Tagged / social sciences

Latest Major Funding Opportunities

Funding opportunities

The following funding opportunities have been announced. Please follow the links for more information.

Economic and Social Research Council

The Economic and Social Research Council, under the Research Councils UK and Fonds National de la Recherche, Luxembourg, bilateral agreement, invites proposals for its Research Grants Scheme. The scheme supports collaborative research in any area of social sciences within the remit of both ESRC and FNR. The UK part of the project must be a minimum of £350,000 and no more than £1 million (at 100% fEC).

Maximum award: £1 million. Closng date: 31/12/16.

Natural Environment Research Council

The Natural Environment Research Council, in collaboration with the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and the Indian Department of Science and Technology, invites applications for their Water Quality in India Scoping Workshop. The workshop will take place in Delhi on 17th and 18th November 2016 and the aims of the workshop will be: to define the scope of a potential new UK/India interdisciplinary programme focussed on research contributing to improved water quality, and through this support the economic development and welfare of India; to facilitate links between the UK and Indian research communities in the area of water quality research.

Applications from researchers working in the fields of water quality, water engineering and related disciplines are welcome. NERC and EPSRC will cover all reasonable travel and subsistence expenses for UK participants attending the workshop.

Maximum award: Not specified. Closing date: 16/09/16.

The Natural Environment Research Council, under its Discovery Science programme, invites applications for its Standard Research Grants.  Discovery Science is a key component of delivering the strategy of NERC and is intended to facilitate the identification of the next generation of strategic priorities. The minimum that can be requested per complete proposal and per component is £65,000 and the maximum for complete proposal is £800,000 at 100 per cent full economic cost.

You must speak to your DDRPP and your Funding Development Officer before applying to this call. Bournemouth University can submit one application per round and operates a demand management process.

Maximum award: £640,000 (at 80% fEC). Closing date: 17/01/17.

Wellcome Trust

The Wellcome Trust invites submissions for its Wellcome Book Prize.  The award is open to new works of fiction or non-fiction published by a UK based publisher or in-print between 1st January 2016 and 31 December 2016 (for the 2017 prize).

A book should have a central theme that engages with some aspect of medicine, health or illness. This can cover many genres of writing – including crime, romance, popular science, sci fi and history. The subjects these books might include birth and beginnings, illness and loss, pain, memory, and identity. The Wellcome Book Prize aims to excite public interest and encourage debate around these topics. Academic textbooks, scholarly monographs, diet books and picture-led books are not eligible, even if they are relevant to medicine or medical science.

Maximum award: £30,000. Closing date: 09/09/16 (recurring).

If you are interested in submitting to any of the above calls you must contact RKEO with adequate notice before the deadline. Please note that some funding bodies specify a time for submission as well as a date. Please confirm this with your RKEO Funding Development Officer.

You can set up your own personalised alerts on Research Professional. If you need help setting these up, just ask your School’s/Faculty’s Funding Development Officer in RKEO or view the recent blog post here. If you are thinking of applying, why not add an expression of interest on Research Professional so that BU colleagues can see your intention to bid and contact you to collaborate.

 

Public Health in Nepal: Vitamine A

international, open access, Publishing

Vit AThis week we published an editorial in the Journal of Biomedical Sciences on the question: “Is early diagnose for Vitamin A deficiency better than the current supplementation programme of Nepal?”
The editorial concludes that prevention is still better than cure, but instead of a mass Vitamin A supplementation in Nepal, we need a health promotion intervention aiming to increase the intake of relatively cheap vegetables and fruit (containing β carotene). In addition we need better surveillance and help to identify children with Vitamin A Deficiency and provide them with Vitamin A supplements. The primary focus should be on adopting sustainable food based approaches to combat vitamin A deficiency. In Public Health terms: rather than a blanket coverage of Vitamin A supplementation to whole population we should consider a targeted intervention aimed at those who need it most.

