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Dr. Louise Caffrey

Assistant Professor in Social Policy (Social Studies)
      
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Dr. Louise Caffrey

Assistant Professor in Social Policy (Social Studies)

 LOUISE.CAFFREY@tcd.ie

 


Louise is an Assistant Professor in Social Policy in the School of Social Work and Social Policy at Trinity College Dublin. She holds a PhD in Social Policy from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), where she was awarded an LSE PhD Scholarship to undertake her research. Louise also holds a Full Post-Graduate Certificate in Higher Education Teaching (PGCHE) from the LSE, an MSc in Applied Social Research from Trinity College Dublin and a BA (International) in Political Science and History from University College Dublin (UCD). Immediately prior to joining Trinity College Louise worked as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Division of Health and Social Care, King's College London, and prior to entering academia she worked as a research consultant, delivering numerous reports for government and NGO clients in Ireland and the UK. Louise is Director of the MSc Applied Social Research. She teaches across the following courses: MSc Applied Social Research, BA Joint Honours Social Policy, BA Social Studies, PGDip Social Policy and Practice, PGDip Child Protection and Welfare and the Masters in Social Work. Louise"s research interests include hearing and representing children"s voices, child contact, inspection of child and family services and policy and practice implementation and evaluation. Louise is also expert in systems approaches and realist evaluation. She uses these frameworks to investigate important questions around policy and practice implementation, including why reforms introduced are not having the intended results or why results are patchy. Louise welcomes PhD applications in the following areas of child protection and welfare and health systems policy: policy or practice implementation, inter-professional working, regulation of services including, audit/inspection of services and performance measurement and management. I have a particular interest in studies adopting complexity theory, a systems approach or realist evaluation/synthesis. Children's experiences/voices in child protection and welfare services; child contact, Signs of Safety.
Project Title
 The Focus and Methodology of Inspection in Ireland: a documentary analysis of Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) child protection and welfare services inspection reports
From
2024
To
2025
Summary
Role: PI
Funding Agency
Department of Children Equality Disability Integration and Youth
Project Title
 A rapid review of the international evidence on the focus and effects of inspection of child and family services
From
2023
To
2024
Summary
Role: PI
Funding Agency
Department of Children Equality Disability Integration and Youth
Project Title
 Children's experiences of child protection and welfare services in Tusla Child and Family Agency
From
2022
To
2023
Summary
A qualitive study exploring children's experiences of the child protection and welfare services in Ireland. A collaboration in the School of Social Work & Social Policy, led by Prof. Stephanie Holt. Role: funded co-investigator
Funding Agency
Tusla Child & Family Agency
Project Title
 Realist Synthesis of Signs of Safety
From
2019
To
2021
Summary
Signs of Safety is a complex, integrated framework for doing children's services work. It has been implemented in more than 100 jurisdictions worldwide and in 2017 was introduced in Ireland as the national child protection framework. Realist Synthesis complements more established approaches to systematic review, which have been developed and used mainly for simpler interventions like clinical treatments or therapies. Using pre-existing literature, the study aims to provide an explanatory analysis of how and why Signs of Safety might work (or not) in particular contexts or settings. To do so it will use a broad array of literature and wider evidence to identify and test Signs of Safety's underlying causal mechanisms and to explore how those mechanisms might operate under varying conditions. Role: PI
Funding Agency
Resolutions Consultancy
Project Type
Research
Project Title
 RESTORE (Towards Dynamic Resilience in Health System Performance and Reform )
From
To
Summary
The goal of the research is to support the effective and thorough implementation of the Sláintecare reform programme. The research will examine key challenges facing the progress of the reform in the light of health system shocks and burdens on staff. It will highlight strategies to facilitate success. The award is a HRB Senior Leader Award, led by Prof. Steve Thomas, the Edward Kennedy Chair of Health Policy and Management at TCD. Louise is contributing expertise on complex adaptive systems and Realist methodologies. Role: collaborator
Funding Agency
Health Research Board

