Dr Georgina Hosang

Profile

I am a Reader (Associate Professor) and Research Lead in the Unit for Psychological Medicine at the Centre for Psychiatry and Mental Health, Wolfson Institute of Population Health. My interdisciplinary work focuses on the impact of life stress (childhood trauma and recent life events) on the onset and course (including physical health outcomes) of severe mental illnesses (mainly bipolar disorder, depression and psychosis) across the lifespan. I am also interested in the developmental pathway from adolescent hypomania to bipolar disorder using twin data. I co-direct with Dr Sania Shakoor the ASSET Research Group which undertakes research focused on life adversity (e.g., childhood maltreatment), mental and physical health across the life course, particularly in underserved communities.

I completed my PhD in Social, Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London, UK and was then awarded the prestigious ESRC/MRC Interdisciplinary Postdoctoral Fellowship. Between 2012 and 2017 I was a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) at Middlesex University and Goldsmiths, University of London. I have been at Queen Mary University of London, since 2017.

I am the recipient of the Samuel Gershon Junior Investigator Award (2019) from the International Society for Bipolar Disorders and the Gerald L. Klerman Young Investigator Award (2023) from the Depression and Bipolar Disorder Support Alliance (DBSA) both in recognition of my research contribution to the mood disorders field.

I am committed to equality/equity, diversity and inclusion (ED) in research and academia more widely, and am the co-chair of Queen Mary, University of London’s Race Equality Action Group and the co-chair of the Women’s Initiative at the International Society of Bipolar Disorders. In 2024 I won the EDI Champion award for the Faculty of Medicine & Dentistry at Queen Mary, University of London.

Teaching

I am the module organiser for PSY253 Psychopathology module part of the BSc Psychology. I also contribute to some SSC modules on the MBBS course.

Research

Publications

1.     Hosang, GM, Shakoor, S, King, N et al. (2024). Interplay between polygenic risk for mood disorders and stressful life events in bipolar disorder. Journal of Affective Disorders, 350: 565–572.

2.     Havers, L, Shuai, R, Fonagy, P, Fazel, M, Morgan, C, Fancourt, D, McCrone, P, Smuk, M, Bhui, KS, Shakoor, S & Hosang, GM. (2024). Youth adversity and trajectories of depression and anxiety symptoms in adolescence in the context of intersectionality in the United Kingdom. Psychological Medicine DOI: 10.1017/S0033291724000795.

3.     Hosang, GM, Manoli, A., Shakoor, S. et al. (2023). Reliability and convergent validity of retrospective reports of childhood maltreatment by individuals with bipolar disorder. Psychiatry Research, 321, 115105

4.     Hosang, GM, Martin, J, Karlsson, R et al. (2022). Association of aetiological factors for hypomanic symptoms, bipolar disorder and other severe mental illnesses: twin and polygenic risk score analysis. JAMA Psychiatry, 79 (2), 143-150

5.     Hosang, GM, Lichtenstein, P, Ronald A, et al (2019). Association of genetic and environmental risks for attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder with hypomanic symptoms in youths. JAMA Psychiatry, 76(11):1150-1158

6.     Hosang, GM, Fisher, HL, et al. (2018). Childhood maltreatment and adult medical morbidity in mood disorders: a comparison of unipolar depression with bipolar disorder. British Journal of Psychiatry, 213 (5), 645-653

7.     Bifulco, A, Spence, R, Nunn, S, Kagan, L, Bailey-Rodriguez, B, Hosang, GM, et al. (2019). The Computerised Life Events and Assessment Record (CLEAR) online measure of life events: reliability, validity and association with depression. JMIR Mental Health, 6 (1), e10675

Supervision

I am the PhD supervisor for the following students:

Abigail Thomson - Emotion Regulation and Youth Mental Health: A Transdiagnostic Mechanism and Clinical Target?

Alina Marinca - Exploring the overlap between neurodevelopmental disorders and traits with adolescent hypomania

Erin Lawrence - Understanding the Psychosocial Risk Factors for Physical Multimorbidity in Psychosis: A Mixed-Method Approach

Irene Gonzalez-Calvo - Youth Subclinical Hypomania: Risk Factors and Long-Term Outcomes 

Simone Rahman nee Jayakumar - Recognition and treatment of depression in renal dialysis patients: The role of inflammation