Research Fellow

45% FTE for 16.5 months from 20^th January 2025 to 31^st May 2026

We welcome applications for a Research Fellow post for the largest study into online sperm donation to date, the Online Sperm Donation Project (OSDP), funded by the ESRC.

The Online Sperm Donation Project is led by Dr Rhys Turner-Moore at Leeds Beckett

University and is a multidisciplinary collaboration between Leeds Beckett University, Universities of Manchester, Sussex and West Scotland, and Pillowfort Productions.  The project explores interpersonal relationships within online sperm donation, what influences people’s sperm donation journeys, and what the impacts are.  This also includes who is being positioned as powerful within this space and whether any abuses of power are occurring.

The four-year project (June 2022 – May 2026) comprises three phases: a two-year qualitative longitudinal study with recipients, donors, their partners, and the people they conceive with; a one-year digital ethnography of online sperm donation sites; and action research with recipients, donors, their partners, and online sperm donation site owners.  The Research Fellow post offers an exciting opportunity to join the project for the third phase: action research.  The aim of this third phase is to explore the ‘ideal future’ of online sperm donation with and for people involved in online sperm donation and to work with them to try to realise this future.  We will run action research workshops to share the research findings from the first two phases of the project using comics and drawings, and through collective reflection on these, work out what needs to change in online sperm donation, plan and do activities that lead to this change, and log what changes happen.  We will also continue to share and disseminate the findings from the project with specialist and non-specialist audiences via our project website, social media, blog and newsletter, as well as via webinars, public seminars and events, conferences, journal articles, briefing documents and the media.

You will be part of a supportive team, comprising 10 researchers from psychology, sociology, bioethics, medicine, and law, and approximately 10 public involvement members with lived experience of online sperm donation as a recipient, donor, and/or site owner.  The post will be based in Psychology at Leeds Beckett University, where the PI is based. The majority of the post could entail home-working, if preferred; some meetings, events and action research workshops will be in Leeds and attendance in-person will be required for these.  

To be successful in the role, you will have, or will be close to completing, a PhD in a relevant discipline (e.g., community psychology, sociology, gender studies).  You will have a passion for participatory research, public engagement and creative methods, and sound knowledge and/or experience of undertaking and writing up action research.  You will have experience of conducting sensitive qualitative research with human participants to high ethical and data management standards, and experience of developing engaging and creative digital strategies and content for research (e.g., websites, social media, blogs) and building digital networks/followings.  You will have outstanding interpersonal and teamwork skills, and excellent planning, organisation and communication skills.

Interview date:  Tuesday 26^th November 2024

Informal enquiries can be addressed to Dr Rhys Turner-Moore, r.turner-moore@leedsbeckett.ac.uk  

Closing date: Tuesday 12^th November 2024 (23:59)

To apply, please visit: https://tinyurl.com/m5y59c5z

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