Maria Liegghio

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Associate Professor

Office: Ross Building South, S817
Phone: (416) 736-2100 Ext: 22847
Email: mlieg@yorku.ca

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Maria Liegghio is an Associate Professor in the School of Social Work at York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Her main areas of research are social work epistemology in mental health; resilience to trauama; the stigma of mental illness in child and youth mental health, or more critically children's psychiatrization; critical social work education, theory, and practice; and collaborative, community-based and participatory action research. She has extensive experience working as a child and family mental health therapist. Her current work is focused on resilience as a socio-political construct, and in particular the resilience of children, youth, and families through the Covid19 pandemic. Adopting de-colonial research and practice approaches, she has three projects: 1) a study exploring the "mental health" experiences of Canadian children and youth, and their families accessing and using mental health services during and through the pandemic; 2) an international collaboration exploring resilience to trauma as an organizing framework for violence prevention and intervention in El Salvador; and 3) an IDRC supported project exploring innovation in resilience to trauma programming for fostering women's post-pandemic recovery in El Salvador. She recently concluded a MITACS supported initiative exploring "promising practices" for multi-sector collaboration in the provision of child and youth mental health services.

Degrees

PhD, Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
MSW, York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
BSW (honours), University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada

Research Interests

Children and Youth , Mental Health, Critical Social Work Theory, Practice, and Education, Stigma of Mental Illness, Resilience and Trauma, Community-based/Participatory Action Research

Current Research Projects

Fostering Latinx Resilience to Trauma between El Salvador, Canada, and the United States

Summary:

The aim of this international, community-university partnership is to conduct a landmark study of resilience to ongoing and historical trauma as an organizing framework for violence prevention and intervention in El Salvador, and broadly, Central America.

Role: Principal Investigator

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Funders:
SSHRC - Partnership Development Grant

Innovation in Resilience to Trauma Programming for Women's Post-pandemic Recovery in El Salvador, Central America

Summary:

This landmark study explores Salvadoran women’s resilience to trauma as an organizing framework for fostering post-pandemic recovery and addressing violence, gender inequalities, and social and economic development. The main questions are: what does “resilience” mean for Salvadoran women and girls? What local efforts, lived and practiced at the community levels, foster personal and collective resilience? The main objective is to explore the impacts two programs and their interventions have for fostering “embodied resilience”, as practiced through somatic healing approaches and the experience of “economic resilience”, as practiced through women’s entrepreneurial strategies, as well as explore the scaling of the interventions for men, older boys, and gender fluid individuals.

Role: Principal Investigator

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Funders:
IDRC - WomenRISE program

Covid19: Fostering Child, Youth, and Family Resilience

Summary:

This 4-year study examines the impacts of the Covid19 pandemic on the resilience of Canadian children, youth, and families. A comparison will be conducted between Québec and Ontario as distinct socio-economic and political contexts. The study uses a modified community-based participatory action research approach and a mixed methods design. The research questions are: 1) in what ways are Canadian children, youth, and families in specific socio-political contexts "responding to" Covid19 pandemic-related adversities based on the resources available to them, and 2) what are the Covid19 pandemic-related experiences of children, youth, and their families that contribute to the reasons for which they access mental health services?

Role: Principal Investigator

Start Date:

Month:

Year:

Funders:
SSHRC - Insight Grant

Covid19: Impacts on the Provisioning and Resilience of Youth Living in Poverty

Summary:

Using a remote photo voice method we explore the impacts of the Covid19 pandemic on the provisioning and resilience of youth from lone mother households living in poverty.

Role: Principal Investigator

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Month:

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End Date:

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Funders:
SSHRC Partnership Engage Grant

Developing a framework of best practices for multi-sector collaboration fostering integration in child and youth mental health systems

Summary:

Post-doctoral Visitor: Dr. Renée Sloos

Role: Principal Investigator, Post-doctoral Supervisor

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End Date:

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Funders:
MITACS Accelerate Grant

Addressing trauma and fostering resilience in El Salvador

Summary:

This project brings together scholars, researchers, students, professionals community leaders and members to explore "trauma" and "resilience" as organizing frameworks for violence prevention and intervention in El Salvador, and more broadly Central America.

