The empowering role of smartphones in behaviour change interventions: The Gray Matters Study

Prof Chris Nugent, Prof Sally McClean and Dr Ian Cleland (Ulster) The use of mobile apps are being claimed to have the ability to support a range of health and social care problems. Their use is, however, surrounded by widespread scepticism due to the lack of clinical evidence of their effectiveness which subsequently hinders their … Read more

‘Surviving out of the Ashes’: An exploration of Mental Health Recovery in Young Adulthood in Northern Ireland

Dr Claire McCauley, Prof Hugh Mc Kenna, Dr Sinead Keeney and Dr Derek McLaughlin (Ulster) In response to the Bamford Review (2005) recommendations, the Service Framework for Mental Health and Well-being (DHSSPS 2010) indicated mental health recovery must be at the heart of all service and strategy development. This, the first study of its kind, … Read more

A New Mental Health Service Model for NI: Evaluating the Effectiveness of Low Intensity CBT (LI-CBT)

Dr Karen Kirby, Ms Orla Mc Devitt-Petrovic, Dr Orla McBride, Prof Mark Shevlin, Dr Donal McAteer, Dr Colin Gorman and Dr Jamie Murphy (Ulster) In 2010, the Strategy for the Development of Psychological Therapy Services in NI proposed a step care framework (SCF) as the most efficient model of mental health service delivery. A core … Read more

‘Quality of Life’: inclusion and resilience in community cultural development

Dr Matt Jennings (Ulster) Work within the arts sector is often precarious, inequitable and underpaid. Yet policy bodies increasingly recognise the social and economic benefits of the creative industries and cultural development. Management research has identified the flexible approach of arts organisations as a model for workplace relations everywhere. Yet the resilience of cultural workers … Read more

Zero Hours Contracts, Job Quality and Impacts on Workers

Prof Duncan McVicar (QUB) Seven years on from the Great Recession, survey data suggest that the use of zero hours contracts (ZHCs) in the UK labour market continues to grow rapidly. In some sectors, such as care working, incidence may be over 50%. This seminar will begin by summarising what we know from existing studies … Read more

Social Mobility in Northern Ireland

Dr John Moriarty, Dr David Wright, Dr Dermot O’Reilly and Professor Allen Thurston (QUB) Both the 2008 and 2011 Programmes for Government placed economic growth and creation of enhanced high skill labour market opportunities to the fore among the strategic priorities for Northern Ireland. Intertwined with these objectives is an emphasis on the key role … Read more

The Northern Ireland Prison Reform Programme: Progress Made and Challenges Remaining

Dr Michelle Butler (QUB) With the devolution of justice powers to the Stormont Assembly following the Hillsborough Agreement (2010), a commitment was given to undertake a review of prison conditions, management and oversight. The findings emerging from this review fed into a significant penal reform programme which was launched in 2011 (DOJNI, 2011). In the … Read more

A Question of Sport: Perspectives of Children and Young People

Dr Dirk Schubotz, Dr Katrina Lloyd and Dr Martina McKnight (QUB) In 2015 ARK surveyed children and young people, who were at the end of their primary and post-primary education respectively, about their experiences of sport and physical activity. A module of questions on sport was included in the Kids Life and Times (KLT) survey … Read more

Children’s attitudes towards old age: findings from the Kids Life and Times Survey 2015

Dr Gemma M. Carney and Dr Paula Devine (QUB) Mindful of Northern Ireland’s history of religious and ethnic segregation, this paper investigates another, more prevalent form of segregation: age segregation. Public policy tends to divide people into age groups by virtue of the ‘natural’ association of childhood with schooling, middle age with work and old … Read more

Negativity toward immigrant out-groups among Northern Ireland’s Youth – are younger cohorts becoming more tolerant?

Dr Stefanie Doebler (University of Liverpool), Dr Ruth McAreavey, Prof Sally Shortall and Dr Ian Shuttleworth (QUB) Negativity toward immigrants is a known problem in Northern Ireland. Media reports of racist hate crimes have been so frequent that Northern Ireland was famously dubbed the ‘race hate capital of Europe’. There exist several accounts on this, … Read more