Dr Daniel Michelson is Clinical Reader in Youth Mental Health at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London. He read natural sciences at Cambridge and went on to complete clinical psychology training and post-qualification research at King’s, followed by academic posts at Oxford, LSHTM and Sussex. He returned to King’s in 2022 and now works between the Academic Department of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry and South London & Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust, where he is an Honorary Consultant Clinical Psychologist.

His research and practice interests centre around mental health prevention, early intervention and recovery-oriented approaches for underserved children, young people (up to age 25) and their families. He leads and collaborates on projects across the UK and internationally, including work on scalable youth mental health innovations in India, Malawi and Uganda. He holds current research grants totalling >£5m from the MRC, NIHR, Wellcome Trust and Grand Challenges Canada.

Current and recent projects

• METROPOLIS: MEchanistic TRial Of Problem sOLving and behavIoural activation for youth depreSsion. Funder: Wellcome Trust. Role: PI. 2024-28.
• HOPEFUL: Enhancing hope with youth-initiated mentor support to improve mental health and social outcomes for young women who are Not in Education, Employment or Training (NEET) and living in coastal deprivation. Funder: NIHR Public Health Research. Role: Co-PI. 2024-29.
• Better Sleep, Better Health: Designing a school-based sleep health intervention in Uganda. Funder: MRC Public Health Intervention Development. Role: Co-I. 2024-25.
• CATALYST: Co-designing and testing an Asset-based TAsk-sharing modeL for Youth mental health Services in deprived communiTies. Funder: NIHR Applied Research Collaboration in Kent, Surrey and Sussex (ARC KSS). Role: Co-PI. 2022-25.
• Baatcheet (‘Conversation’): Developing a web-based storytelling intervention to address anxiety, depression and social disability among Indian youth aged 16-24 years. Funder: Grand Challenges Canada. Role: Co-PI. 2022-24.
• PRIDE: PRemIum for aDolEscents. Developing and evaluating a suite of transdiagnostic mental health interventions for common adolescent mental health problems in India. Funder: Wellcome Trust. Role: Clinical Academic Director. 2016-22.
• Active Ingredients: Understanding mechanisms of psychological interventions for youth anxiety and depression. Funder: Wellcome Trust. Role: PI (problem solving); Co-I (hopefulness, self-disclosure and psychoeducation). 2020-21.

Research Interests

• Children and young people's mental health
• School- and community-based mental health services
• Global mental health
• Task-sharing
• Prevention and treatment of anxiety, depression, conduct problems and their co-occurrence
• Development and trials of psychosocial interventions
• Mixed-method evaluation
• Evidence synthesis
• Co-design

Teaching

• Module Lead, Service Development and Evaluation, MSc in Child and Adolescent Mental Health
• PhD Admissions Tutor, Department of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry
• Research supervisor, MSc, DClinPsy and PhD programmes