Role: Principal Investigator

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Supporting resilient outcomes: Understanding the emotional, instrumental and financial contributions of youth in low-income lone mother households

Summary:

The purpose of this study is to explore youth resilience, poverty and provisioning in the Global North, specifically in two major Canadian urban centres – Toronto and Vancouver. The aim is to understand the emotional, instrumental, and financial formal and informal activities and roles youth living in poverty undertake to meet their own needs and those of other family members; that is, how children and youth help families "make ends meet".

Role: Co-investigator

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Collaborator: Dr. Lea Caragata (principal investigator)

Crisis responses, policing and police encounters with psychiatrically "at-risk" children and youth

Summary:

The purpose of this 2 year, community-university partnership is to pilot a study - its methods, questions, and theoretical orientation - to explore crisis responses, policing, and police encounters with children and youth in need of, or involved with the child and youth mental health system.

Role: Principal Investigator

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Funders:
SSHRC Insight Development Grant

Book Chapters

Publication

Year

Liegghio, M. (2018). Za młodzi, żeby być szaleni. Upośledzaja zderzenia z “normalnośia” z perspektywy młodzieży doświadczajacej psyshiatryzacji. (Polish, English translation: Too young to be Mad: Disabling encounters with ‘normal’ from the perspectives of psychiatrized youth). In A. Witeska-Młynarczyk (ed)., Antropologia psychiatrii dzieci i młodzieży: Wbór tekstów. (p.p. 250-279) Warzawa, Poland: Oficyna Naukowa.

2018

Liegghio, M. (2013) . Chapter 5: A denial of being: Psychiatrization as epistemic violence. In B. LeFrancois, R. Menzies, & G. Reaume (Ed.s.), Mad matters: A critical Canadian reader. (p.p. 122-129). Toronto, Ontario: Canadian Scholars’ Press.

2013

Journal Articles

Publication

Year

Liegghio, M.; Sloos, R.; Fantin, S. & Ciordas, H. (2022). “He/his/she/her/father/mother/son/daughter”: A critical reflection of reproductions of cis-normativity and cis-dominance in preparing qualitative data for analysis. Qualitative Research. First published online May 9, 2022.

2022

Liegghio, M.; Canas, H.; Truong, A.H.; & Williams, S. (2021). A call to de-policing crisis responses: Distressed children and youth caught between the mental health and police systems. Journal of Community Safety & Well-being, 6 (1), 28-34.

2021

Liegghio, M.; Truong, A.H.; Canas, H. & Al-Bader, H. (2020). “I don’t want people to think I’m a criminal”: Calling for more compassionate policing in child and youth mental health. Journal of Community Safety & Well-being, 5 (3), 120-126.

2020

Liegghio, M. (2020). Allyship and solidarity, not therapy, in child and youth mental health: Lessons from a participatory action research project with psychiatrised youth. Global Studies of Childhood. Special Issue: Psychiatrised childhoods: Observed, understood and experienced, 10 (1), 78-89.

2020

Liegghio, M. & Caragata, L. (2020, July). Covid19 and youth living in poverty: The ethical considerations of moving from in-person interviews to a photovoice using remote methods. Affilia: Journal of Women and Social Work. DOI: 10.1177/0886109920939051

2020

Liegghio, M., Delay, D., & Jenney, A. (2019). Challenging social work epistemology in children’s mental health: The connections between evidence-based practice and young people’s psychiatrization. The British Journal of Social Work, 49, 1180–1197.

2019

Liegghio, M. (2017) . Our biggest hurdle, yet: Caregivers’ encounters with structural stigma in child and youth mental health. Families in Society: The Journal of Contemporary Social Sciences, 98 (4), 300-309.

2017

Liegghio, M.; Van Katwyk, T.; Freeman, B.; Caragata, L.; Sdao-Jarvie, K; Brown, K.; & Sandha, A. (2017) . Police involvement among a community population of children and youth accessing mental health services. Social Work in Mental Health, 15 (1), 14-27. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15332985.2016.1156043

2017

Liegghio, M. (2017) . “Not a good person”: Family stigma in child and youth mental health from the perspectives of young siblings. Child and Family Social Work, 22 (3), 1237-1245. doi:10.1111/cfs.12340.

2017

Liegghio, M. (2016) . Too young to be Mad: Disabling encounters with “normal” from the perspectives of psychiatrized youth. Special Issue: Mad Studies: Intersections with Disability Studies, Social Work and ‘Mental Health’ for Intersectionalities: A Global Journal of Social Work Analysis, Research, Polity, and Practice, 5 (3), 110-129.

