Katie Pybus
Lecturer in Mental Health
Profile
Biography
Katie is a Lecturer in Mental Health with interests in the relationship between social security systems and mental health, as well as the broader socioeconomic context of mental health and stigma.
Katie completed her undergraduate degree in psychology before training to become a registered mental health nurse and working across a range of hospital and community settings in Yorkshire and London. These experiences informed her research interests in the social determinants of mental health and illness, and she subsequently completed an ESRC funded PhD at the University of York in 2019.
Following a period working as a government social researcher in the Department for Work and Pensions, Katie returned to the University of York as a research fellow. She has since worked on research related to housing and mental health, food insecurity, social security and the relationship between socioeconomic factors and mental health crisis. During the pandemic, Katie has been part of a research team seeking to understand the experiences of families living on low incomes during Covid-19 through the Covid Realities research programme focusing in particular on mental health outcomes.
Katie joined Hull York Medical School in 2022.
Qualifications
- PhD Health Sciences, University of York
- MSc Social Change, University of Manchester
- Accelerated Diploma in Mental Health Nursing, King’s College London
- BSc (Hons) Psychology, Lancaster University
Research
Overview
Katie's research interests include: mental health and social security; the socioeconomic context of mental health and stigma; structural forms of stigma; public attitudes towards mental illness and experiences of stigma.
Research group(s)
External activities
Memberships
- Nursing and Midwifery Council: Registered Mental Health Nurse
- Society for Social Medicine
- Royal College of Nursing
- Scientific Committee Member, RCN International Research Conference (2018)
- City co-ordinator for Pint of Science festival (York): 2016-2018
Invited talks and conferences
2021: “My biggest worry right now is the mental health of my children”. Youth mental health and COVID-19 – what do we know and what should we do? University of Oxford, The Centre for Society and Mental Health and The Policy Institute.
2021: Ask the author: Looking at the links between poverty, income inequality and food insecurity. University of York. (Invited speaker).
2020: Understanding the barriers for people with labels of “personality disorder”. Local Area Coordinator training session. (Invited speaker).
2019: Linking Leeds seminar, Department for Work and Pensions: Extending the parity of esteem agenda: mental illness and stigma from a socioeconomic perspective. (Invited speaker).
2019: ‘It can happen to anybody’ Yorkshire and Humber Public Health Network conference on mental health: A world free of stigma and discrimination. (Invited speaker).
2018: Society for Social Medicine Annual Scientific Meeting: Can you turn on a light switch? Exploring whether changes to disability-related welfare payments in the UK disadvantage claimants with a mental illness.
2018: British Sociological Association Annual Conference: “There’s nothing wrong with you, you’ll be alright”: Perceptions of being unable to work due to mental ill health in the context of UK welfare reform.
2018: Welfare Conditionality: Principles, Practices and Perspectives Conference: “Being held to ransom”: Psychosocial effects of conditionality on welfare claimants with a mental illness in the UK.
2017: Society for Social Medicine Annual Scientific Meeting: “Unseen Injuries”: Invisibility and Mental Illness in the UK Welfare System. (Poster).
Media coverage
- ‘I feel like a failure’: Universal credit parents face mental health nosedive Big Issue 7 May 2021
- Universal credit and mental health Child Poverty Action Group 7 May 2021
- We must break the link between mental health and poverty Big Issue 10 May 2021
- Mental health: Why PM's pledges will fall short until families have more cash Big Issue 15 May 2021
- Mental Health: Assessment, Hansard 22 January 2019
- Mentally ill people more at risk of losing benefits, study shows, The Guardian 22 January 2019
- People with mental illness are most at risk of losing benefits, study shows, The BMJ 22 January 2019
- People with mental health problems are more likely to lose their benefits, The Big Issue 22 January 2019
- Mentally ill claimants more than twice as likely to lose benefits, Huffington Post 22 January 2019
- Brits with mental health problems TWICE as likely to lose up to £140 a week in benefits, The Sun 22 January 2019
Teaching
Undergraduate
Details to follow.
