About us - Institute of Mental Health

The Centre for Social Futures looks at the role that families, carers and the wider community can play in helping people living with mental health problems.

The Centre seeks to transform how service users, carers and professionals work together in a new community of understanding. It seeks to advance social and cultural interventions that promote mental health recovery and help to address the gross inequalities experienced by people living with mental health conditions. The Centre is led by Professor Paul Crawford, professor of health humanities.

SoFU mission

Key goals are:

The acknowledgment of the valuable role that social and cultural approaches can play in mental health care provision
The empowerment of self-help, family and community-driven solutions to mental health challenges
A renaissance of the interpretation and understanding of social and cultural aspects of lived experience to complement and inform science in mental health
Carry out world-leading research into social and cultural dimensions of mental health conditions and experiences – and become a national beacon and catalyst for innovation

Scroll down for the latest SoFU news, events and more.

Mental Health, Culture and Creativity - Dr Blessing Marandure, May 2026

View the full recorded webinar session on this page, or visit the IMH Vimeo

A qualitative investigation of the impact of a self-stigma music-making programme in the context of the Friendship Bench, Zimbabwe - Tamaryn Palmer

Watch the full recorded webinar on this page, or visit the IMH Vimeo

View the full recorded webinar presentations:

Towards a Feminist Psychiatry - webinar still

View the full recorded webinar session on this page, or visit the IMH Vimeo

A large group of people sitting in a semi circle in front of a rust coloured building

Pakistan’s first national psychotherapy conference at the Aga Khan University (April 12-14, 2025) in Karachi was a huge success: 350 delegates across 3 days, mostly young people with a voracious interest in psychoanalytic psychology, psychotherapy and mental health.

Written by Professor Paul Crawford

Modern healthcare systems increasingly resemble production lines with mantras of efficiency and effectiveness dominating.

Five animated figures stand in a row against a yellow background. They're animals dressed as humans

In a recent letter to centre director Professor Paul Crawford, Aardman Executive Producer Lorna Probert congratulated the What’s Up With Everyone? project on its transformational approach to youth mental health.

Professor Paul Crawford is on the left, wearing a grey blazer and white shirt. On the right is Jill Berelowitz wearing a pink patterned trouser suit (only visible above the waist)

Professor Paul Crawford joined guests at the unveiling of The Tree of Cherished Memories on 29^th June 2022, created by London-based sculptor Jill Berelowitz.

Professor Paul Crawford has been invited to give a plenary speech at the forthcoming American College of Psychiatirists Annual Meeting in Florida.

A non-fiction book researched and co-authored by academics from the University of Nottingham and Bishop Grosseteste University exploring Florence Nightingale’s relationship with home has won the “Best Achievement” award in the 2022 People’s Book Prize.

The team behind the What's Up With Everyone? project have published a report on preliminary findings.

SoFU's Neil Chadborn appeared on BBC East Midlands Today last night, talking about COP 26 and 'eco-anxiety'. Watch it again here.

In a blog written for World Mental Health Day, Executive Chair of the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), Chirstopher Smith, talked of the importance of mental health research in tackling the challenge of mental health and suicide.

A new paper from members of the Centre for Social Futures (SoFU) reveals the complex and challenging social life inside in-patient mental health wards.

Centre director, Professor Paul Crawford, has been in conversation with celebrity agony aunt Dr Miriam Stoppard, discussing youth mental health.

Our Centre director, Professor Paul Crawford, has contributed to a major report into cultural and creative recovery in the UK, post-Covid.

Read the story in full here.

On July 5^th 2021, SoFU director Professor Paul Crawford was one of the 30 invited guests attending the renaming of London Road Community Hospital in Derby as renamed Florence Nightingale Community Hospital. In addition, the current and former chairs of the hospital, Dr Kathy McLean and John Rivers CBE respectively, unveiled a new statue of Florence Nightingale.

The Aardman animated 'What's Up With Everyone?' campaign, led by Professor Paul Crawford, has won the Design Week 2021 award for Social Media and Content.

Homes can be both comforting and troubling places. A timely new book (lead author Professor Paul Crawford, Director of the Centre for Social Futures) proposes a new understanding of Florence Nightingale’s experiences of domestic life and how ideas of home influenced her writings and pioneering work.

Centre for

Social Futures

Welcome to the Centre for Social Futures (SoFU)

SoFU mission

Scroll down for the latest SoFU news, events and more.

Mental Health, Culture and Creativity - Dr Blessing Marandure, May 2026

Music-Making Programme in the context of the Friendship Bench, Zimbabwe - Tamaryn Palmer, May 2026

Mystery and Mental Health: Mythos in Mental Health and End of Life Care

Towards a Feminist Psychiatry - Professor Linda Gask

Karachi - City of (New) Lights

St Lukes - Nurturing Nursing

Written by Professor Paul Crawford

Aardman 'enlightened' by What's Up With Everyone? project

Unveiling of the Tree of Cherished Memories

Centre lead to give plenary talk for American College of Psychiatrists

Nightingale book wins 2022 People's Book Prize award

WUWE report on early findings

‘Florence Nightingale at Home’ nominated for The People’s Book Prize

SoFU research featured on BBC East Midlands Today

Centre research features in AHRC blog

SoFu paper reveals the complex social world of in-patient mental health units.

Aardman collaboration features in national newspaper

Centre director contributes to government report on cultural recovery

East Midlands hospital re-named in honour of Florence Nightingale

What's Up With Everyone? wins Design Week 2021 award

New “Florence Nightingale at home” book receives rave reviews