2016

Liegghio, M. & Caragata, L. (2016) . “Why are you talking to me like I’m stupid?”: The micro-aggressions committed by the social welfare system against lone mothers. Affilia: Journal of Women and Social Work. 31 (1), 7-23. doi: 10.1177/0886109915592667

2016

Liegghio, M. (2015) . Over 1000 aluminum cans for forty dollars: The provisioning contributions of older children from the perspectives of welfare-reliant lone mothers. Children & Society, 29, 388-398.

2015

Liegghio, M. & Jaswal, P. (2015) . Police encounters in child and youth mental health: Could stigma informed crisis intervention training (CIT) for parents help? Special Issue on Mental Health: Journal of Social Work Practice: Psychotherapeutic Approaches in Health, Welfare and the Community, 29 (3), 301-319. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02650533.2015.1050654

2015

Van Katwyk, T., Liegghio, M. & Laflamme, L. (2014) . Democratic learning: The study circle as a critical approach to social work education. Canadian Social Work Review/Revue Canadienne de Service Social, 31(2), 227-243.

2014

Liegghio, M., Nelson, G., & Evans, S. (2010, September) . Participatory action research with children with mental health issues: Contributions of a sociology of childhood perspective. American Journal of Community Psychology, 46 (1-2), 84-99.

2010

Liegghio, M. (under review, submitted Feb 2022). Contending with the “adult gaze”: The ethics of representation in participatory research with psychiatrized children and youth. Children & Society.

Research Reports

Publication

Year

Liegghio, M. (December 2013) . ‘No one gets left behind’: Self and family stigma from the perspectives of youth diagnosed with a mental health issue, caregivers, and siblings; Final report of findings. Toronto, Ontario, Canada: A report to the Mental Health Commission of Canada.

Liegghio, M.; Van Katwyk, T.; Pereira, N. & Sdao-Jarvie, K. (2012, August) . A mental health literacy program for frontline child and youth mental health professionals: The stigma of mental illness, facilitator’s guide. Mississauga, Ontario, Canada: Peel Children’s Centre.

Degrees

PhD, Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
MSW, York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
BSW (honours), University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada

Research Interests

Children and Youth , Mental Health, Critical Social Work Theory, Practice, and Education, Stigma of Mental Illness, Resilience and Trauma, Community-based/Participatory Action Research

Current Research Projects

Fostering Latinx Resilience to Trauma between El Salvador, Canada, and the United States

Summary:

Project Type:

Role:

Start Date:

Month:

Year:

Funders:

Innovation in Resilience to Trauma Programming for Women's Post-pandemic Recovery in El Salvador, Central America

Summary:

Project Type:

Role:

Start Date:

Month:

Year:

Funders:

Covid19: Fostering Child, Youth, and Family Resilience

Summary:

Project Type:

Role:

Start Date:

Month:

Year:

Funders:

Covid19: Impacts on the Provisioning and Resilience of Youth Living in Poverty

Summary:

Using a remote photo voice method we explore the impacts of the Covid19 pandemic on the provisioning and resilience of youth from lone mother households living in poverty.

Project Type:

Role:

Start Date:

Month:

Year:

End Date:

Month:

Year:

Funders:

Developing a framework of best practices for multi-sector collaboration fostering integration in child and youth mental health systems

Summary:

Post-doctoral Visitor: Dr. Renée Sloos

Project Type:

Role:

Start Date:

Month:

Year:

End Date:

Month:

Year:

Funders:

Addressing trauma and fostering resilience in El Salvador

Summary:

Project Type:

Role:

Start Date:

Month:

Year:

End Date:

Month:

Year:

Supporting resilient outcomes: Understanding the emotional, instrumental and financial contributions of youth in low-income lone mother households

Summary:

Project Type:

Role:

Start Date:

Month:

Year:

Collaborator:

Crisis responses, policing and police encounters with psychiatrically "at-risk" children and youth

Summary:

Project Type:

Role:

Start Date:

Month:

Year:

End Date:

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Funders:

All Publications

Book Chapters

Publication

Year

2018

2013

Journal Articles

Publication

Year

2022

2021

2020

2019

2017

2016

2015

2014

2010

Research Reports

Publication

Year

Upcoming Courses

Term	Course Number	Section	Title	Type
Summer 2025	GS/SOWK5913 3.0	A	Contesting Children's 'Mental Health'	SEMR