Research Associate/Research Fellow in Population Mental Health

About us

In April 2024, IoPPN, King’s College London led the establishment of a national disseminated population mental health consortium, as part of a UKRI funded population health improvement initiative (Population Health Improvement UK- PHIUK). This post will be situated in Department of Psychological Medicine, at IoPPN (Denmark Hill campus), London (KCL) and will work across this partnership. The consortium spans 10+ universities and non-academic partnerships including local government and public health. The consortium challenges areas include children and young people’s mental health, the prevention of self harm and suicide and multiple long-term conditions. In addition cross-cutting areas include: policy, practice and lived experience, data and methods, training and capacity building and inequalities. This role will be based with the central coordinating team at KCL, working alongside the Consortium Co-Director, and will support successful delivery of the programme.

About the role

This is an exciting opportunity for a postdoctoral researcher, with a strong background in public health and mental health research and epidemiology, and with expertise in quantitative and qualitative methods, to develop a programme of work examining upstream social determinants of mental health. You will work closely with the Co-Director of the consortium (Prof Das-Munshi) to oversee and lead research within the initiative and take on a leadership role, helping to coordinate and lead research activities, to ensure successful delivery of this national initiative.

You will have expertise in public health and in mental health research. Experience across a range of data sources (eg. Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Surveys, UK birth cohorts, health records including CPRD) and linked data would be an advantage, as would an understanding of quantitative and qualitative methods. You will work closely with our non-academic partners, which include Thrive-LDN, and you may have an understanding of theory of change and other methodologies commonly used in these sectors.

The population mental health consortium will be establishing a training programme and the postholder will be expected to work with this platform to share learning across the wider membership and inform the development of training materials.  Dependent on your prior experience, you may be supported to line manage more junior staff and be expected to work with peers in the consortium leading research and impact initiatives, as well as chairing meetings. Applicants earlier in their career will be supported to work towards this.

The postholder will be supported to develop their academic career, including through fellowship applications and other grant applications to external research funders (led by the applicant or others in the team), and will be encouraged to explore collaborations with others. The postholder will receive research and wider professional skills development through local Early Career Researcher Networks and the College’s wider training programme.

This is a full time post (35 hours per week), and you will be offered a fixed term contract until 31 March 2028.

The successful applicant will need to be able to be based on location (Denmark Hill campus, IoPPN) for at least 3 days a week.

About you

To be successful in this role, we are looking for candidates to have the following skills and experience:

Essential criteria

1. PhD in a relevant discipline (public health, epidemiology, etc.)
2. Evidence of previous research in mental health
3. Experience of working with quantitative data (eg. national surveys, cohorts, health records), and/ or mixed methods research
4. Excellent project management, time management, communication  and presentation skills
5. Good knowledge of population mental health and health inequalities
6. Ability to work collaboratively with non-academic partners (public health, local government) and people with lived experience

To be considered for the Research Fellow post in addition to the above, you must demonstrate:

1. Evidence of previous research in mental health at postdoctoral level or good knowledge of population mental health and health inequalities
2. Track record of first authored publications in high impact journals.
3. Evidence of attracting grant funding and/ or assisting in application for substantial grant funding

Desirable criteria

1. Track record of publications in peer reviewed scientific journals
2. Experience of working across policy/ public health/ voluntary sectors and/ or people with lived experience
3. Experience of supervising researchers and students and/ or delivering seminars, presentations or training to diverse audiences.
4. Experience of presenting mental health/ public health research (academic and non-academic audiences)

Please note that this is a PhD level role but candidates who have submitted their thesis and are awaiting award of their PhDs will be considered for the Grade 6 post. In these circumstances the appointment will be made at Grade 5, spine point 30 with the title of Research Assistant. Upon confirmation of the award of the PhD, the job title will become Research Associate and the salary will increase to Grade 6.

Further information

We pride ourselves on being inclusive and welcoming. We embrace diversity and want everyone to feel that they belong and are connected to others in our community.

We are committed to working with our staff and unions on these and other issues, to continue to support our people and to develop a diverse and inclusive culture at King's.

We ask all candidates to submit a copy of their CV, and a supporting statement, detailing how they meet the essential criteria listed in the advert. If we receive a strong field of candidates, we may use the desirable criteria to choose our final shortlist, so please include your evidence against these where possible.

To find out how our managers will review your application, please take a look at our ‘ How we Recruit’ pages.

Interviews are due to be held between 16 and 20 December.

We are able to offer sponsorship for candidates who do not currently possess the right to work in the UK.

This post is subject to Disclosure and Barring Service and Occupational Health clearances.