Children with disabilities tend to have frequent contact with health, social care, and specialist education services as they grow up. Whilst health outcomes have improved, disabled children experience some of the most significant physical and mental health disparities in our society. Some children and families, however, appear to be more ‘resilient’ to early challenging childhood experiences than others. Current services rarely specifically focus on promoting wellbeing and resilience in children with disabilities. Little is known about what constitutes ‘resilience promoting’ interventions and services to promote wellbeing, and work needs to be undertaken to understand better how resilience can be promoted and measured. This studentship will explore conceptual, methodological, measurement and interventional issues in relation to wellbeing, resilience and disabled children. Significant energies are directed at closing the gap between the producers of knowledge, public policy, service delivery and the experiences and outcomes of service users. In health and social care, for example, there is a need to base practice on evidence of ‘what works’, although getting evidence into practice is complex and dependent on multiple factors. A wide range of international and national implementation research programmes are being conducted at Bangor University with partners in health and social care and other public services which will provide a foundation for PhD studentships.

Scholarship Application Deadline: 1 April 2011

Further Scholarship Information and Application