Healthy Living Lab

Northumbria University’s Healthy Living Lab is one of the leading research groups in the UK focusing on issues relating to public health and food insecurity in disadvantaged social groups and under-represented individuals and communities. Areas of focus include school breakfast clubs, school meals, and holiday activity and food programmes.

The lab brings together over twenty academic colleagues that develop, inform, evaluate and co-develop community and school-based interventions.

Expertise is drawn from across disciplines including psychology, sociology, nutritional science, economics, computer sciences, public health and sport sciences to research and address public health issues in a holistic way.

The Healthy Living Lab is situated within the Department of Social Work, Education and Community Wellbeing at Northumbria University. Through collaboration with a range of partners and external organisations the Lab bridges the gap between scientific research findings, policy and practice. These include government departments, local authorities, schools, charities and businesses.

The Lab specialises in co-designing research projects with service providers and user groups, especially children and young people, and uses a variety of methods to capture the voices of children and young people. Importantly, the Lab ensures that not only are children's and young people’s voices heard but that they are also included in the co-design or all our work, from conceptualisation to dissemination of the research findings.