1. First, list your current professional title. Second, describe your background, experience, and research as it relates to Quality-of-life studies.
I am currently a postdoctoral researcher in the research section - Child Public Health - at the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE), Germany. My research focuses on the understanding and identification of determinants of quality of life and well-being for the minority population (for example, migrants). As a public health scientist, active in both the public and private sector for over a decade, I have been involved in national and international research aimed at understanding various social determinant of health, healthcare outcome and policy, as well as the sociocultural adaptation as mechanisms to reducing inequality and facilitates life quality. Generally, I rely on the defining experience and characteristics of the study population to provide scientific evidence that supports the quality of life and promotes well-being.
2. What initially attracted you to the field of quality-of-life studies?
About 15 years ago, I volunteered as a project-support in a non-governmental organisation providing care for orphans and vulnerable children—this experience presented in a practical sense the implication of socioeconomic discrepancies for quality of life. About seven years later, I migrated to Germany from Nigeria. My experience and exposure living in Europe have continued to project the importance of other societal, environmental and individual features as predictors of quality of life. The complexity sounding these factors and their entanglement have since intensified my interest in understanding how they together or individually facilitate well-being and quality of life.
3. What are some areas of quality-of-life studies you feel are lacking attention? Any advice for future QoL researchers?
There is an increasing need to adapt quality of life research to reflects the changing societal composition as well as the conceptualisation of a good life. For example, the trends in migration have created new demographic configurations across the globe that have positively or negatively affected the migrants-host relationship. There is a need to explore how the changing relationship affects the quality of life of the host and migrant group. Similarly, the evaluation of the unprecedented advancement in technology and the implication for quality of life needs more attention.
4. How long have you been a member of ISQOLS? Why did you choose to be a member of ISQOLS? How has your involvement in ISQOLS impacted your career/research/advancement in your knowledge of QoL studies?
I attended my first ISQOLS Conference in 2016 in South Korea. After listening to a series of presentation, I knew I have to be part of ISQOLS. I was excited at the opportunity to interact and exchange with scholars who speak the quality of life language. Moreso, I came in contact with Prof. Dr Erharbor S. Idemudia – my host for a research stay in North-West University, South Africa – during the 2019 ISQOLS conference in Granada, Spain.
5. Feel free to include any other important comments or things you'd like to share with the ISQOLS community.
I have recently been awarded a Feodor Lynen Research Fellowship, from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation from January 2021. Together with Prof. Dr Erharbor S. Idemudia, we will the developing and testing a cross-cultural measure of microaggression for quality of life and well-being research. My research career has been incredibly exciting, I am looking forward to all of the future challenges. I am always happy and looking forward to sharing and learning from others across the globe.
The International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies (ISQOLS)
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ISQOLS
P.O. Box 118
Gilbert, Arizona, 85299, USA
