Psychosocial Studies Research
Research in the field of Psychosocial Studies at UEL has emerged over almost three decades. We aim to create new understandings of the relationships between the individual, culture and society. We are interested in the development of theory and research practices that allow us to explore the psychological complexity of the individual to be incorporated into sociological and cultural accounts. To do this we cross disciplinary boundaries by drawing on philosophies, theories and methods of a variety of usually independent disciplines within the humanities and social sciences. For example these may include sociological, psychological, historical, cultural and even biological theories which we attempt to creatively, critically and reflexively infuse to develop profound dialogues with the subject being explored. There is a strong tradition of work in Psychosocial Studies that has used psychoanalytic theory as a tool to bridge some of these boundaries and understand links between subjectivities and modern forms of social structure.
Although these have a tendency to overlap, there are particular distinguishable research themes in the field.
Research Methodologies
In relation to its psychodynamic roots, there is a general tendency in Psychosocial Studies to research the context of human experience. Thus a variety of research methods are employed and developed. Although much of our research is empirically grounded in a range of (usually) qualitative data, not all psychosocial research methods are bounded by empirical analysis. Indeed a range of methods, experiences, and perceptions are engaged with to facilitate the emergence of concepts and insights. Below are some examples.
Infant observation has proved to be a durable and insightful tool to advance understandings of the significant impacts that social settings play in influencing psychic development. This has a long tradition in both psychoanalytic psychotherapy training and psychodynamic forms of research often in partnership with the Tavisotock and Portman NHS Trust. Through a variety of classroom observations which emphasise the centrality of social context, Dr. Heather Price has developed insights into, for example, links between emotion, the unconscious, literacy and learning.
Narrative research has a particularly appealing range of resources for psychosocial researchers. The internationally renowned Centre for Narrative Research (CNR) has historically been linked to Psychosocial Studies. Professor Corinne Squire is a co-director and co-founder of the Centre. Corinne has developed complex and innovative insights into analyzing, reading, and doing narrative, in relation to for example, gender, ‘race’, HIV, and contemporary social research. Dr. Cigdem Esin who is also an integral member of the CNR, has been working on a plethora of narrative related research. For example, Cigdem has focused on interactions between individual stories and grand socio-cultural narratives, visual autobiographies and the transnational and idiosyncratic stories of particular women’s movements between Turkey, Germany and Britain. Cigdem has also contributed to the qualitative research methods literature by developing articles on Pluralism in Qualitative Research. Her interest in the pluralistic approach has also led to an article on looking at Collective Findings, Individual Interpretations.
Members of the field have also been exploring some of the limits of qualitative methods. For example, through the application of psychodynamically-informed and relationship-based perspectives, Dr. David Jones thinks through some of the possible negative impacts of interviewing people about issues that are emotionally distressing. Additionally in drawing from extracts of interviews with families impacted by serious mental illness, David draws attention to the methodological difficulties inherent in studying shame. David’s work has thrown much light on the key role shame plays for human experience but equally he draws attention to the challenges it poses for researchers. Thus innovative psychodynamically-informed interviews and analysis are employed to facilitate the emergence and depth understanding of narratives relating to associated sensitive affects.
As we shall see below Dr. Candida Yates and Dr. Angie Voela have both independently developed methods for conducting film and visual forms of psychoanalytic and poststructuralist analyses.
Dr. Darren Ellis has produced psychosocial research on embodiment by mixing methods to develop insights, associations and concepts which downplay traditional dualistic divisions between the mind and the body, rationality and emotion, and thinking and feeling. His research has attempted to develop understandings of the contact points between (inner/virtual) autonomic processes alongside (outer/actualised) expressions, such as speech. Dr. Nicola Diamond has extensively researched issues relating to the body, for example through insightful research on trauma, violence, and intra and inter-subjectivity. Although Nicola’s work draws on a complex range of psychoanalytic thought, she is indeed authorised to research such issues as she develops intricate comprehensions of human functioning through her work as a psychoanalyst.
Education
We have a strong current of research concerned with the emotional and affective context of learning and teaching. Leading the way is Heather Price who has written on a wide range of associated subjects; for example: Emotional Labour in the Classroom, Emotion Learning, School Literacy and its Social Emotional Context, the Unconscious in the Classroom, and Teaching Psychoanalytic Studies in the UK. Heather has also been conducting some psychoanalytically-informed ethnographic field research at the Summerhill School to look at alternative and democratic forms of education and education outside mainstream schooling. This has led to, among other things, the commissioning of an article for the Journal of Psychoanalysis, Culture and Society.
Contemporary Identities
Thinking through contemporary identities is fundamentally a psychosocial project. In contemporary society the question of ‘who one is’ is a particularly complex question to answer as the individual tends to be immersed in hybrid, multiple, fleeting and temporary identities. What is it now to ‘be yourself?’ How much is choice and how much are we thrown in to an identity?
Corinne Squire has been concerned with these questions through looking at what it is to be HIV positive. One of Corinne’s monographs (which won the Sociology and Health and Illness Book Prize) HIV in South Africa: Talking about the big thing, highlights the significance of race, class and gender in relation to HIV and the wider medical, political and religious discourses. This was conducted through a narrative analysis of three years of field work data which produced some very important and informative individual accounts of living with HIV. Along with Mark Davies, Corinne has developed an edited collection of trans-disciplinarly articles by leading scholars in the field of HIV studies, entitled: HIV Treatment and Prevention Technologies in International Perspective. This volume helps to establish new ways of understanding current and future configurations of HIV technologies.
