PhD doctoral researchers

The contribution of our research students is integral to the academic and community life of the School of Social Policy.

Students come from a wide range of backgrounds, some straight from undergraduate degrees, others having worked in social and health care, education, youth work, criminal justice, community work, faith-based organisations, national and local government and the voluntary sector. The School also has a tradition of hosting visiting international research students from the USA and Eastern Europe, as well as an established tradition of supervising research students with a range of disabilities, who are also service users.

Department of Social Work and Social Care 

Meanaz Akhtar
Photonarratives - third generation South Asian women as care givers 

Naheed Akhtar
The criminalization of Islam: An examination of the UK's anti-terrorism laws post 9-11

Nasrin Akhtar
Third-sector research  

Tarfa Aldoweekh
Social work

Mary Ayim
Family-Systems and ‘Support’ For Recovery: Experiences of  Mental Health Service Users and their Family Caregivers in Kumasi-Ghana

Safina Bi
Child Sexual Exploitation - hearing the voice of the child

Fung (Angel) Chan
To study the opportunities of General Practitioners’ in addressing social determinants of health in Hong Kong

Anne-Marie Glover
Making sense of relationships within "Step Up", a partnership-based approach to social work education  

Caroline Greenhalgh
‘Seeing is believing’  How do High Net Worth Individuals utilise evidence to inform their philanthropy? 

Jeewan Kala Gurung
Social Worker's use of authority in the Child Protection Process 

Emily Harle
How does pornography with explicit sexual consent, impact practice of sexual consent, amongst young men who have sex with women?

Simon Haworth
Social Work & Social Harm

Rianne Houghton
Reclaiming the Domestic: What the homespace means to victims of domestic violence and abuse

Mohammed Hussain
Adult Social Care - NIHR School for Social Care Research PhD  Scholarship  

Marianthi Kourti
How do autistic people form a gender identity?

Gemma Mallett
Compassion Fatigue in Foster Carers

Nushra Mansuri
Parental alienation 

Emma Perry
A qualitative study of new relationships in permanent care settings from the perspective of the non-care dwelling spouse /partner

Nicola Plummer
Understanding individual systems to facilitate multi agency working 

Emma Reith Hall
The development of student social workers' communication skills 

Carlette Norwood Ritter
A Comparative Study: What are the similarities and differences in which black American women and black British  women experience racism? 

Sian Thomas
Sexual Violence and Access to Justice in the Refugee Journey  

Mark Tompkins 
Older people and carers' experiences of 'Hospital-at-home'

Katherine Zwerger
Negotiation of Safety and Risk:  Implications for Adult Social Care Services for People with Dementia and Their Carers Living in the Community

Department of Social Policy, Sociology and Criminology

Kalim Ahmed
The mental and physical health impacts of unpaid care work on the carers. (in collaboration with the ONS)

Qurratul Aini

Social protection and budget decentralization in Indonesia  

Sara Alsaraf
Sexual and gender based violence in the refugee crisis: understanding resilience  

Bimo Arianto 
Understanding the social security coverage gap in Indonesia exploring the attitudes of employers and workers towards occupational social security 

Yunchong (Skylar) Bao
Interactions between Cultures and Behaviour — The management of couples between Chinese people and their partners from other countries

Allaa Barri
Refugees? integration policies in the EU: A Design Thinking approach

Nabilla Che Roslan
Migration and Statelessness   

Zihan Chen
Research on the Influencing Factors of Migrant's Integration in City and its Impact on Citizenship Behaviour in China.

Chalisa Chintrakarn
The motivations of young Thai women for undergoing cosmetic surgery

Bircan Ciytak
Negotiating belonging across generations – The case of 3rd Turkish heritage in Germany

Gabriella D’Avino
The importance of social networks amongst refugees resettled through the Community Sponsorship scheme and the Vulnerable  Persons Resettlement Scheme in the UK

Radost Dineva
Employability and people with disabilities  

Ana França-Ferreira
What difference does civil society make? Exploring relationships between social integration and associational life in the context of ethnic and religious diversity

Abby Gilsenan
Beyond ‘Good Catholic Girls’: Exploring the Role of Statutory RSE in Young Women’s Constructions of Sexual Agency in Catholic Schools

Patrick Hall
A critical realist comparison of local authority adult social care commissioning for older people in England  

Christopher Haycock 
The effect of “Culture Shock” on new U.K higher education students and the associated impact on student completion and attainment.

Hanna Head
Reducing Drug Policy Harms Through Police-Led Reform - ESRCD TP Collaborative Studentship 

Kirsty Hearn
South-south humanitarianism in contexts of forced displacement

Rachel Hu
Female Chinese Immigrant Transnational Entrepreneurs in UK 

Khatija Hussain
Digital Age: Isolation or Freedom? Is digital age the cause for or the effect of feelings of isolation or freedom amongst university students

Verity Jones
Models of co-production in Youth Mental Health service delivery

Ulviyya Khalilova
The influences of western culture on non-material values in Azerbaijan: the application of cultural orientation scale

Jasim Khan 
Crime and Social Harm

Koreana Ko
(Re)defining home through plans and decisions for life after retirement and old age: the case of ethnic Korean immigrants over the age of 50 in the South of England? 

