International Health Humanities Network Membership

Professor Stephen Clift, BA, PhD, FRSPH

Stephen Clift is Professor of Health Education in the Faculty of Health and Social Care, Canterbury Christ Church University, and Director of the Sidney De Haan Research Centre for Arts and Health. He is also Professorial Fellow of the Royal Society for Public Health (RSPH) and has lead on developments within the Society related to creative arts and health. He has worked in the field of health promotion and public health for over twenty-five years, and has made contributions to research, practice and training on HIV/AIDS prevention, sex education, international travel and health and the health promoting school in Europe. His current interests relate to arts and heath and particularly the potential value of group singing for health and wellbeing.

The De Haan Research Centre was established in 2005 and since then has made original contributions to research on the value of singing for people with enduring mental health challenges and older people with chronic respiratory illness. The Centre has also conducted the first ever community based randomised controlled trial on the value of singing for older people, with funding from the National Institute for Health Research. Stephen is one of the founding editors of the journal Arts & Health: An international journal for research, policy and practice published by Taylor Francis. He is Chair of the recently established RSPH Special Interest Group for Arts, Health and Wellbeing. He is also co-editor with Professor Paul Camic of the Oxford Public Health Textbook on Creative Arts, Health and Wellbeing published in November 2015.