Centering lived and living experience of suicide Work Package 1 forms the heart of the project and will establish a core group of researchers who have diverse lived/living experiences of suicidality or suicide bereavement. This video gives a short summary about Work Package 1. View media transcript A quick reminder, what is Word Package one? Well, Word Package one forms the heart of the project, and its main focus is on lived and living experiences of suicide. A key part of this involves creating a lived and living experience hub which will become a centre of excellence and lived and living experience perspectives in suicide research, building a network of organisations, activists and scholars from across the world who are engaged in this work. This hub will house six lived experienced researchers who will each conduct their own research project. Or Package one asks research questions like, how is lived experience engaged with by policymakers, services, campaigners, and researchers working in suicide prevention? How do people with lived experience of suicide make sense of the term and the idea of lived experience? And how do people with lived experience understand the things that makes life feel livable or unlivable? We'll answer these questions through lots of different kinds of collaborative research activities, and we expect many more questions to be raised by our collaborators and lift experienced researchers as we co produce our lived experience research agenda. If you'd like to learn more about the Lived and Living Experience Hub, you can visit the hub page on our website or scan the QR code below. We hope to see you soon at one of our hub events. Work Package 1 team members:Lynne Gilmour- LeadFiona Malpass- Co-leadHazel Marzetti- Co-leadSarah Huque- Co-leadGeorgie Akehurst- Research FellowResearch Assistant with PhD opportunity (hiring in 2026)Research Assistant with PhD opportunity (hiring in 2026)Research Assistant (hiring TBC)Post-doctoral Research Fellow (hiring in 2027)Post-doctoral Research Fellow (hiring in 2027)Post-doctoral Research Fellow (hiring in 2027) Read more about WP1 team members Research Questions How is ‘lived experience’ engaged with by policy makers, services, campaigns and researchers working in suicide prevention? How do people with lived experience of suicide make sense of the notion of lived experience? How do people with lived experience understand the conditions that make life un/liveable? Additional Research Questions will be co-designed as part of WP1 activities. Research Activities Meta-ethnography: Researchers will undertake a rigorous review of current evidence in the form of academic research publications by researchers thinking about and approaching lived experience in suicide research. This will be followed by activities to engage with publications beyond academic papers. Site visits: Researchers from WP1 will visit organisations and groups around the world whose work includes lived experience engagement in suicide research and prevention, helping to learn about and build a clearer picture of possibilities and gaps in current practices. Site visits will include: Mariwala Health Initiative (India), Orygen (Australia), University of British Columbia Men’s Health Research Programme (Canada), Manchester Centre for Mental Health and Safety (UK). Institutional ethnography: Researchers will spend time with 4 organisations that have lived experience input into services relating to suicide. Using institutional ethnography as a research method, researchers will observe and participate in the inner workings and structures of these organisations. Establishment of the Lived/Living Experience Hub: This will involve the creation of a Lived/Living Experience Hub (official name still to be decided!) – establishing a centre of excellence in lived-experience perspectives on suicide, and building a network of organisations, activists and scholars across the world who are engaged in this work. Collaborators will work together to produce a research agenda addressing the notion of ‘liveability’ from a range of perspectives and contexts. Lived Experience Research Projects: Informed by the research agenda, 6 Lived Experience researchers will each carry out a co-produced research project in the last 5 years of the project, working with collaborators and communities experiencing suicidality (suicidal thoughts, experiences, attempts, bereavement, etc.). Lived experience researchers will also be able to engage across the other work packages, depending on the focus of their research projects. Updates & Events This article was published on 2026-01-30
