Professor Elizabeth McDermott

Professor Elizabeth McDermott

School of Social Policy and Society
Professor of Mental Health & Society

Contact details

Email
e.mcdermott.1@bham.ac.uk
Twitter
@ElizabethMcDer6
View my research portal
Address
School of Social Policy and Society
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

Elizabeth McDermott, MSc, PhD, is a public mental health interdisciplinary researcher, working in the fields of mental health inequalities, public health and health services research. She specialises in the mental health of LGBTQ+ populations and theory-led mixed methods research.

Professor McDermott is committed to theoretically-informed empirical work that aims to better understand how to tackle mental health inequality across diverse populations.

She is currently the Deputy Director of the Institute for Mental Health

Qualifications

PhD in Applied Social Science (2003), Lancaster University

MSc in Health Research and Policy (1998), Liverpool John Moores University

BA (Hons) Health, (1996), Liverpool John Moores University

Postgraduate Certificate in Academic Practice (2009), University of York

Biography

Professor McDermott has held academic posts in the Institute of Health Research at Lancaster University as a research associate/fellow. Then moved to the Dept. Social Policy & Social Work at the University of York, to take up post as a permanent lecturer in Health Policy. After seven years, she returned to Lancaster University as a Senior Lecturer in Health Research in the Faculty of Health & Medicine and subsequently was promoted to Professor of Health Inequality. Prior to an academic career, she worked in public health (mental and sexual health) (NHS) in Liverpool for a decade

Teaching

Postgraduate 

MSc Mental Health

  • Sociology of Mental Health & Illness

Undergraduate 

BA Social Policy, Sociology and Criminology

  • Mental Health & Society

Postgraduate supervision

Elizabeth would welcome PhD students interested in aspects of the following: 

  • LGBTQ+ youth mental health
  • Mental health inequality (e.g. gender, ethnicity, social class)
  • Young people’s mental health help-seeking
  • Public health prevention and reduction in youth mental health
  • Mental health policy

Research

  • LGBTQ+ mental health
  • Youth mental health
  • Mental Health Inequalitites (e.g. gender, ethnicity)
  • Mental Health Prevention and Promotion
  • Mental Health Policy
  • Mental Health Interventions
  • Theory-led Evaluation Methodologies 

Current projects: 

Queer Futures 2+ is a collaboration between Lancaster University and University of Birmingham funded by the ESRC. The study uses Foucauldian Discourse Analysis to examine the barriers and facilitators to integrated care for LGBTQ+ young people’s mental health support (2023-25). 

The Trevor Project is a collaboration between the University of Birmingham led by Prof McDermott and the US-based charity to generate a UK Survey of LGBTQ+ mental health (2022-6). https://www.thetrevorproject.org/survey-international/uk/2024/en/ 

The Good Measure Project is an international collaboration across 6 universities that aims to advance the measurement of gender and sexual dimensions of adolescent mental health and wellbeing. It is funded by the Medical Research Council (2022-5)   

The Queer Futures 2 study (funded by NIHR 2019-2023) aimed to produce a model of early intervention mental health support for LGBTQ+ young people with common mental health problems (e.g. anxiety and depression). The project involved LGBTQ+ young people, CAMHS practitioners, schools, clinicians, local authority and the third sector. The major outputs from this study are available online including NHS commissioning guidelines for LGBTQ+ youth mental health services across a range of settings 

The CLASS study funded by the NIHR School for Public Health Research (2019-2022) aimed to evaluate the impact on young people’s mental health of interventions that tackle homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying in schools.

Other activities

Member of the NIHR Public Health Funding Committee

Trustee of LGBT+ Consortium 

Publications

Recent publications

Article

McNulty, F, McDermott, E, Eastham, R, Hughes, E, Johnson, K, Davis, S, Pryjmachuk, S, Mateus, C & Jenzen, O 2025, 'Being, Doing, Deciding: Cisheteronormativity, bodily autonomy, and mental health support for LGBTQ+ young people', Youth, vol. 5, no. 2, 53. https://doi.org/10.3390/youth5020053

Eastham, R, McDermott, E, McNulty, F, Hughes, E, Johnson, K, Davis, S, Pryjmachuk, S, Mateus, C & Jenzen, O 2025, 'Equitable access to mental health support for LGBTQ+ young people: An intersectional youth rights approach', Feminism and Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1177/09593535251372600

McDermott, E, Cahill, L, Nath, R, Reid, B, Schaub, J, Stander, WJ & Taylor, A 2025, 'Understanding protective and risk factors in preventing suicide among LGBTQ+ youth in the UK', International Journal of Mental Health. https://doi.org/10.1080/00207411.2025.2575422

