Who can join LEARN?

We welcome people that don’t have any previous experience of being involved with research before or having been part of a lived experience or patient and public involvement group. There are lots of ways that we can learn from your experiences and if you want to learn more about involvement and gain skiils and experience in this area, we can support you through access to training and support for specific roles.

• Anyone with lived experience of mental health or who consider themselves neurodiverse, as well as parents/carers can be a part of LEARN.
• We are also interested in including people with an interest in mental health and technology research.
• We recognise that people will not necessarily have gone through a diagnosis and that people view medicalised understanding of mental health and neurodiversity differently. We know that mental health and neurodiversity covers a wide area and is interpreted differently and consensus over language can be challenging.
• As MindTech researchers work mostly within the following areas, it is likely that there will be more opportunities related to these areas of mental health and/or neurodiversity:
  • Depression and anxiety
  • Bipolar
  • ADHD
  • Autism
  • Dementia
  • Psychosis
  • Tourette’s

Currently, we are only able to accept applications from individuals over the age of 18.

How do we make sure that LEARN will be accessible?

We believe that accessibility and inclusion is about who we include and how we include them.

• Although most opportunities will be offered remotely, we understand that not everyone has access to IT equipment and/or the internet, and that we need to find other ways to connect with people that are digitally excluded. For many opportunities, we can offer additional payments to recognise the costs of working remotely.
• As part of your application, we will ask for the first part of your postcode, as some opportunities may have the option to participate in face-to-face sessions too.
• We will encourage researchers to offer alternative and accessible ways for you to be involved, such as sending us a voice note, taking part in 1-1 conversations, or responding by email.
• We want to hear from people that haven’t been involved in research before and support people in this process, so we will offer or signpost to information or training that you might need.

As part of the application, we will ask you to complete a diversity monitoring form so we can understand more about membership of the wider network is and who take part in specific opportunities. We will do this because we want to make research more accessible. 

Apply to join LEARN