Research & consulting
We’re always inviting and seeking long-term and impactful collaborations. These can be through -
Research
Trainings & workshops
Talks
Research
As clinicians and academics, we design and execute studies that have the potential for positive human impact. We specialize in understanding lived experiences and narratives across cultures and demographics. This allows us to ensure that the knowledge gained is impactful and meaningful to those whom it is meant to serve.
Our research design is qualitatively led, even if we include quantitative metrics. We try and work as collaboratively with our intended participants as possible. We keep a justice-led, feminist, intersectional and decolonial perspective in our work, paying due attention to the historical, political and cultural nuances of the people.
Dr Chandra’s research continues to focus on parentification on one hand, and understanding & supporting the needs of the experiences of young parents in rural India on the other. In the coming years, she is looking to focus on research empathy and its limits in those who are serving in humanitarian and/or climate crises.
Dr Devgun focuses on researching the impact of childhood sexual trauma (CSA) on child and adolescent mental health as well as how they interact with the law and the judiciary. She works in developing ways to train law enforcement and paraprofessional to prevent re-traumatization of victims. She also researches grooming behaviors, CSA dynamics and sexual abuse prevention.
Please get in touch if you’d like to propose a research collaboration, or are seeking a research partnership where we can lead the design & execution, intervention, evaluation, all the way till report writing.
At this time, we are particularly interested in seeking partnerships with those looking to develop pilot projects and/or evaluate their feasibility, or their efficacy at scale in the areas mentioned here.
Trainings & workshops
We speak with people, through trainings and workshops, about their mental health needs, help them language their emotions, and develop internal resources to approach personal or organizational challenges.
We prefer to offer trainings as long-term engagements, so that the material developed is not a didactic lecture, but rather an intimate, involved and personalized conversation, which can then be applied, revisited and reworked till it finds a natural place in the lives of people.
An example of our training approach is working over some months with people-facing and/or grassroots-focused NGOs where the field workers have to face difficult circumstances everyday, or listen to painful stories often. This can - and does - take a toll on their mental health. This burden of care is also usually skewed against women. We work with such persons to help them express their concerns (we don’t assume) - psychological and otherwise (eg domestic or financial concerns), and work with them to attend to these in a safe, therapeutic environment.
A workshop is a shorter, more intense burst of training, and recommended when you’d prefer to see what a mental health workshop can look like, or if you have limited time and resources. It can be both a gateway or a booster to your ongoing endeavors.
An example of our workshops is delivering intensive, day-long interactive teaching to therapists who work with childhood neglect (recently delivered at the Manipal Student Mental Health center). We also offer workshops on POCSO and what clinicians needs to know, sensitizing and equipping the judiciary who work with CSA, how to work with grief and bereavement and in any of the areas of our expertise.
Talks
For larger audiences, we’re happy to be your resource persons to talk about specific subjects. These are delivered talks that address specific areas of psychological concern.
Examples of talks by Dr Chandra are a podcast Interview on Latchkey Urchins & Friends (S02 E06) on parentification or a radio Interview with Antionette Lattouf, ABC Radio Australia (unrecorded) or a talk on coping with the pandemic hosted online by the American Center or an invited talk on the need for community in cities & our mental health (unrecorded) for the Unbox Cultural Festival.