Having grown up in South Africa, Merran Toerien completed her BA(Hons) in Psychology and Gender Studies at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg.  She then completed a PhD in the Department of Sociology at the University of York (England) where is currently employed as RCUK Research Fellow in Communication and Language use in Interaction.  Her specialist field is conversation analysis (CA), which she mainly uses to conduct applied research in institutional settings.  In her first postdoctoral research post (at the University of Bristol) she used CA to examine nurse-patient interactions during recruitment to medical trials.  She then returned to York, where she has worked on a study funded by the UK’s Department for Work and Pensions, examining interactions between advisers and benefits claimants.  She is currently working on a study funded by the UK’s National Institute for Health Research, exploring enactment of patient choice in neurology clinic appointments.  Recent visits to Rhodes have enabled her to pursue a long-standing wish to build research links with South African colleagues.  She is currently working with Catriona Macleod and Louise Vincent to develop a study blending her methodological expertise with their substantive expertise to examine pre-abortion counselling provision.  

Last Modified: Mon, 16 Jul 2012 14:38:16 SAST