Ms. Kiran Manku

NeuroGenE Research Assistant, University of Oxford; EMDIYA ECR - Oxford
kiran.manku@psych.ox.ac.uk

Kiran supports the NeuroGenE team at the University of Oxford managing grants, working on the methodology and research strategy, and conducting research. She contributes research to the stigma component of the NeuroGenE project, by carrying out systematic reviews, case studies, and collaborative research papers. Kiran also supports the Africa Ethics Working Group in an administrative role. In addition, she is the UK Early-Career Researcher in the Ethics for Mental Health Digital Innovations for Young People in Africa (EMDIYA) Network.

Kiran’s research interests include understanding conceptualisations of disabilities and disorders, investigating factors that contribute to stigma, and evidence-based policy and practice in the field of disability and development. This encompasses many components including the streams of traditional healing, ritual healing, and modern biomedicine, all of which have implications on accessing health care. Her current research focuses on attitudes towards persons with mental health, neurodevelopmental, and neurological disorders. Kiran takes a multidisciplinary approach in her methodology intertwining development, psychology and anthropology. She has completed fieldwork in Kenya on comparative attitudes and empathy towards persons with disabilities. In collaboration with Dr. Caesar Atuire, she has developed a contextual tool to capture frameworks of conceptions of psychosis in Ghana.

Kiran was awarded her Masters in International Development from the University of Birmingham, UK. Prior to this she completed her Bachelor degree in Psychology also at the University of Birmingham, with a year aboard in Anthropology at Universität Heidelberg, Germany.