Vera Kubenz
The production of disability through disabled people's every day interactions with strangers in the context of accessible parking spaces

Sudarshan Kunwar
Addressing Energy Poverty in the light of Climate Change in Rural Nepal

Zahira Latif
Apna Khar Boha Bano (make your own home): An exploration of Pakistani Mirpuri Muslim women, domestic violence and home  

Yaqi Li
Urban single women in mainland China: A social critique

Ajeng Meilisa
Construction of Educational Transformation Adaptation by Parents in the implementation of learning during the Covid 19 pandemic

Unaysah Mogra
Ethnic diversity, intergroup relations and children's wellbeing 

Tom McNeil
The cost of crime and deliberative democracy: a persuasive frame for developmental crime prevention in an age of austerity

Muznah Madeeha
Generational changes and Qatari Women’s Labour Force Participation

Helen Nethaway
Food as a ‘Human Right’: Faith-Based Charities and Female Refugee and Asylum Seekers in Birmingham  

Natasha Nicholls
Volunteers and the Community Sponsorship Scheme: The volunteer relationship with the refugee family and their journey as a volunteer

Nobuko Nagai

Carl Packman
What is the financial situation and self-reported advice needs of the new ‘precariat’  in the UK?

Ji Won Park
Social enterprises

Emma Partlow
Reasonable or unreasonable adjustments for working bodies? The experience of work as a disabled person in Britain

Jessica Partridge
Quantitative Investigation into Feminist Gendered Pathways to Female Offending in the UK

Olivia Petie
Understanding the immediate effects and longer-term impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on the integration of refugee women in the UK

Kathryn Pryce
A qualitative study to investigate the complex relationship or women to economic power and abuse, contrasting emerging concepts with existing research and government policy

Tong Ren
The Feasibility and Financial Sustainability of the Long-Ter m Care Insurance (LTCI) System under the Public-Private Cooperation Mechanism in China

Danielle Roe
TRANScend; Gender Diversity and Online LGBTQ+ Homonormativity 

Marcia Rose
An investigation to examine the social prescribing model as an effective intervention in mental health.

Erick Sitepu
Examining the link between the illicit trafficking of counterfeit goods and police corruption in Indonesia

Nikita Sowan
Stigma and prejudice amongst female South Asian survivors of sexual violence

Yi Tang
Social inequality in ethnicity and higher education

Egle Tsirova
Provisional thesis title: Neoliberalism and the production of social harms: a quantitative exploration.

Sarah Turner
Changing Gender Roles

Katrina Waters
Desire and dissent – An analysis of women’s pro-active engagement in a sexualised culture and its potential to challenge the erosion of women’s sexual rights in the UK

Siqi Yu
Community-based Correction and Social Reintegration of Offenders in China

Yunyi Xiao
The impact of schools and communities on drug abuse among adolescents in Birmingham under the influence of COVID-19  

Paladia Ziss
Safe in exile? How and to what effect do urban refugees and  citizens in Turkey understand, experience and negotiate  safety, security and stability?  

Health Services Management Centre

Alexander Alich 
Shamanism, Safety & Risk: an ethnography of emerging shamanic practice and culture

Soha Almehmadi
A qualitative exploration of the experience of British Arab carers within the United Kingdom

Shaimaa Alotaibi
The Implementation of Public-Private Partnerships in Public Primary Healthcare Centres in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and its Effectiveness Regarding the Quality of Care

Nour Al-Quraan
Distributive Equity in Healthcare Accessibility in Jordan

Garry Cooper-Stanton
Narrative Inquiry of the experiences of male patients diagnosed with lymphoedema.

Stevie Creese
Health Services Management

Helen Crump
Learning from Failure in the Reporting of Service Improvement  

Deborah Davidson
Can a national leadership development programme bring about systemic change in the NHS?  

Neil Hampson
What effect do the values and principles of co-operative organisations have when operating in the care sector?

Angela Hicks
Exploring health and wellbeing of long-term acupuncture patients in the West 

Min Kyong Kang
Searching for a financial stabilization plan for the long term insurance system for the elderly in South Korea: A comparative study with the U.K, Germany and Japan

Sukhwinder (Essie) Kaur
Does the NHS Have an Organisational Silence Culture  Around Employee Mental Health Problems and Absenteeism?

Jennifer Knights
Realising leadership potential in the NHS Business and Administration workforce 

Jilesh Kunjappan Kunnumpurath
Understanding the experience of using direct payments (DP) to pay for Social Care and the impact of this on individuals during their life course changes.

Hongyji Lin
Welfare regime theory and the Japanese welfare state  

Oluwadara Olowe
Employees Engagement in Developing Interventions Against Absenteeism in the NHS

Tamira Rolls
Public engagement and prioritisation of health care interventions. In particular, public attitudes towards prevention, and the level of public support for funding prevention programmes within Wales

Buddhika Samarasinghe
A refined theory of the interplay between standardisation and individualisation of care: a realist evaluation and synthesis of on-the-day surgery cancellations

Anthony Stem
Health policy shopping in the UK: a qualitative exploration of the US nexus  

David Sullivan
Organisational memory or NHS amnesia: exploring the contribution of local clinical governance system investigations to the safety and quality of healthcare in the UK’s NHS

Yikai Sun 

Reputation management in response to institutional change in Chinese hospitals

Julie Werrett
A prospective service evaluation of an LGBT Health & Wellbeing Centre