Young people's development in adversity and delivering effective interventions
The research is predominantly concerned with the development of children and adolescents in the face of adversity. There are two objectives. The first has been to elucidate the environmental mechanisms underlying development in adversity. The second has been to use this understanding to develop interventions to enhance children’s and young people's development and support their families.
We focus on two critical time periods for children and young people’s development; the perinatal and adolescent periods. We examine how adversity in high income and low and middle income countries can affect development; including parental mental health disorders such as depression, anxiety and eating disorders, and adult physical illness like HIV and cancer. We are also interested in the neuroscience underlying this development and how a community held knowledge of the importance of the early years for like long health is essential. Our research aims to elucidate risk and protective factors involved in children and young people’s psychological development and creating effective interventions particularly in schools and perinatal services.