The University of Sheffield

Faculty Member, School of Health & Related Research

Research Fellow

Thesis Title: Work and its Other

About

From 2010 I have worked in health sciences, first as a systematic review at the Centre for Reviews and Dissemination (University of York), then (from July 2011) as a health economic modeller at School of Health and Related Research (ScHARR) at the University of Sheffield. This work continues my methodological interests in formalisation and evidence-based decision-making. I remain interested in developments in welfare reform and see much overlap between social policy and health policy issues.

I have a varied background, including an undergraduate degree in Electronic Engineering, a postgraduate degree in 'Critical Theory & Cultural Studies', a PhD in Sociology/Human Geography (bordering on social policy and pollitical economy), and a stint as a qualitative researcher at the Centre for Housing Policy at the University of York. I am interested in exploring and developing connections between different academic disciplines, approaches, and bodies of knowledge.

I am a generalist, in the sense that I believe there is often a diminishing marginal return associated with increased specialisation and concentration of one's efforts within a single topic, discipline, or approach; and that new insights and understandings of social processes and problems can often be achieved more effectively through integrative inter-disciplinary research than aggregative intra-disciplinary research.

In my PhD thesis, I combined approaches from systems theory, social psychology, economics, statistics, sociology, biogeography and political theory in order to understand a set of changes to systems of welfare provision, directed at Incapacity Benefit claimants (now Employment & Support Allowance claimants), known as Pathways to Work. Through this multi-disciplinary approach, I have illustrated how close analysis of one political reform can both be informed by, and help inform, a nexus of related programmes of reform; and also both help inform, and be informed by, a variety of theories of social processes.

As I have a background in the applied physical sciences (electronic engineering), I am comfortable with formal, quantitative, and statistical approaches to social research. However, in keeping with my generalist research philosophy, I am careful to avoid equating increased formalisation and quantification of one's theoretical assumptions or empirical material (respectively) with increased objectivity or insightfulness. Instead, my research approach might most concisely described as 'mixed methods'.

In 2009 I worked at the Centre for Housing Policy (University of York) on government-commissioned qualitative research investigating the role of information sharing systems in the context of criminal justice and offender rehabilation.

Occasionally, I have worked as a freelance statistician for commercial organisations.

I hope to publish more in all of the above areas.

Contact Information