Dr Wendy Dossett

Wendy is Senior Lecturer in Religious Studies at the University of Chester, Programme Leader for the MA in Religious Studies and Principal Investigator of the Higher Power Project. She is a former Associate Director of the Alister Hardy Religious Experience Research Centre, and Secretary of the Shap Working Party for Religions in Education. She has research interests and publications in Japanese Buddhism, religious education, religious and spiritual experience outside of institutional settings, and in spirituality and recovery from addiction. She has worked with people in recovery at a residential rehabilitation centre, and undertaken field research amongst those in twelve step programmes for recovery from addiction.   The first findings of the Higher Power Project have been published as ‘Addiction, Spirituality and the Twelve Steps’ in International Social Work. May, Vol. 56, No.2, 2013

As a researcher in Religious Studies with a focus on spirituality Wendy is keen to explore the language used by people in recovery. Her main focus is on Twelve-step spirituality, but she is also interested in spiritual, communitarian and practice-based dimensions of many other recovery methodologies.  She is interested in the relationship between the language of spirituality used in the wider population and that of recovering communities. The association of spirituality with recovery is highly controversial in today’s pro-secular medicalised environment, and she sees the task of clarifying the nature of the language used as important. Wendy’s approach is neither to promote nor defend particular understandings of spirituality or recovery, but to enable the people involved to tell their stories.

Role in CSARS Group: Wendy is Director of Research for CSARS Group and the Principal Investigator of the Higher Power Project.

Contact Wendy:  w.dossett@chester.ac.uk

Professor John Stoner

John Stoner is an experienced environmental scientist and senior manager with interests in the environment and health. He played a prominent part in designing and delivering the organisational and culture changes associated with the formation of the National Rivers Authority and subsequently the Environment Agency. He was formerly Regional Director of the NRA and EA in Wales and was awarded an OBE for services to the environment in Wales in 1997.

In 1999 he was appointed a Professorial Research Fellow at the Centre for Research into Environment and Health (CREH) at the University of Aberystwyth, where he has managed a wide range of large partnership projects assessing the risk of environmental factors to human health and their implications for policy and practice. He has also been heavily involved in directing the development the Rivers Trust movement in Wales, with the aim of improving the management, awareness and enjoyment of the aquatic environment in partnership with the voluntary sector. This has involved securing government and European funding and managing large, complex, multi-disciplinary partnership projects.

Since 2008 he has developed his knowledge and experience of recovery from addiction by working at a 12-Step treatment centre in West Wales and latterly as researcher on the Higher Power Project and associated 12-Step mutual-aid recovery projects. He is currently a Visiting Professor in Addiction, Recovery and Spirituality at the University of Chester, where he is also Director (Projects) of the recently formed CSARS Group. His primary interest is in applying research results in the field to influence policy and practice for the benefit of the individuals affected by addiction and society more generally. He sees the development of multi-disciplinary partnership projects as the key to success in delivering these benefits.

Role in CSARS Group: As Director (Projects) of CSARS Group, John liaises with Public Health England, Welsh Government, third sector organisations, mutual-aid organisations and the addictions treatment industry to facilitate better mutual understanding and improved outcomes for people suffering with substance use disorders and their families and communities. He organises and runs Twelve-Step Facilitation and other forms of Mutual-Aid engagement, and offers training to addictions treatment workers. He seeks to maximise the benefits of the outcomes of the Higher Power Project by making them available on the frontline for people seeking recovery and addictions workers.

Contact John: j.stoner@chester.ac.uk

Liam Metcalf-White

Liam Metcalf-White received his BA and MA in Religious Studies from the University of Chester. He is currently an MPhil/PhD candidate in the Sociology of Religion and Graduate Teaching Assistant in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies. He has research interests in religion, spirituality and recovery from addiction, critical theory, gender studies, and qualitative research methods. He has undertaken ethnographic fieldwork on the UK Recovery Walks and within the Visible Recovery Advocacy Movement, and has presented his research at conferences including the British Sociological Association, the British Association for the Study of Religion, and the Faces and Voices of Recovery Annual Conference. Liam is employed on a CSARS Group Mutual-aid Facilitation Recovery Project in North Wales working with people in early-recovery from substance use disorders, and undertakes recovery–experience research projects on behalf of the CSARS team. He is also on the BSA Sociology of Religion Study Group committee as their Internet Officer. Contact: l.metcalfwhite@chester.ac.uk

Tim Roberts

Tim’s background is in Broadcast Media with an extensive career in Business Development and Project Management at ITV PLC. He began retraining in counselling and addiction in 2011 and took up a post at the Rhoserchan Treatment Centre in West Wales as a Support Worker where he worked for 18 months before moving to the Parkview Project in Liverpool. In November 2013 he joined the University of Chester as Senior Research Assistant on the Higher Power Project and took on additional duties assisting in the creation of the CSARS Group and in running the Knowledge Transfer Projects that the newly formed group has generated, Most recently he has been a co-facilitator of the WRAP Project in Wrexham. In his spare time he eats a lot of cake.

Contact Tim: roberts.t@chester.ac.uk