Dr Claire Hargreaves

Research Fellow

Profile

I am a quantitative social scientist, with over ten years experience in research focused on communities, criminal and family justice, and the interlinks with health and social care. My research involves large scale data linkage (including national and international administrative data), data management, statistical analysis and data visualisation, as well as primary data collection, survey design and public engagement.

I am a Research Fellow based in the Sociology Department leading an ESRC funded fellowship, aiming to deliver a new farming-household typology based on characteristics of the farmer, farm household and farm business, and subsequently identify patterns in policy engagement and health vulnerabilities. The project aims to assist policymakers, markedly those charged with the delivery of agricultural policies in England and Wales to refine proposals and inform a more equitable approach to policy intervention by offering a nuanced understanding of the socio-economic and business characteristics of farming households. This understanding will aid policymakers and farming stakeholders in anticipating the diverse impacts of policies across different farming sub-groups.

Alongside this, I am working on a 24-month ESRC-funded data linkage study, led by Professor Judith Harwin (School of Law, Lancaster University), investigating the impact of family drug and alcohol courts (FDACs) on parental offending through the linkage and analysis of three administrative data sources, FDAC, Cafcass and the Police National Computer (PNC). I am also co-investigator on a 30-month NIHR-funded project, which aims to provide a comprehensive evidence framework to inform the provision of social care for imprisoned women which will be of utility too service commissioners, providers and frontline staff.

I have recently worked on a range of projects within the Nuffield funded Family Justice Observatory Data Partnership, led by Professor Karen Broadhurst (Sociology, Lancaster University) and Professor David Ford (SAIL Databank, Swansea University). I recently led on the project ‘Uncovering private family law: what can the data tell us about children’s participation?’ investigating, through the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) administrative data, the proportion of private law cases in which children directly participated and the implications for children, families and the family justice system. I have also exposed, through the linking of Cafcass Cymru to health records in Wales, the heightened socioeconomic and health vulnerabilities of women and men involved in private law proceedings in Wales.