise within the School in the field of `happiness' study, led by Ian Shaw. The early focus of this work was in the links between social and individual capital and mental health as well as a critique of Lord Layard's socio-economic approach to the study. The relevance of this early focus has recently been emphasised by government reports into the relationship between 'mental capital and well being' by the foresight group (external site), which places more emphasis upon a broadly public health approach.
However, School interest in Happiness and Wellbeing is broader than this and encompasses such concerns as achieving 'work life balance' and the quality of the physical environment. It also, for instance, includes the activities of our Centre for Trauma, Resilience and Growth (external site) which is a renowned focus for research into determinants of psychological growth following adversity.