Reference:
Simkhada P, Sathian B, Adhikari S, van Teijlingen E, Roy B. (2015) Is early diagnose for Vitamin A deficiency better than the current supplementation programme of Nepal?. J Biomed Sci. 2(4):28-30.
http://www.nepjol.info/index.php/JBS/index

Presentation PhD student Jib Acharya in Liverpool

international, open access, PG research, Publishing, student research

Jib LJMU 2016Mr. Jib Acharya (FHSS) gave an interesting presentation yesterday about the qualitative research findings of his PhD at Liverpool John Moores University.  Jib’s PhD research focused on the knowledge, attitudes and beliefs of poor women in Nepal about healthy eating and the study also identifies major food barriers.

His mixed-methods approach combines a quantitative questionnaire survey with qualitative research. Jib’s research project is supervised by Dr. Jane Murphy, Dr. Martin Hind and Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen. Some of the preliminary findings of this FHSS thesis have already been published in two scientific journals [1-2].

References:

  1. Acharya, J., van Teijlingen, E., Murphy, J., Hind, M. (2015) Assessment of knowledge, beliefs and attitudes towards healthy diet among mothers in Kaski, Nepal, Participation 17(16): 61-72.
  2. Acharya, J., van Teijlingen, E., Murphy, J., Hind, M. (2015) Study of nutritional problems in preschool aged children in Kaski District in Nepal, Journal of Multidisciplinary Research in Healthcare 1(2): 97-118. http://dspace.chitkara.edu.in/jspui/bitstream/1/560/1/12007_JMRH_Acharya.

Why editorials?

international, Knowledge Transfer, open access, Publishing, Research Integritiy, writing

Zika editorial 2016BU academics are editors on a wide range of scientific journals.  As editors we often write editorials for academic journals which have a number of specific functions.  It is a key means of communication between the editor(s) and the journal’s readership.  It is also vehicle to highlight topical academic and political issues related to the journal and the discipline(s) it represents. JAM June 2016 editorial

Earlier this week the latest issue of the Journal of Asian Midwives came out with an editorial which is an illustration of the first point giving information to the readers [1].  The topics addressed in this editorial included the announcement that this new journal was now indexed in the CINAHL Database, a recent major international conference in the field and a call for the forthcoming 2017 ICM (Internation Confederation of Midwives) tri-annual conference.  Today saw the publication of an editorial on the Zika virus and its potential impact in Nepal in the journal Medical Science [2].   This guest editorial co-written by BU’s Visiting Faculties Dr. Brijesh Sathian and Prof. Padam Simkhada with Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen (Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health) calls for action in Nepal.  A country where malaria is endemic. The Zika virus uses mosquitoes like the ones spreading Dengue fever and malaria.  Zika is a virus we do not wish to see spreading in countries where malaria is already rife.  The editorial warns that precautionary measures are needed to prevent a Zika outbreak as the spread of the virus to the country seems inevitable, the only uncertainty is when it will be arriving.

Both journals are Open Access which means these editorials can be read by anybody with internet access free of charge.

References:

  1. Jan, R., van Teijlingen, E. (2016) Editorial JAM June 2016, Journal of Asian Midwives 3(1):1. http://ecommons.aku.edu/jam/vol3/iss1/1/
  2. van Teijlingen, E., Sathian, B., & Simkhada, P. (2016). Zika & Nepal: a far greater risk for its population than to individuals. Medical Science 4(2): 312-313. http://www.pubmedhouse.com/journals/ms/articles/1064/PMHID1064.pdf

 

Students Who Bounce Back Project

Centre for Excellence in Learning

Credit: Gareth Williams (CC BY 2.0)

Credit: Gareth Williams(CC BY 2.0)

Are you a student carer? Do you know a BU student who has caring responsibilities?

BU student carers – those students who provide unpaid support to someone who could not manage without your help – are invited to take part in a photo-diary research project entitled ‘Students who bounce back’, led by Dr Jacqueline Priego, from BU’s Centre for Excellence in Learning.