McDermott, E, Eastham, R, Hughes, E, Pattison, E, Johnson, K, Davis, S, Pryjmachuk, S, Mateus, C, Jenzen, O & McNulty, F 2024, 'Early mental health intervention and supported self-care for LGBTQ+ young people in the UK: a mixed-methods study', Health Services and Delivery Research, vol. 12, no. 47, pp. 1-102. https://doi.org/10.3310/KYWA6382

McDermott, E, Eastham, R, Hughes, E, Johnson, K, Davis, S, Pryjmachuk, S, Mateus, C, McNulty, F & Jenzen, O 2024, ''What works’ to support LGBTQ+ young people’s mental health: An intersectional youth rights approach', International Journal of Social Determinants of Health and Health Services, pp. 1-13. https://doi.org/10.1177/27551938241230766

McDermott, E, Kaley, A, Kaner, E, Limmer, M, McGovern, R, McNulty, F, Nelson, R & Spencer, L 2023, 'Reducing LGBTQ+ adolescent mental health inequalities: A realist review of school-based interventions', Journal of Mental Health. https://doi.org/10.1080/09638237.2023.2245894

McDermott, E, Kaley, A, Kaner, E, Limmer, M, McGovern, R, McNulty, F, Nelson, R, Geijer-Simpson , E & Spencer, L 2023, 'Understanding How School-Based Interventions Can Tackle LGBTQ+ Youth Mental Health Inequality: A Realist Approach', International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, vol. 20, no. 5, 4274. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph20054274

Shields, AM, Anantharachagan, A, Arumugakani, G, Baker, K, Bahal, S, Baxendale, H, Bermingham, W, Bhole, M, Boules, E, Bright, P, Chopra, C, Cliffe, L, Cleave, B, Dempster, J, Devlin, L, Dhalla, F, Diwakar, L, Drewe, E, Duncan, C, Dziadzio, M, Elcombe, S, Elkhalifa, S, Gennery, A, Ghanta, H, Goddard, S, Grigoriadou, S, Hackett, S, Hayman, G, Herriot, R, Herwadkar, A, Huissoon, A, Jain, R, Jolles, S, Johnston, S, Khan, S, Laffan, J, Lane, P, Leeman, L, Lowe, DM, Mahabir, S, Lochlainn, DJM, McDermott, E, Misbah, S, Moghaddas, F, Morsi, H, Murng, S, Noorani, S, O'Brien, R, Patel, S, Price, A, Rahman, T, Seneviratne, S, Shrimpton, A, Stroud, C, Thomas, M, Townsend, K, Vaitla, P, Verma, N, Williams, A, Burns, SO, Savic, S & Richter, AG 2022, 'Outcomes following SARS-CoV-2 infection in patients with primary and secondary immunodeficiency in the UK', Clinical and Experimental Immunology, vol. 209, no. 3, pp. 247-258. https://doi.org/10.1093/cei/uxac008

Cameron-Mathiassen, J, Leiper, J, Simpson, J & McDermott, E 2022, 'What was care like for me? A systematic review of the experiences of young people living in residential care', Children and Youth Services Review, vol. 138, 106524. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.childyouth.2022.106524

McDermott, ES, Eastham, R, Hughes, E, Pattinson, E, Johnson, K, Davis, S, Pryjmachuk, S, Mateus, MDCC & Jenzen, O 2021, 'Explaining effective mental health support for LGBTQ+ youth: A meta-narrative review', SSM Mental Health. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmmh.2021.100004

Chapter

McDermott, E & Marzetti, H 2023, Preventing LGBTQ+ youth suicide: A queer critical and human rights approach. in J Semlyen & P Rohleder (eds), Sexual Minorities and Mental Health: Current Perspectives and New Directions. 1 edn, Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 391–419. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-37438-8_16

Rawlings, V & McDermott, ES 2021, Pushing back on ‘risk’: co-designing research on self-harm 165 and suicide with queer young people. in V Rawlings, J Flexner & L Riley (eds), Community-Led Research: walking new pathways together. https://doi.org/10.30722/sup.9781743327579

Commissioned report

McDermott, E, Schaub, J, Stander, W, Reid, B, Taylor, AB, Eden, TM, Hobaica, S, Kofke, L, Jarrett, BA, Suffredini, K & Nath, R 2024, 2024 United Kingdom Report on the Mental Health of LGBTQ+ Young People. The Trevor Project. <https://www.thetrevorproject.org/survey-international/uk/2024/en/>

Entry for encyclopedia/dictionary

McDermott, E 2024, Class. in AE Goldberg (ed.), The SAGE Encyclopedia of LGBTQ Studies. 2nd edn, SAGE Publications. <https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/the-sage-encyclopedia-of-lgbtq-studies-2nd-edition/book283559>

McDermott, E & Rawlings, V 2024, Online Surveys. in AE Goldberg (ed.), The SAGE Encyclopedia of LGBTQ Studies. 2nd edn, SAGE Publications. <https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/the-sage-encyclopedia-of-lgbtq-studies-2nd-edition/book283559>

View all publications in research portal