About us
Members of the team leading the SSCR at Sheffield come from across the Faculty of Social Sciences and Faculty of Health. They have extensive experience of delivering high quality projects in the field of applied research for social care to improve outcomes for people who require social care.
Executive Director
Professor Katherine Runswick-Cole is Executive Director for SSCR for Sheffield. She is also the Deputy Director of the School for Social Care Research (Public Involvement and Engagement (PIE) and Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI)).
Katherine is based in the School of Education in the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Sheffield.
Katherine has lots of experience working with children, young people, and adults with learning disabilities, their families and allies in research.
She has published widely. Her work draws on critical disability studies and critical studies of care. She is a family carer, as the mother of two adult children, one of whom has the label of learning disability.
Co-directors
Dr Liz Croot is the lead for academic career development in Sheffield SSCR. She also leads the research theme focused on creating and synthesising evaluative evidence of social care interventions.
Liz is based in the Sheffield Centre for Health and Related Research, which is part of the Division of Population Health in the Faculty of Health at the University of Sheffield.
Liz has extensive experience working with:
- Adults with learning disabilities
- Their families and allies
- Local authority staff and social care provider organisations
- Hospital and community health services
Liz's research aims to improve health and social care services for adults with learning disabilities. She has significant expertise in developing and evaluating programmes and interventions. Liz is committed to inclusive research practices, and she also teaches students about how to make sure research involves people who are often underrepresented.
Professor Kate Hamblin is the lead for practice and policy liaison in Sheffield SSCR. She is also the research theme lead for technology.
Kate is director of the ESRC Centre for Care, and based in the Centre for International Research on Care, Labour and Equalities (CIRCLE) in the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Sheffield.
Kate has worked with:
- People with cognitive impairments
- People with dual-sensory impairments (i.e. people who have both hearing loss and vision loss)
- Families, friends and neighbours who provide support to someone
- People who work in the care sector, including care workers, local authority staff and commissioners.
Kate’s research has explored how technologies are used to help people do the things they want to do and with care and support.
Professor Peter Bath is lead for the Care Data and Analytical Infrastructure theme within the SSCR. Peter is based in the Information School within the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Sheffield.
Peter’s research interests include the use of information to support the care of people with different health conditions and the use of statistical and machine learning methods to analyse health and social care data. Much of his research over the last 30 years has centred on the needs of older people and on using data analytic methods to predict outcomes within this group.
Peter was Principal Investigator (PI) for the EMoTICON-funded “A Shared Space and a Space for Sharing” research project (2014-2017) which investigated how people in extreme circumstances share information and develop empathy and trust in the online world. Peter’s research in this interdisciplinary project focussed on how people with life-threatening and terminal illnesses get to know other people and develop friendships in online health forums.
More recently, Peter has been examining the needs of people with multiple long term-illnesses, sometimes called multimorbidity. He was the PI for the NIHR-funded Development Award “Using Artificial Intelligence (AI) to Tackle Multiple Long-Term Conditions - Multi-morbidity in South Yorkshire” (2021) and is Co-Investigator for the NIHR-EPSRC project “Re-Engineering Services for Health: Maximising Person-centred Care (RESHAPE-CARE)” (2023-2024) funded through the SEISMIC programme. Peter set up a Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement (PPIE) panel for people with multiple long-term health conditions.
Peter was also been in several projects developing tools to predict outcomes in people with suspected COVID-19 during the initial phases of the pandemic.
Professor Nathan Hughes is lead for the Disability Across the Life Course theme, and for supporting our engagement with the Three School initiatives focussed on: prevention, dementia, and mental health.
Nathan is co-director of the Centre for International Research on Care, Labour and Equalities, and deputy director of the ESRC Centre for Care. His research considers the experiences of people with neurodevelopmental disabilities, such as acquired brain injury, communication difficulties, and learning disabilities, including in relation to social care, education, and criminal justice.