Angie Voela has utilised a range of theoretical frameworks such as process philosophy, literary theory and psychoanalytic thought to explore issues concerned with gender identities. For example, she has written on: Women, Men and Other Interesting Figures in Greek Literary Texts, The Construction of the Women in Karkavitsas, Masculinity as Moments of Becoming, Locating the Mother, The Revision of Feminine Heterosexuality in Feminist Theory, The Father, Individual and Society in Popular Culture, and Images of Femininity Greek Cinema.
Candida Yates has also been thinking through gender identities by drawing on psychoanalysis and a psycho-cultural approach which she is very much a pioneer of. Candida has written on: Masculinity and Good-Enough Jealousy, Cinematic Symptoms of Masculinity in Transition, Masculine Jealousy and the Struggle for Possession, Masculine Identity and being a Fan, and Flirtatious Masculinity in Contemporary Politics. Candida’s interest in the emerging psycho-cultural approach has also led to a chapter in a forthcoming book on Identities and Identification Processes: Approaches from Cultural Studies. Candida has written a monograph on Masculine Jealousy and Contemporary Cinema and is presently developing a monograph on Emotion, Identity and Political Culture.
Being based within East-London, we are privileged that the programme attracts people form a diverse range of cultures. Many of who do some tremendous empirical research through their dissertation projects on issues concerned with ‘race’ and identity. Thus Psychosocial Studies at UEL has a very particular interest in developing research concerned with identity, ‘race’ and difference. Lurraine Jones’ research interests surround identity construction, particularly in relation to Black British Identities. Lurraine has researched Mixed Heritage identity and Black British women. She is presently completing a PhD on the meaning and place of ‘race’ within Equality and Diversity Training.
Media, Culture and the Inner World
Psychosocial Studies is at the forefront of developing new ‘psycho-cultural’ approaches to the study of media, culture and the inner world. This work develops a psycho-cultural approach that applies theories and methods taken from psychosocial studies and psychotherapy to the field of media and popular culture.
The AHRC Media and Inner World research network is jointly run by Dr. Candida Yates at UEL and Dr. Caroline Bainbridge at the University of Roehampton. The network brings together psychoanalytic psychotherapists, academics and media practitioners to explore the place of emotion and therapy in popular culture. For further details of MIW events, courses and research publications see: www.miwnet.org.
The relationship between psychoanalysis and popular culture can be found in the 2012 MiW special edition of Psychoanalysis Culture and Society. Candida Yates is the Co-Editor of the open access online journal Free Associations, which also foregrounds research into media, culture and the inner world. UEL Psychosocial Studies researchers are at the forefront of debates that engage with the nature of therapy culture and what that might mean in different social, cultural and clinical contexts.
Emotion
Psychosocial researchers at UEL research emotion and affect in different social, cultural and clinical contexts. Many of our present and past staff contributed to an edited book entitled: Emotion: New Psychosocial Perspectives, which explores the emotional undercurrents of everyday phenomena. It is driven not by old disciplinary boundaries but by a concern to offer new perspectives on emotion that capture both the subjective and objective dimensions of human experience.
Corinne Squire along with Perri 6, Susannah Radstone and Amal Treacher have also produced an edited book entitled Public Emotions. The book argues that there is a need to examine, less the nature or causes of public emotions than their institutional, social and personal consequences. This is conducted in relation to issues concerned with conflict, ritual, social classification, collective life, identity, memory and power.
The emotional and therapeutic work of film and television has been explored by Candida Yates and Angie Voela using psychoanalytic and philosophical frameworks. This work includes: research into the relationship between jealousy and masculinity and the affective texts of cinema and popular culture and Experimental Cinema: the Case of Prometheus Retrogression.
Through the clinical context, Nicola Diamond has written about feelings, emotionality and affect through her work on embodiment which addresses the biological sciences to the field of psychoanalysis and sociological thought. For example she has written on: Understanding of Interpersonal Bodily Experience, Attachment and Intersubjectivity, When Thought is not Enough, Thin is the Feminist Issue in The Body, and Between Touches. More recently Nicola has just completed a monograph entitled: Between Skins.
Darren Ellis has also been interested in developing psychosocial thought in relation to emotion and the body. He has written on: the Psychophysiology and Emotional Disclosure, and conducted a Discourse Analysis of Disclosure which highlights some of the diverse ways that emotional inhibition is enacted.
Understanding Marginalisation and Distress
A large strand of our work is concerned with the relationship between personal accounts of living within a marginalized social category and wider medical, political and religious discourses.
David Jones has utilized psychoanalytic theories and methods to further understand marginalization and distress particularly in relation to mental health and criminal behavior. For example, David has written about: Madness, the Family and Psychiatry, Families and Serious Mental Illness, Shame and Loss in Families Suffering from Mental Illness, Psychosocial Understanding of Personality Disorder, and Men, Madness and Violence. David has also written two monographs in this area; the first is entitled Myths, Madness and the Family: The Impact of Mental Illness on Families, and the second is entitled: Understanding Criminal Behaviour: Psychosocial Approaches to Criminality.
Darren Ellis has been working aspects of marginalization and distress through an analysis of adhering to conspiracy theories on the internet. This project thinks psychosocially about the existential anxiety that is theorized to coincide with post-modern uncertainties and how adherents who feel marganalised, through the medium of the internet, attempt to work through this anxiety. Additionally he has been working on a larger project concerned with surveillance and subjectivity. One strand of this project has been to focus on the so called affective atmospheres of surveillance and another to think through the production of affects such as suspicion and trust. Darren also thinks through the ambiguous concept of reasonable suspicion in the context of the UK’s police stop and search powers which are disproportionality applied to ethnic minorities. Another article that Darren has written with Ian Tucker looks at Ernst Bloch’s understanding of Educated Hope which is applied to an analysis of the recent student protests in the UK.
Undergraduate and taught postgraduate programmes are also available
