Rory O’Connor

I had a lovely few days at 11th International Congress of Clinical & Health Psychology in Children & Adolescents in Malaga.

I was also delighted to receive the AITANA 2025 Lifetime Career Award for mental health research and suicide prevention.

Huge thanks to all collaborators near and far 🙏🏻

Reaching 100,000 people through DBI is truly remarkable. 10s of thousands of people in distress have received immediate compassionate support. I’m incredibly proud to be part of this world-leading initiative, which is transforming how we support people in their moments of greatest need

Www.dbi.scot

YouTube video by Universidad Miguel Hernández de Elche Entrevista Rory O'Connor

In advance of 11th Intl Congress of Clinical & Health Psychology in Children and Adolescents next week, I spoke with Jose Pedto Espada about the IMV model, current challenges and opportunities in suicide prevention and strategies for effective public health action.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=xFcG...

🆕Please Share!

Save the Date: 10th Suicide and Self-harm Early and Mid-Career Researchers' Forum, 11-12 June 2026 #EMCRF2026

Check back for details in due course: www.suicideresearch.info

delighted to see this published 🙌 using EMA, we (with @roryoc.bsky.social) investigated suicidal ideation in daily life. we found that it arises from an interaction of within-person increases in loneliness and an individual’s level of personality functioning psycnet.apa.org/fulltext/202...

Designing Research That Saves Lives with Professor Nav Kapur

Our NCISH Director Professor Nav Kapur spoke with @roryoc.bsky.social for a @mqmentalhealth.bsky.social podcast episode about designing research that saves lives.

This episode is available in both audio and video format:

open.spotify.com/episode/5CDG...

www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUk0...

YouTube video by MQ Mental Health Research The Teenage Brain Explained with Prof Sarah-Jayne Blakemore

This is superb - thank you @sjblakemore.bsky.social @roryoc.bsky.social @mqmentalhealth.bsky.social -- The Teenage Brain Explained with Prof Sarah-Jayne Blakemore youtu.be/xy7jkcSl8to?... via @YouTube

This is #WorldMentalHealthDay2025

Nurturing our mental health can start with something as simple — and as powerful — as a breath.

“Artist Shanty”

Inspired by a walk through the artist shanties in Bismore Park, Hyannis Port, Cape Cod recently.

This amused me this morning.

Don’t quite understand what it actually means though 😅

#CommuterChat

Thanks Ann 🙏🏻

If you are attending #eabct2025 today, consider coming to my keynote, Lomond Auditorium at 12-1.

“Love Is The Cure”

I was inspired by a walk along De Sleutelbrug (The Keybridge) in Amsterdam on Sat.

I stumbled across simple but powerful message on bridge: Love Is The Cure.

Perhaps if more people in the world embraced this - more love & less hate - the world would be a happier, safer place.

Huge congratulations to Dr Yawen Zheng who successfully defended her PhD earlier.

Thanks to the examining team Pooja Saini, Ruchika Gajwani & Jessica Fish

Jonathan Evans and I are proud supervisors 🎉🎉🎉

*pleased to be able to join post-viva remotely from Schipol airport 😅

If you're still at #ICBM2025, I am speaking about three recent studies in the last session starting at 3.30pm

Important piece on future of suicide prevention in US

‘Dismantling research programs, training mechanisms, & international collaboration does not improve efficiency; rather it eliminates the very systems needed to develop innovative, cost effective interventions.’

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40671474/

🆕 Following requests from authors, we have increased the word limit for all regular papers in Archives of Suicide Research to 5,000 words (Introduction, Methods, Results & Discussion)

I've been working on follow-up to When It Is Darkest, after a hiatus.

When I published When It Is Darkest, I did so without an agent.

But I think that an agent would really help for book #2.

If you're an agent or know an agent who might be interested in representing me, please get in touch.
🙏

Following WHO call that we can no longer be silent I tweeted this in May.

Thousands more innocent people killed since then (inc 17,000 children since Oct 2023) & hostages remain incarcerated.

But still, people with voices & power to make this devastation end remain silent.

My heart breaks 💔

Thank-you, pleased to hear that!

Keep posted.

I had a great conversation with Harry Corin- for his new podcast Question The Default.

Harry lost his dad to suicide when he was 12.

We chat all things suicide prevention and mental health.

Drops in the autumn.

Such a powerful and emotional film about the impact of suicide on a family - as they embark on a journey to talk about and make sense of their loss. A tough but important watch.

Available on Netflix

Irish people ain’t designed to run in this heat ☘️🏃☀️

I thought The 1975 rocked it @daryloconnor.bsky.social less convinced 🤔 #Glastonbury

It was great to host @hinzeverena.bsky.social at SBRL this week and to hear more about her important work on chronic pain and suicide and self-harm among youth

#WorldRefugeeDay is a moment to stand in solidarity with refugees globally. Our new podcast episode explores refugee mental health & suicide risk with host, Professor Rory O'Connor & special guests, Muzafar Ali & Prof Nicholas Procter. Listen: ow.ly/BCpK50WcwTG

Please share!

New partnership with RSABI.

Fully funded PhD scholarship (UK students only): Towards an enhanced understanding of suicide risk among those from agricultural backgrounds.

Supervised by me and @katierobb.bsky.social

Closing date: 21st July 2025

🔗 www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

Jeez, really felt that, ~80% humidity 🏃

We had a wide ranging conversation about such an important topic #WorldRefugeeDay

Judge deems Trump's cuts to National Institutes of Health illegal The federal judge said the NIH violated federal law by arbitrarily canceling more than $1 billion in research grants because of their perceived connection to DEI initiatives.

A glimmer of hope that humanity can still prevail at NIH

www.nbcnews.com/science/scie...