Projects
Current and recent projects within the Violence and Society Centre
Sally McManus
Professor & Director of the Violence and Society Centre
Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey 2023/4 - national survey of mental health and wellbeing in England
The Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey (APMS) series provides data on trends and inequalities in mental health and associated risk factors. Sally has been a key part of the research team since 2006, the latest survey report publishes in November 2025. Collaboration with the National Centre for Social Research and University of Leicester.
- Funder: NHS England
- October 2020 – March 2026
Good Measure Project - advancing measurement of gender and sexual dimensions of adolescent mental health and wellbeing
Questions on gender identity, sex and sexuality are often overlooked in research on young people’s mental health despite the importance of these topics to young people. The Good Measure project aims to advance understanding of the links between adolescent sexual development, gender identity and mental health. The collaboration is led by Glasgow University.
Read more: Good Measure Project | University of Glasgow
- Funder: MRC
- November 2022 – May 2026
Assessing risk factors for gambling-related suicidal ideation: evidence from regular sports bettors in Britain
This project is at the knowledge mobilisation stage and involves working with primary care and other healthcare professionals to improve identification of people experiencing gambling harms. The collaboration is led by Glasgow University.
Read more: Gambling-Related Suicide Research Programme Funding Calls | Greo
- Funder: GREO
- September 2023 – December 2026
Vanessa Gash
Deputy Director of the Violence and Society Centre
INTERFACED: Enhancing (Post-)Pandemic Interfaces of Civic Participation
The project seeks to improve political interactions and strengthen democratic systems across Europe in the face of political polarization and disengagement.
- Funder: HORIZON, European Commission
- January 2025 - December 2027
Ruth Weir
Senior Research Fellow & Deputy Director of the Violence and Society Centre
Teenage Relationship Abuse
Drawing on existing collaborations with Thames Valley Police (TVP), the Domestic Abuse Commissioner’s (DAC) office, the Home Office and the charity SafeLives, Ruth and colleagues formed an interdisciplinary National working group on teenage relationship abuse to explore whether the definition of domestic abuse, as set out in the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, should be lowered to include 13–16-year-olds and to understand the challenges in identify and supporting young people experiencing or carrying out harmful behaviour in the current system.
- Funder: City St George’s, University of London
- November 2023 – April 2024
Understanding Domestic Abuse Perpetrators
This project, led by the University of Essex, set out to address the following question:
Are there any common profiles of domestic abuse perpetrators in Essex, and do they present different risks and opportunities for targeted interventions?
To answer this question the team conducted a mixed-methods study, analysing a large, longitudinal database of domestic abuse incidents and suspect data -relating to 16,491 suspects and 40,488 observations between 2016-2020- provided by Essex Police. The findings revealed at least four distinct clusters of domestic abuse suspects in Essex. The team explored the implications of these for interventions, training, and commissioning, and made recommendations for further research.
- Funder: Home Office
- February – June 2022
Developing the evidence base for Teenage Relationship Abuse risk assessment
This project develops an evidence base on risk in teenage relationship abuse (TRA) to inform early identification across services working with children and young people. It combines lived-experience and practitioner insight with advanced data analytics to identify risk and protective factors and improve understanding of how TRA manifests.
- Funder: Science & Technology in Policing (STAR) Fund
- April 2026 – March 2027
Annie Bunce
Research Fellow
Exploring best practice principles for co-analysis in academic and lived experience collaborations
To work with charity Revolving Doors in order to identify the main gaps for co-analysis when working with a particularly marginalised group - adults with lived experience of the criminal justice system.
- Funder: Participatory Research Funding, City St George’s, University of London
- August 2024 – June 2025
Doing co-analysis justice: illustrated output and launch event
The development of an illustrated output demonstrating co-produced principles for co-analysis and further dissemination activity, building on the initial research funded In the project above.
- Funder: HEIF KE Fund, City St George’s, University of London
- January – July 2026
Outcome measures for support in safe accommodation for victim survivors of domestic abuse
A consortium that will work closely with lived experience panels, service providers, and local authorities to identify and agree a shared set of outcomes. This will help local authorities make better-informed decisions, shape support services, and most importantly, deliver real improvements in the lives of survivors. Led by Verian Group and the University of Bristol.
- Funder: Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government
- October 2025 - March 2026
Darren Cook
Research Fellow
Developing AI-driven System for Detecting Right-Wing Extremist Misinformation on social media
- Funder: British Academy
- March 2025 – March 2026
To develop and validate an AI-driven system capable of detecting and analysing misinformation in real-time using natural language processing and machine learning. The system will visualise misinformation patterns through an interactive dashboard and utilised to assess its role in the 2024 UK riots.
Knowledge Transfer Partnership
- Funder: Innovate UK
- January 2026 – February 2028
Work with National Legal Service Solicitors and London Belgravia Holdings, law firms specialising in domestic abuse cases, to build AI functionality to help them safely auto-process incoming legal queries.
