Louisa Peters joined Leeds Trinity University in the summer of 2023 having recently completed her PhD in Psychology at the University of Huddersfield. Louisa has an academic background in the arts, completing an MA Musicology (2009) and MA Applied Research and Consultancy (2010) at Lancaster University. She spent 10 years working within arts and third sector organisations, plus student support services at the University of Bath. In 2020, Louisa was awarded an MSc Psychology (conversion) from Leeds Beckett University, before undertaking her doctoral studies exploring how and why community arts enable recovery from serious mental illness. Louisa currently teaches on mental health related modules, as well as qualitative methods and is a member of the British Psychological Society Health Psychology division.

Louisa’s research interests span across health psychology having conducted research into chronic pain conditions, inflammatory bowel disease and serious mental illness. In particular, Louisa is interested in lived experiences of chronic illness, recovery, illness self-management and the relationship between illness and identity. Louisa is also an advocate for making research accessible and reducing ableism in academia. This has led to the use of visual methods and incorporating arts within data collection. Louisa also has an interest in critical realism and specialises in realist research, including realist evaluation methodology and conducting a realist literature review.