
Professor Debbie Watson
B.Sc.(Ed) (Hons.) (Exon), Ph.D.(Exon.)
Expertise
My research focuses on understanding and improving the lives of children and young people using new materialist and post-qualitative approaches. I am particularly interested in sociological relationships and futures in the making.
Current positions
Director Brigstow Institute
Brigstow Institute
Professor In Child and Family Welfare
School for Policy Studies
Contact
Press and media
Many of our academics speak to the media as experts in their field of research. If you are a journalist, please contact the University’s Media and PR Team:
Biography
I was previously a secondary school biology and science teacher and have taught trainee teachers, and students in Education Studies, Childhood Studies, Social Work and Social Policy courses. I qualified as a teacher at University of Exeter and subsequently taught in two Devon schools before gaining ESRC studentship funding for my PhD studies. My PhD was in Education and was a longitudinal study of 50 young people's learning careers with a focus on how young people construct and engage with scientific knowledge.
Since completing my PhD I was employed as a research assistant and teaching assistant at Exeter University- both in the School of Education and in Peninsula Medical School where I was a researcher on a peer led sex and relationships education programme for young people in schools. In 2007 I secured the post of Senior Lecturer in Childhood Studies at the University of Bristol and I have since been promoted to Reader and then to Professor in 2019. I have a track record of co-produced, interdisciplinary and creative research.
I am currently Professor of Child and Family Welfare and Director of the Brigstow Institute which supports radical interdisciplinary research across and beyond the University. We champion the use of co-produced research and the importance of critical making in research. I am also co-investigator in the ESRC Centre for Sociodigital Futures and part of the leadership team heading up impact and engagement. My research in the Centre is focused on Caring Futures where I am leading an interdisciplinary project to understand the impact of predictive analytic AI systems in child welfare contexts. This involves research with five community groups across Bristol engaging young people in creative technology workshops considering data harms and AI and working with colleagues in engineering to conduct system analytics on the Think Family database and risk model currently in use in Bristol.
Research interests
Debbie has been at the University of Bristol since 2007 and is currently Professor in Child and Family Welfare. She is also the Director for the Brigstow Institute- which is one of five University research institutes. In this role she is responsible for academic leadership of the institute in enabling radical interdisciplinary research both within and beyond the University. Brigstow champions co-produced, creative research methodologies and approaches and supports the wider research community to engage across disciplines in playful and experimental ways.
In her own research Debbie is currently a co-investigator in a large ESRC centre- the Centre for Sociodigital Futures. Here she heads up research on Caring Futures and is currently running a project exploring the use of predictive analytics in child welfare contexts. This comprises a number of activities: system analytics on risk models, creative workshops with young people on data harms and AI systems and community stakeholder research on impacts of such systems in everyday life. Debbie is also part of the leadership team for the Centre and leads on impact and engagement as well as contributing expertise to the Centre's work around collaboration.
Historically she has worked across disciplines on a number of projects which have usually been co-produced and had digital or arts-based elements. These include 'trove': researching and co-designing digital tools with care-experienced children to enable their participation in life story work; 'Difficult Conversations': using sandboxing to understand the barriers in care-experienced families to conversations about trauma; 'VR Dance': working with young people and hip hop artists and VR technologists to consider risk and resilience for at risk young people; 'What does nature mean to me?': which involved young children and artists engaging in art/nature excursions and 'Life Chances': co-writing a sociological work of fiction with parents on low-income about the impact of Universal Credit. Some of her research is more traditional -for example she worked with medical colleagaes on a systematic review exploring how to support families at high risk of sudden infant death.
Many of her projects have resulted in outputs beyond academic papers and books such as training resources for adults supporting care-experienced children in 'Difficult Conversations'; a prototype of a digital tool in 'trove' or a toolkit to support communities to reduce dog fouling in neighbourhoods in 'Poo Patrol'.
Theoretically Debbie is inspired by more-than-human or New Materialist theories and she is co-convenor of the New Materialisms strand of the British Sociological Association.
Research projects
Current
- Caring for futures (Centre for Sociodigital Futures)
Websites and links:
https://www.bristol.ac.uk/research/centres/sociodigital-futures/
https://www.bristol.ac.uk/brigstow/
https://difficultconversations.info/
https://stuartiaingray.com/portfolio/trove/
https://brigstowinstitute.blogs.bristol.ac.uk/project/what-does-nature-mean-to-me/
Projects and supervisions
Research projects
What does nature mean to me?
Principal Investigator
Description
Combining art and nature this project aims to co-produce understandings of the importance of nature for primary aged children in two areas of Bristol following the impact of lockdowns on…Managing organisational unit
School for Policy StudiesDates
01/06/2022 to 31/10/2022
ESRC Centre for Sociodigital Futures
Principal Investigator
Role
Co-Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of Sociology, Politics and International StudiesDates
01/05/2022 to 30/04/2027
VR Dance
Principal Investigator
Description
Researching the experiences of young people at risk of criminal exploitation who engage in a dance and immersive technology programme. Collaboration with East London Dance CompanyManaging organisational unit
School for Policy StudiesDates
01/01/2021 to 31/12/2023
‘Difficult Conversations: developing research-led training in dealing with care experienced and adopted children’s difficult life story questions’
Principal Investigator
Description
This project seeks to co-create training tools and mechanisms of delivery to help adoptive parents, foster carers and social workers deal honestly and directly with difficult questions and conversations around…Managing organisational unit
School for Policy StudiesDates
02/09/2019 to 31/03/2021
My Place
Principal Investigator
Description
Developing distance travelled tools for place based learning. Paul Hamlyn funded project with Architecture Centre. Looking at under 5 year olds sense of place and learning of architectural design.Managing organisational unit
School for Policy StudiesDates
14/01/2019 to 13/01/2020
Thesis supervisions
Ethnography of an educational provision for teenage mothers in Malta
Supervisors
The Voices of Adopted Mixed Ethnicity Children: Ethnic Identities, Experiences of Discrimination and Ethnic Socialisation
Supervisors
An exploration of the interplay between race, class and space in the lives of mothers and mixed ethnicity children
Supervisors
Transitions from mainstream education for D/deaf young people
Supervisors
Children’s transitions to school: parents’ voices
Supervisors
Decision making about sex and relationships education policy by English primary schools' governing boards
Supervisors
The experiences of transition to adulthood for young people with learning disabilities in Korea
Supervisors
Changes to admissions criteria in Gloucestershire secondary schools: what is the likely impact on the educational outcomes of disadvantaged pupils?
Supervisors
Reflections from a pupil referral unit
Supervisors
Publications
Recent publications
01/01/2024Addressing menstrual stigma through sex education in England- taking a sociomaterial turn
Sex Education
Assembling with VR
Exchanges: The Warwick Research Journal
Being, Becoming, Belonging
Qualitative Social Work
Interventions to Improve Safer Sleep Practices in Families With Children Considered to Be at Increased Risk for Sudden Unexpected Death in Infancy
Frontiers in Pediatrics
Children’s voices in physical activity research
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
Thesis
Teaching
I regularly teach a Year 3 Undergraduate unit for the Childhood Studies BSc programme called 'Play and Creativity'. I contribute to Social Work Masters teaching in respect of lifestory work with care experienced children and digital social work and performance methods for Advanced Qualitative Research Methods. Previously I have taught units on Education, Child and Family Policy and Research Methods. I also supervise undergraduate and masters level dissertations in addition to the PhD supervision I provide. I currently supervise seven PhD students.