The latest wave of data from the Northern Ireland Life and Times (NILT) survey is now available. In 2023, 1,200 people living across Northern Ireland gave their opinion on key social issues affecting their lives, including politics and identity, mental health, gender-based violence, criminal justice system, and good relations. Results from all questions, as well as the questionnaire, dataset, and the technical report are now available on the NILT website.

Find out more

One in 5 adults in Northern Ireland have a probable mental illness. In addition, our history of conflict here may have contributed to more complex mental health difficulties. Thus, accessing timely and appropriate mental health supports is vital. In this seminar, Professor Siobhan O'Neill and Dr Nicole Bond (Office of the Mental Health Champion) highlighted findings from the 2023 Northern Ireland Life and Times survey, exploring public experiences of accessing mental health supports. The recording and slides from the seminar are now available on our website.

Find out more

The Welfare State is perhaps the biggest social policy success of the post-war generation. The ARK Ageing Programme invited Dr. Eve Worth (University of Exeter), author of 'The Welfare State Generation: Women, Agency and Class in Britain since 1945' to present evidence of the impact of the welfare state on the progress of women as individual agents and important workers in public sector jobs. Dr Worth discussed whether the welfare state is worth saving, and what role each generation can play in maintaining social cohesion in a time of insecurity and hyper-individualisation. The recording and slides from the seminar are also available on our website.

Find out more

This two-day symposium focuses on good practice and challenges of undertaking participatory and collaborative research. The event features key note presentations by Timo Ackermann (Professor of Social Work at the Alice Salomon University of Applied Sciences in Berlin) and Emily J. Ozer (clinical and community psychologist and Professor at the UC-Berkeley School of Public Health). The symposium will be held in the School of Social Sciences, Education and Social Work at Queen's University Belfast on 30-31 May 2024. Places are free, but must be booked in advance via the link below.

Find out more

ARK is involved in organising a symposium to explore pathways to collaborating on voluntary and community sector research in Northern Ireland. The symposium will take place on 25th June and will be held at NICVA, Belfast. Two key aims of this event are to strengthen sustainable relationships between academic researchers and practitioners in the voluntary and community sector in Northern Ireland and to consider models of Voluntary Sector Research Partnerships. Registration for this free event is managed by NICVA. For more information and to register click on the link below.

Find out more

We welcome Amit Anand who will complete a six-week placement with ARK. Amit is currently a second year Social Policy student at Ulster University. His research during placement will explore data collected on minority ethnic groups in Northern Ireland. He is looking forward to learning more about ARK's work.

May 17th was the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia. In 2018, ARK's Paula Devine and Gemma Carney worked with the BBC Rewind team on the video 'Queering the Family', which matched ARK survey data with BBC archive material. Click on the link below to read, watch and listen to the multimedia production.

Find out more

ARK is Northern Ireland's social policy hub. Established in 2000 by researchers at Queen's University Belfast and Ulster University, its primary goal is to increase the accessibility and use of academic data and research. Most of our dissemination is via our website, which is divided into five main areas:

• Surveys
• Projects
• Resources
• Publications
• Events


Find out more
top