Members
Gabriel Abarca
I am a PhD Student at the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, King’s College London. My thesis explores trajectories and subjectivity in afro-descendant young immigrants and the mutual relationship between them and mental health services in Chile, funded by BecasChile Scholarship (CONICYT-CHILE). I studied a BSc in Psychology at the University of Santiago, and an MA in Adult Clinical Psychology with a specialisation in Psychoanalysis at the University of Chile. I also hold a Postgraduate Certificate in Gender, Masculinities and Public Policy from the University of Chile. I have worked as a lecturer at the Department of Psychology and the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Santiago, and the Department of Sociology at the University of Chile. I am an associate researcher of the Transdisciplinary Laboratory of Social Practices and Subjectivity (LaPSoS) at University of Chile and I have clinical practice in community mental health care centres in Chile. My research interests include: subjectivity, illness and mental health in young population; mental health and migration; health system and politics of evidence; feminism and gender theories; care studies; psychoanalysis and governmentality studies.
Contact: gabrielabarcabrown@gmail.com
Tatiana de Andrade Barbarini
I am a Postdoctoral researcher at the Federal University of Sao Paulo (UNIFESP) and a researcher at the Interdisciplinary Laboratory of Human/Social Sciences and Health (LICHSS) and the Center of Public Policy studies (NEPPs). My postdoctoral research aims to map and analyze the demand and care network in child mental health in Campinas (Brazil), particularly the practices and trajectories focused on problems initially identified as 'agitation'. I am part of the editorial board of Idéias - Journal of Philosophy and Human Sciences (UNICAMP). I have experience researching in health scoiology, education and childhood, ADHD, and medicalisation.
Contact: tati.barbarini@gmail.com
Adelaida Barros
Physician practicing psychiatrist. Doctorate in social anthropology at the University of Oxford. My doctoral thesis focuses on therapeutic processes in urban inter-cultural contexts (Mapuche medicine in Santiago, Chile). My focus is on the social relationships that are generated in an episode of vital crisis (illness, mourning, etc.) and how different actors negotiate the final result of the treatment process according to cultural practices and values. I studied medicine at the University of Chile and then specialized in psychiatry at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile. I completed the MPhil in Medical Anthropology in Oxford in 2016. I am interested in anthropological developments on therapeutic ritual, play, self, biographical memory and imagination, and its therapeutic role. My interest has focused on the anthropological understanding of therapeutic experiences of radical transformation in religious and secular forms of psychotherapy.
Contact: adelaidabaros@gmail.com
Sofía Bowen
I am a PhD student at the department of Global Health and Social Medicine at King’s College London. Previously, I studied a BSc in Social Anthropology at Universidad de Chile and an MSc in Medical Anthropology at University of Edinburgh. I have worked as a research assistant at University of Chile and as young lecturer, academic coordinator and research assistant in the Anthropology Department at Pontifical Catholic University of Chile. My overarching research interests include medical anthropology; anthropology of mental health and psychiatry; medical knowledge, technologies and practices; subjectivity, everyday life and personhood; health inequalities; therapeutic governance; and political economy of health. My PhD research explores social, political and cultural practices and discourses shaping ‘work-stress’ in Chile, focusing on the experience of low and middle-income employees and their interaction with therapeutic knowledge, experts and institutions.
Contact: sofia.bowen@kcl.ac.uk
Juan Claux
I’m a PhD student at the University of Edinburgh. My thesis is about the work of Peruvian hospital and community psychiatrists in the context of mental health services reform. I also teach community health and medical anthropology courses at Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia. My interests are: the anthropology of biomedicine and psychiatry, medical education, social medicine, public health, qualitative research, applied research, and social epidemiology.
Contact: j.a.claux@sms.ed.ac.uk
Elaine C. Flores
I am a PhD candidate at the Centre of Global Mental Health, Epidemiology and Population Health Department from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. I am also affiliated to EMERGE - The research unit in emerging diseases and Climate Change of Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia. The topic of my thesis is “El Niño” Southern Oscillation effects on mental health in the northern coast of Peru, and the possible use of social capital as a preventive tool against mental disorders. I hold an M.D. degree from San Martin de Porres University (USMP) and an MSc in Epidemiology Research, from the Peruvian University Cayetano Heredia (UPCH). I am a former research and biostatistics lecturer of the Postgraduate section of the Faculty of Human Medicine (USMP). I also have several years of professional experience in clinical research operations and management. I am especially interested in mental health in vulnerable populations, social inequalities & poverty, disasters and environmental-related health issues.
