Mind matters: investigating academia’s ‘mental health crisis’

Why do so many academics struggle to ‘power down’ at the end of a long working day, and what are the longer-term health effects of failing to switch off at evenings and weekends?

Desiree Dickerson is a clinical psychologist based in Valencia, Spain, who works with academic institutions to develop healthier and more sustainable approaches to research. She joins Simone Lackner to discuss why poor mental health is often so prevalent in academia, and often described as reaching crisis proportions.

Lackner is a multidisciplinary researcher and ambassador for the Researcher Mental Health Observatory (REmO), an international network focussed on wellbeing and mental health within academia. In 2022 she founded The Empathic Scientist, a consultancy which focuses on wellbeing and inclusion in academia.

This episode is the first of an eight-part series on mental health and wellbeing in academia. Over the next few weeks Adam Levy will be speaking with a wide range of people who share their own experiences and expertise, including potential solutions to a longstanding problem.

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