Understanding social determinants of health and well-being
About Us
The Social Health research theme brings together researchers who examine how social relationships, group processes, and social structures shape health and well-being across the lifespan. We view social health not as an optional add-on to physical or mental health, but as a foundational condition that influences vulnerability, resilience, and flourishing in everyday life. Importantly, rather than treating social relationships and groups merely as predictors of mental or physical health outcomes, we conceptualise social health as a core pillar of health in its own right and seek to understand what constitutes healthy social relationships and social structures.
Social health refers to the quantity and quality of social relationships that individuals can access within a given context to meet their psychological, emotional, and material needs. The World Health Organisation defines health as a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being. Yet, despite being one of the three core pillars of health, social health has often remained under-theorised in psychological and health research.
Our work spans multiple levels of analysis—from dyadic relationships and social networks to groups, communities, and broader social systems—and across diverse contexts, including families, peer groups, workplaces, clinical settings, non-human animal networks, and human societies experiencing inequality, marginalisation, or social change.
Our Mission
Our mission is to advance understanding of social health by integrating insights from social networks, group behaviour, and health research. We aim to bridge traditionally separated areas of psychology by drawing on theories and methods from evolutionary biology, animal behaviour, cognition, clinical psychology, social psychology, and developmental psychology. By doing so, we seek to develop a more comprehensive understanding of how social connections protect or undermine health; identify the social conditions that promote collective wellbeing; examine how social inequalities, exclusion, and structural disadvantage shape health outcomes; and generate evidence that can inform interventions, policy, and practice aimed at improving social and population health.
Key Staff
Co-Leads: Professor Lauren Brent & Dr Mete Sefa Uysal
Members of Social Health
Research Areas
Social relationships, social networks, and well-being
This research area focuses on how the quality, stability, and meaning of close and everyday social relationships shape psychological, emotional, and physical well-being across the lifespan. Researchers examine friendships, family relationships, romantic partnerships, and caregiving ties, as well as experiences of loneliness, social support, and belonging. A key aim is to understand how relationships function as sources of resilience or vulnerability in the face of stress, life transitions, and adversity, and how relational processes contribute to both flourishing and ill-health. Researchers also investigate how patterns of social connection—who is connected to whom, how strongly, and under what conditions—shape behaviour, health, and well-being. They study how network positions influence access to resources, information, and support, how social ties spread behaviours and norms, and how network disruptions (e.g., social isolation, migration, demographic or organisational change) affect social health and population resilience. This area integrates methods from network science, social psychology, and behavioural ecology to capture the complex, relational nature of social life.
Research Team Members
Group processes and social identity
This research area examines how group memberships, social identities, and intergroup relations shape social health. Moving beyond individual relationships, this work examines the structure, dynamics, and functions of social groups and networks. Researchers investigate how identification with families, communities, organisations, and social movements provides meaning, belonging, and information, but can also generate exclusion, conflict, and harm. Topics include leadership and followership, social network structure, group resilience, norms and influence, collective action, cooperation, conflict, and social change. By focusing on group processes, this work highlights how social health is not only an individual experience but also a collective one, emerging through shared identities, norms, and practices within groups and institutions.
Research Team Members
| Andrew Livingstone | Darren Croft | Sam Ellis |
| Miriam Koschate-Reis | Joseph Sweetman | Emily Hughes |
| Safi Darden | Christopher Begeny | Luke McGuire |
| Adam Rutland | Stefan Schilling | Morgana Lizzio-Wilson |
Inequality, marginalisation, and social health
This area focuses on how social, economic, and political inequalities shape access to healthy social relationships and supportive social environments. Researchers examine how marginalisation, discrimination, poverty, social hierarchies, and structural violence undermine social health by disrupting trust, belonging, and social participation. At the same time, this work explores how communities develop collective resources, solidarity, and resilience in the face of inequality. By situating social health within broader systems of power and oppression, this research highlights how social health is unequally distributed and deeply embedded in social structures, policies, and historical contexts.
Research Team Members
| Andrew Livingstone | Manuela Barreto | Jennifer Lay |
| Tim Fawcett | Christopher Begeny | Luke McGuire |
| Adam Rutland | Morgana Lizzio-Wilson |