Articles by Keira Pratt-Boyden
Papers by Keira Pratt-Boyden
Frontiers in Psychology
When Open Dialogue diversifies internationally as an approach to mental healthcare, so too do the... more When Open Dialogue diversifies internationally as an approach to mental healthcare, so too do the research methodologies used to describe, explain and evaluate this alternative to existing psychiatric services. This article considers the contribution of anthropology and its core method of ethnography among these approaches. It reviews the methodological opportunities in mental health research opened up by anthropology, and specifically the detailed knowledge about clinical processes and institutional contexts. Such knowledge is important in order to generalize innovations in practice by identifying contextual factors necessary to implementation that are unknowable in advance. The article explains the ethnographic mode of investigation, exploring this in more detail with an account of the method of one anthropological study under way in the UK focused on Peer-Supported Open Dialogue (POD) in the National Health Service (NHS). It sets out the objectives, design and scope of this resea...
A graphic comic of the Power in Big Local Partnerships project findings. This report considers po... more A graphic comic of the Power in Big Local Partnerships project findings. This report considers power in Big Local partnerships and Big Local, a resident-led, place-based programme. It explores how decisions are made, by and with whom and in what contexts. It considers how particular ideas gather appeal, how some voices are heard more than others and importantly, identifies ways to strengthen decision making. An online comic has been designed alongside this report to visually demonstrate inclusivity and invisibility in decision making and how power and knowledge operate in community meetings
This report is about the practice of decision-making in a resident-led, place-based programme. It... more This report is about the practice of decision-making in a resident-led, place-based programme. It explores the operation of power within decision-making: how decisions are made, by and with whom and in what contexts. It considers how particular ideas gather appeal, how some voices are heard more than others, and how beliefs in ‘the right way’ to make decisions matter, and can have unintended consequences of limiting agendas and imagination. It identifies ways to strengthen decision-making in a community-led programme, by developing new forms of participation and sharing power among all sections of the community. The research is based on Big Local. Big Local is a resident-led funding programme providing groups of people in 150 areas in England with £1.15m each to spend across 10–15 years in order to create lasting change in their neighbourhoods. A key goal of the Big Local programme is for communities to build confidence and capacity for the longer term (Local Trust, 2019). In Big Lo...
International Journal of Migration, Health and Social Care, 2020
Purpose This review and theoretical analysis paper aims to bring together literatures of place, m... more Purpose This review and theoretical analysis paper aims to bring together literatures of place, mobility, refugees and mental health to problematise the ways in which social support is practised on the ground and to rethink its possibilities. Design/methodology/approach This paper draws on an interdisciplinary understanding of social support that focusses on the social networks and significant and intimate relationships that mitigate negative mental health and well-being outcomes. The authors explore the dialectic relationship between place and mobility in refugee experiences of social support. Findings The authors argue that, in an Euro-American context, practices of social support have historically been predicated on the idea of people-in-place. The figure of the refugee challenges the notion of a settled person in need of support and suggests that people are both in place and in motion at the same time. Conversely, attending to refugees’ biographies, lived experiences and everyda...
Survey content. (PDF 392 kb)
Anonymised survey dataset. (XLSX 63 kb)
Power in Big Local partnerships, 2021
This report is about the practice of decision making in a resident-led, place-based programme. It... more This report is about the practice of decision making in a resident-led, place-based programme. It explores the operation of power within decision making, how decisions are made, by and with whom and in what contexts. It considers how particular ideas gather appeal, how some voices are heard more than others, and how beliefs in ‘the right way’ to make decisions matter and can have unintended consequences of limiting agendas and imagination. Finally, it identifies ways to strengthen decision making in a community-led programme by developing new forms of participation and sharing power among all sections of the community.
BJPsych Bulletin
SummaryThis article explores how ‘wicked problems’ such as climate change might force psychiatry ... more SummaryThis article explores how ‘wicked problems’ such as climate change might force psychiatry to rethink some of its fundamental ideas and ways of working, including clinical boundaries, understandings of psychopathology and ways of organising. We use ethnographic evidence to explore how mental health service ‘survivor’ activists are already rethinking some of these issues by therapeutically orienting themselves towards social problems and collective understandings of well-being, rejecting ‘treatment as usual’ approaches to distress. In this way we provide an example of the potential of activists to help psychiatry negotiate the climate crisis.
Development in Practice, 2013
Development in Practice, 2013
International Journal of Migration, Health and Social Care, 2020
Purpose
This review and theoretical analysis paper aims to bring together literatures of place, m... more Purpose
This review and theoretical analysis paper aims to bring together literatures of place, mobility, refugees and mental health to problematise the ways in which social support is practised on the ground and to rethink its possibilities.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper draws on an interdisciplinary understanding of social support that focusses on the social networks and significant and intimate relationships that mitigate negative mental health and well-being outcomes. The authors explore the dialectic relationship between place and mobility in refugee experiences of social support.
Findings
The authors argue that, in an Euro-American context, practices of social support have historically been predicated on the idea of people-in-place. The figure of the refugee challenges the notion of a settled person in need of support and suggests that people are both in place and in motion at the same time. Conversely, attending to refugees’ biographies, lived experiences and everyday lives suggests that places and encounters of social support are varied and go beyond institutional spaces.
Research limitations/implications
The authors explore this dialectic of personhood as both in place and in motion and its implications for the theorisation, research and design of systems of social support for refugees.
Originality/value
This paper surfaces the dialectics of place and mobility for supporting refugee mental health from an interdisciplinary perspective.
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Articles by Keira Pratt-Boyden
Papers by Keira Pratt-Boyden
This review and theoretical analysis paper aims to bring together literatures of place, mobility, refugees and mental health to problematise the ways in which social support is practised on the ground and to rethink its possibilities.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper draws on an interdisciplinary understanding of social support that focusses on the social networks and significant and intimate relationships that mitigate negative mental health and well-being outcomes. The authors explore the dialectic relationship between place and mobility in refugee experiences of social support.
Findings
The authors argue that, in an Euro-American context, practices of social support have historically been predicated on the idea of people-in-place. The figure of the refugee challenges the notion of a settled person in need of support and suggests that people are both in place and in motion at the same time. Conversely, attending to refugees’ biographies, lived experiences and everyday lives suggests that places and encounters of social support are varied and go beyond institutional spaces.
Research limitations/implications
The authors explore this dialectic of personhood as both in place and in motion and its implications for the theorisation, research and design of systems of social support for refugees.
Originality/value
This paper surfaces the dialectics of place and mobility for supporting refugee mental health from an interdisciplinary perspective.
This review and theoretical analysis paper aims to bring together literatures of place, mobility, refugees and mental health to problematise the ways in which social support is practised on the ground and to rethink its possibilities.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper draws on an interdisciplinary understanding of social support that focusses on the social networks and significant and intimate relationships that mitigate negative mental health and well-being outcomes. The authors explore the dialectic relationship between place and mobility in refugee experiences of social support.
Findings
The authors argue that, in an Euro-American context, practices of social support have historically been predicated on the idea of people-in-place. The figure of the refugee challenges the notion of a settled person in need of support and suggests that people are both in place and in motion at the same time. Conversely, attending to refugees’ biographies, lived experiences and everyday lives suggests that places and encounters of social support are varied and go beyond institutional spaces.
Research limitations/implications
The authors explore this dialectic of personhood as both in place and in motion and its implications for the theorisation, research and design of systems of social support for refugees.
Originality/value
This paper surfaces the dialectics of place and mobility for supporting refugee mental health from an interdisciplinary perspective.