Background
Cardiff University has been awarded a £3m grant from Health and Care Research Wales to establish the Centre for Adult Social Care Research (CARE). The Centre brings together multi-disciplinary expertise from across the University, and fosters collaboration with organisations and groups across the UK, to develop cutting-edge research on adult social care, underpinned by substantial UK-level research funding.
Vision
To be a leading research centre in adult social care that envisions a society where every individual with care and support needs receives person-led, compassionate and high-quality social care that promotes the well-being and inclusion of adults of all backgrounds.
Mission statement
Our mission is to advance knowledge and understanding in the field of adult social care through multidisciplinary research and collaboration. CARE will generate high quality evidence about social care for adults, rooted in the experience of people who receive care and support and those who provide care, and based on the most rigorous research approaches suitable for the questions being addressed.
Background
The development of CARE is supported by the Children’s Social Care Research and Development Centre (CASCADE). CARE offices are located in the University’s SPARK building. SPARK opened in 2022 as the first social science research park in the world. Part of the University’s £300m Innovation Campus, this purpose-built facility co-locates world-leading social science researchers with organisations and representatives from the public, third and private sectors, some of which are focused on social care.
The grant to establish CARE was awarded to Cardiff on the basis of its record of research and impact, particularly in children’s social care. CASCADE is the largest children’s social care research centre in the UK, with £7.2m research grants since April 2020 led by the CASCADE partnership, on top of its £2.6m infrastructure funding. Cardiff is one of only two UK universities to have two social work academics in the global top 100 contributors to journal scholarship, as identified in a recent analysis in the US journal Research on Social Work Practice.
The lead School for CARE is the School of Social Sciences, which has several large research centres and offers both taught programmes and research degrees in social work. Significant amounts of social care research funding, outputs and impact were returned to two REF 2021 submissions from the School of Social Sciences – Education (ranked #3 for GPA in UK) and Sociology (ranked #10 for GPA). The University’s Centre for Trials Research is a key partner and will employ some of the CARE staff. Other Cardiff University schools involved in supporting CARE are Business, Healthcare Sciences, Law, Medicine and Psychology.
Areas of focus
CARE builds on an existing track record of research on adult social care, and the health-social care interface, from across Cardiff University. Our main topics are:
- Dementia and long-term conditions
- Learning disabilities, neurodiversity and learning difficulties
- Housing and long-term care settings for older people
- Transitions to adulthood and adult social care services
- Workforce management and care provision
- Technology, social care and wellbeing
- Older age, equality and social inclusion
- Mental health services and social care support.
To ensure its work is relevant to the social care sector, CARE will have an oversight group of senior leaders and policy-makers, and advisory panels of practitioners and people with lived experience of receiving social care services.