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Details Date
Louise is a Fellow of the UK Higher Education Authority. Further information at: https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/individuals/fellowship Since 2013
Louise is an Associate on the K4U Horizon 2020 Study, led by Prof. Nancy Cartwright at Durham University. K4U's aim is to construct a radically new picture of how to use social science to build better policies. Further information: https://www.dur.ac.uk/k4u/ . March 2016 to present
UNICEF Reference Group for Review of Child Protection Systems in Four Countries in South Asia. I am providing guidance to the project on the use of a systems approach. February 2017 to November 2017
Flynn, S.,Caffrey, L.,Antosik-Parsons, K.,Whiting, S., Byrne, J. and Conlon, C., New-Materialist Bricolage: Presenting an Ontological Position for Qualitative Internet-Based Research, International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 28, (2), 2025, p179 - 192, Notes: [DOI: 10.1080/13645579.2024.2329430], Journal Article, PUBLISHED  TARA - Full Text  URL
Caffrey, L., Tobin, S., Flynn, S., Holt, S., Houston, S., Petautschnig Arancibia, C. & Sheaf, G., The Intended and Unintended Effects of Inspection on Child and Family Social Work Services: A Rapid Evidence Review of the International Literature, Human Service Organizations: Management, Leadership & Governance, 2025, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  TARA - Full Text  URL
Gilligan, R., Holt, S., Brady, E., Caffrey, L., Safety and Beyond: What are children's priorities for their participation in the child protection and welfare process?, Child Abuse and Neglect, 2025, p11 , Journal Article, PUBLISHED  DOI
Gregory S, Caffrey L, Daly D, Sheaf G., How woman-centred care is experienced and understood in maternity services by women and professionals: A rapid review, Scandinavian Journal of Caring Sciences, 2025, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  TARA - Full Text  DOI  URL
De Clercq, L., Meulewaeter, F., Rowaert, S., Decoene, S., Caffrey, L., Caslor, M., Vandevelde, S., & Vanderplasschen, W., Families' perspectives on the impact of signs of safety in child protection services through the lens of self-determination theory, Children and Youth Services Review, 2025, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  URL
Liz Farsaci, Padraic Fleming, Louise Caffrey, Sara Van Belle, Catherine O'Donoghue, Arianna Almirall Sanchez, David Mockler, Steve Thomas, Barriers and facilitators to international Universal Health Coverage reforms: A realist review, International Journal of Health Policy and Management, 2025, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  DOI  URL
Caffrey, L., Flynn, S., Quinn, N., Tobin, S. & Holt, S., The Focus and Methodology of Inspection in Ireland: a documentary analysis of Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) child protection and welfare services inspection reports, November, 2025, Report, PUBLISHED  TARA - Full Text  DOI
Flynn, S.,Lakkshme Sundaresan, S., and Caffrey, L., Outcomes Measurement in Social Care: Insights from Current Evidence, Journal of Social Care, 4, 2024, pArticle 2-, Notes: [https://arrow.tudublin.ie/jsoc/vol4/iss1/2], Journal Article, PUBLISHED  TARA - Full Text
Caffrey, L., Brady, E., Keegan, O., Dunne, S., Sheaf, G., Holt, S., & Gilligan, R., Children's Experiences of Signs of Safety: A Scoping Review, Children and Youth Services Review, 2024, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  TARA - Full Text  DOI
Flynn, S., Lakkshme Sundaresan, S., Caffrey, L., Putting Outcomes into Practice: The Implementation of a Framework of Outcome Measures within a Child and Family Service, The British Journal of Social Work, 2024, p1 - 18, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  URL
  

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Stephanie Holt, Robbie Gilligan, Louise Caffrey & Eavan Brady, Through the Eyes of the Child: A Study of Tusla Child Protection and Welfare Intervention - A Research Briefing, Children and Youth Services Review, 2023, -, Miscellaneous, PUBLISHED
Conlon, C., Antosik-Parsons, K., Flynn, S., Caffrey, L., Byrne, J. and Whiting, S., Lessons from Pivoting to Online Interviewing: Ethical and Technical Considerations for Qualitative Researchers following the COVID-19 Pandemic, Social Sciences Research Network, 2023, Report, PUBLISHED

  


Award Date
LSE PhD Scholarship 2010-2014
UCD Entrance Scholarship 2002
Dr Caffrey's research focuses on implementation science and workforce issues in human service organisations, specifically, child protection systems and health systems. Louise's research spans several strands: 1) Regulation of services - particularly audit, inspection and performance measurement and management of services. This theme explores overarching issues of system safety, inter-professional working and intended and unintended effects of regulation. 2) Service users' perspectives and experiences of services - particularly children and patients. 3) The challenges of implementing public policy. Louise's research has sought to better understand, firstly why implementing policy/practice change is so challenging and, secondly, how we can better evaluate public initiatives and so that evaluation findings are more useful for policy makers. Louise specialises in understanding public sector organisations as Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS) and using Systems and Realist Evaluation approaches. For example, Louise's research studies the implementation of practice frameworks like Signs of Safety (Ireland's national practice framework for child protection social work), change initiatives like Athena SWAN (a gender equity initiative for universities) and policy goals, for example, accountability and improvement of services via inspection, creation of Health Research Systems, safety in child contact centres and welfare-to-work policy for lone parents. Louise welcomes applications from PhD students in the following areas: 1) Regulation - inspection, audit and performance measurement/management of services; 2) Hearing children's perspectives and experiences of practice initiatives, change initiatives and public policy that aim to protect them; 3) Implementation of practice frameworks, change initiatives and public policy in child protection and health systems. 4) Research on Signs of Safety, Athena SWAN and HIQA inspection. 5) Use of complexity theory, systems approaches or Realist Evaluation/Synthesis