Contact: elaine.flores@lshtm.ac.uk
Álvaro Jiménez
I am a clinical psychologist and PhD student in Sociology at the Université Paris Descartes. My doctoral thesis consists of a comparative study on self-harm (suicide attempt and self-injury) in Chilean and French adolescents. In addition, I am a lecturer and a young researcher at the Faculty of Social Sciences of the University of Chile. My research interests lie in the junction between clinical psychology, the sociology of mental health and medical anthropology, particularly around the social and normative dimensions of ‘mental’ symptoms. As part of my interest in the globalization of psychiatric categories and practices, I currently participate in a comparative anthropological study on attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in Chilean, French and Brazilian children.
Contact: alvarojimol@gmail.com
Claudio Maino
I am a psychologist graduate from the University of Chile and I am currently a doctoral student in the Cermes3 (Centre de Recherche Médecine, Sciences, Santé, Santé Mentale, Société) laboratory at Paris V Descartes University. I also work as a clinical psychologist in the Psicoanalytical Space and Consultation Center L'EPOC. My thesis is about the social history of depression in Chile and I work under the direction of Pierre-Henri Castel and the co-direction of Esteban Radiszcz. I have been trained within the Lacanian analytical clinic for several years and since then I have been interested in the articulation between clinical specialties and "psi" knowledge with disciplines of social and human sciences such as anthropology, literature, comparative sociology and history.
Contact: claudiomaino@gmail.com
Cristián R. Montenegro
I am a sociologist from Universidad Academia de Humanismo Cristiano (Chile), currently pursuing doctoral studies at the London School of Economics’ Department of Methodology, from where I also obtained an MSc in Health, Community and Development in 2012 (Department of Social Psychology). My current research project is called “User Organizations and the Chilean Mental Health System: Observing the Construction of an Emergent Boundary”. I have worked as a researcher at the Department of Social Participation and Integrated User’s Management, South-East Metropolitan Health Service, in Santiago, Chile. In that position, I participated in the design and implementation the first Observatory of Users’ Experience in Health Services in the country. In parallel I was involved in several research projects around mental health, disability and human rights, teaching courses on qualitative social research and community health psychology in different Chilean universities. I am interested in the assemblages between global normative ideas, institutional designs and people's everyday experiences. In particular, the relation between global policy recommendations and assessment/evaluation instruments and the ecology of interests and identities enacted by these epistemic circles. Finally, I'm exploring the applications (and implications) of Social Systems Theory for an empirical sociology of mental health policy.
Contact: c.r.montenegro@lse.ac.uk [@CrrrMontenegro]
Sebastián Rojas
I’m a clinical psychologist, and current PhD candidate at the Department of Global Health & Social Medicine, King’s College London. Also, I’m a lecturer in Child Psychology at Facultad de Psicología, Universidad Diego Portales, Chile. My recent research and publications have focused in exploring the social and cultural determinants shaping ADHD in Chile. Lately, I’ve been inquiring how the interactions between children and stimulant medication in the classroom setting can produce different effects. By this, I’m exploring how the effects of the medication are determined by more than just it chemical properties, being strongly influenced by the sociomaterial contexts in which these practices take place. In order to tackle these questions, I’ve been using an analytical framework inspired by STS, Childhood Studies, and medical sociology and anthropology.
Contact: sebarojasn@gmail.com
Wagner Silva-Ribeiro
I am an epidemiologist working mostly on social determinants of mental disorders. For more than ten years, I’ve developed research on the effects of violence on mental health Brazilian major urban centres and on the mental health of vulnerable populations, such as prisoners and low income/deprived communities. As a researcher at the Personal Social Services Research Unit, in the London School of Economics and Political Science, I currently work in a research project aiming at identifying barriers that hinder adolescents’ access to mental health care in the UK and Brazil. In collaboration with colleagues in Brazil, I have also investigated the structure of mental health systems in Latin-American countries and developed research on the main barriers to integrate mental health care into primary care settings.
Contact: w.silva-ribeiro@lse.ac.uk
Felipe Szabzon
I am a PHD candidate at the Joint Erasmus Mundus Doctorate Program “Phoenix Dynamics of Health and Welfare”, an interdisciplinary PhD programme organized by the National School of Public Health, Portugal; École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, France; Linköping University, Sweden and Évora University, Portugal. My research thesis focuses on the challenges faced by the community-based mental health services to support informal caregivers and comprehensively describe how families experience the act of caring for their relatives under the current availability of communitarian resources. My previous training is a BA in clinical psychology and a MA in public health both acquired in São Paulo, Brazil. My main research interests are Public Policies, Collective Health and Mental Health Reforms.
Contact: felipe.szabzon@gmail.com
Norha Vera
I am a Colombian PhD student at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London. My research consists in identifying cultural dimensions associated with recovery from mental disorders in Latin America, to then adapt a measure of recovery for use in the region. My work is part of the RedeAmericas international research project. I have a mixed academic background in political science, clinical and experimental psychology, and population research. I am interested in the development of culturally appropriate mental health services in low and middle-income countries, the role of informal carers, and the effect of social factors on mental health and treatment effectiveness.
Contact: norha.vera@kcl.ac.uk