  • The project seeks to explore the life experience of student carers at BU and the impact of caring in their learning experiences.
  • By taking part, student carers will help us to enhance the academic and pastoral support for student carers at BU in the future.
  • The Student Carer bursary was funded through a pilot scheme in 2015/2016. This research will evaluate the effectiveness of the bursary and inform whether to continue with the bursary in future years. We would like to hear from students who were and were not successful in securing the bursary, and also from those student carers who were not aware of the bursary.

For details about the project, including its reimbursement scheme (up to £50 Amazon voucher + travel expenses), please email jpriego@bournemouth.ac.uk.

A carer is defined as anyone who cares, unpaid, for a family member who, due to illness, disability, a mental health problem or an addiction, cannot cope without their support.

Featured Image Credit: Gareth Williams (CC BY 2.0)

Centre for Qualitative Research Summer Surgery Sessions

CQR logo

CQR is pleased to announce a series of appointments available to postgrad (Masters or PhD) and academic researchers considering using qualitative methods for their projects.

 The half-hour sessions with Centre for Qualitative Research Director, Dr. Kip Jones, will take place over the summer at Royal London House, Lansdowne. Anyone who is thinking of using qualitative methods and would like more information, support from CQR members, or links to  resources, are welcome to book a half-hour session to discuss their project and get feedback.
Too often research projects jump into using qualitative methods of research such as interviewing, observing, etc. without really having any background in the method or training for it. When it comes time for Vivas or publications, often these projects do not then meet expectations.  What CQR hopes to do is ensure that qualitative projects of any kind carried out at BU are vigorous.  This is the reason behind the surgeries (as well as plans for future Centre for Qualitative Research seminars and masterclasses).
It is easy to book a slot for a session. Simply email Kip (kipworld@gmail.com) stating the date of either a Tuesday (10-12 noon) or a Wednesday (1-3 pm) over the summer when you can be available. You will get an email back with your timeslot for the particular date.

CQR members have expertise in a wide range of methods. We hope through this surgery process to connect you up with a particular resourceful person.
Research as Film/Film as Research
Photo-elicitation
Grounded Theory
Performance Poetry
Ethics
Interviewing
Focus Groups
Ethnography
Participatory Action Research
Autobiography
Auto-ethnography
Biographic Narrative Interpretive Method
Appreciative Inquiry
Arts-based methods
Telephone interviews
Questionnaire design
NVIVO
Performance Poetry
Reflexivity
Performative Social Science

BU-Nepal link highlighted

international, Publishing, writing

Talbot Himalayans 2016This week BU’s work in Nepal was highlighted in several ways.  Most publicly on the wonderful new mural at Talbot Campus.  Secondly, BU currently displays some of the entries of images to the past two years of its research photo competition.  The photos show the creativity of BU’s academics and students as well as the fascinating range of research taking place at the university.  One of these pictures was taken by FHSS Visiting Faculty Dr. Bibha Simkhada during fieldwork in Dhading, Nepal.  The selected photos are on display in the Atrium Art Gallery until the 13th of June.  Helicopter Dhading

Last, but not least, another FHSS Visiting Faculty, Poole Hospital NHS Foundation Trust midwife Jillian Ireland published a blog on her involvement in the THET-funded project in Nepal.  She reflects on her time as UK volunteer in Nepal.  Jilly wrote: ” Three volunteers Andrea Lawrie, David Havelock and I are keen to share what we experienced in a paper sometime soon and today I will condense some of my own reflections. I wrote ‘letters’ (via email) to my Head of Midwifery, Sandra Chitty and to Senior Lecturer in Midwifery at Bournemouth University Dr. Jen Leamon while I was away, using different styles of expression to ‘get at’ my reflections from more than one angle. It helped me to separate out elements of the whole experience.”

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH