Heather Law studied for a degree in psychology at The University of Manchester before moving to work at Greater Manchester  Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust in 2007. To begin with, Heather worked as a research assistant in the child and adolescent services in Prestwich mainly on studies looking at assessment and care pathways for young people in contact with the criminal justice system. Heather really enjoyed working with young people, so went on to work as an assistant psychologist with the same group of young people.

Heather came to work at The Psychosis Research Unit in 2010 as coordinator for a large research programme about understanding recovery in psychosis and bipolar disorder. Being involved in this project was a positive experience for Heather and the topic of recovery was something that felt worthwhile. The recovery Research Programme has now been published and you can read more about it HERE. Whilst coordinating this research programme Heather also studied for a PhD with Tony Morrison as her supervisor. Her thesis was completed in 2014 and was also on the topic of understanding recovery in psychosis, so it complemented the day job! Heather has successfully published several studies conducted during her PhD and these can be found on her Researchgate Profile.

Heather has also had lots of opportunities to share her work via publications including book chapters and journal articles. More recently in her spare time Heather has worked with colleagues from child and adolescent services to write an edited book called ‘Young People in Forensic Mental Health Settings: Psychological Thinking and Practice’.

Currently Heather is a project manager at the Youth Mental Health Research Unit (JUICE) and is working on several different studies, including Motiv8 and IPPACT. 

Heather’s role often involves working with young people to develop new research ideas and improve current research projects. Heather feels privileged to work with an amazing team of like-minded people on some ground breaking research. In the future, Heather plans to continue with project management at the unit whilst applying for funding for her own research studies to improve mental health care for young people.