Elizabeth Cook
Senior Lecturer in Sociology
An analysis of sex/gender related motives and indicators (SGRMIs) in Domestic Homicide Reviews (DHRs) in England and Wales
Femicide, the killing of women and girls because of their gender, is a global burden. However, there is a lack of quality, comparable data to aid prevention. This will assess the feasibility of applying the UNODC and UNEGEEW’s (2022) recently published statistical framework to a sample of femicide victims in England and Wales. It therefore seeks to directly inform the recently established Home Office Domestic Homicide Review (DHR) Library and the development of the Domestic Abuse Commissioner’s Office National Oversight Mechanism, as well as strengthen academic-policy relationships for preventing violence against women and girls (VAWG).
- Funder: Policy Support fund, City St George’s, University of London
- August 2024 – June 2025
Improving the Commissioning of Domestic Homicide Reviews in England and Wales
In England and Wales, Domestic Homicide Reviews (DHRs) are a statutory review mechanism for investigating domestic abuse-related deaths. However, how individual DHRs are commissioned has not been examined, nor has the effectiveness of oversight. This leaves a gap in what constitutes current measures of and evidence on domestic abuse-related deaths, underpinned by the question of whose death counts, how evidence is generated and, fundamentally, the legitimacy of DHRs. Addressing this gap, this study used a survey and Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to local authorities to collect data about the notification, decision-making, and oversight pathways in relation to domestic abuse-related deaths. Collaboration with the University of Durham.
- Funder: British Academy Small Grant Scheme
- 2024 – 2025
Non-intimate femicide
The focus of this research is ‘non-intimate femicide’, which broadly refers to the killing of women and girls by someone outside of the intimate and/or domestic sphere. This project involved a) conducting a scoping review of conceptual and definitional issues, b) analysis of 20 years of national homicide data (using Homicide Index data) in England and Wales, and c) a content analysis of media reports for non-intimate femicide to examine how this form of gender-based violence is represented in the media. Collaboration with the University of Manchester.
- Funder: British Academy/Leverhulme Small Grant Scheme
- 2022 - 2023
Kimberley Cullen
Knowledge Exchange Manager
Adolescent Domestic Abuse Infographic and Roundtable
A roundtable session with the Adolescent Domestic Abuse Working Group (ADAWG) to discuss and determine next steps to inform policy change.
- Funder: HEIF KE Fund, City St George’s University of London
- December 2023 – July 2024
Anastasia Fadeeva
Research Fellow
UK Data Service Impact Fellow
Engage with a wide range of stakeholders and audiences via a series of high impact public events on the issues of violence in older age, the long-term impacts of violence on mental health, and the lack of reliable data.
Read more: UK Data Service Data Impact Fellows 2025: Anastasia Fadeeva | Data Impact blog
- Funder: UKDS
- January 2025 – December 2026
Ladan Hashemi
Senior Research Fellow
Black and Minoritized Women’s Experiences of Specialist Domestic Violence Services in the United Kingdom (UK): A Scoping Review
Mapped the existing available literature on Black and minoritized women’s experiences with specialist Domestic Violence and Abuse (DVA) services in the UK to summarize current understanding and identify knowledge gaps.
- Funder: In 2 Research Programme
- June 2024 - Sep 2025
Animating Change: Expanding Awareness of Violence Against Women and Girls Through Culturally Informed Visual Campaign.
The aim is to produce two animations on sextortion and healthy relationship targeting young people on social media
- Funder: University of Bristol ESRC Impact Acceleration Account
Navigating gender equality and safety: the personal journeys of MENA diasporic women
The aim is to examine how MENA diasporic women, through their experiences as IKWRO service users, and the perspectives of staff, navigate issues of gender equality and safety, and to identify the challenges and supports that shape their personal journeys.
- Funder: British Academy
Developing an evidence-based platform for gender-based violence (GBV) prevention in Iran
Building on an established and ongoing collaboration between the Violence and Society Centre at City, University of London, University of Bristol, Iranian & Kurdish Women’s Right Organisation (IKWRO), and an Iran-based domestic violence (DV) safehouse and NGO (Mehre Shams Afarid), this will develop an evidence-based platform for gender-based violence prevention in Iran.
- Funder: ISPF Institutional Support Grant, City St Georges, University of London
- August 2023 – July 2024
Breaking the Silence: An Online Animated Campaign for Domestic Violence Awareness in Iran.
A social media campaign to launch an engaging and targeted online animated campaign that effectively raises awareness about the urgent issue of VAWG in Iran. It has used visually compelling infographics, animations, and statistics derived from survey data to highlight the severity of the issue.
- Funder: HEIF KE Fund, City St George’s, University of London
- March – July 2024
Alexandra Innes
Reader in International Politics
Data Synthesis and Meta-Analysis of Research Documenting Sexual Violence Along Migration Routes
Carry out an evidence synthesis of qualitative data relating to sexual violence along migration routes. While sexual violence is often clandestine, there is verifiable evidence of sexual violence along known routes where people migrate without state authorization. This project will collect, evaluate, synthesize and analyse this evidence globally.
- Funder: British Academy
- September 2024 – April 2026
Polina Obolenskaya
Research Fellow
Adolescent domestic abuse: working with SafeLives
Build a strong collaborative relationship with SafeLives by running a workshop with young people with experience of adolescent domestic abuse to develop a substantive and methodological framework for future research applications.
- Funder: Participatory Research Funding, City St George’s, University of London
- September 2023 – March 2024
We have also conducted a number of earlier studies and a range of consultancies, including for the College of Policing and the University of Essex.