Dr. Kristi Sawyer is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London. She graduated from her PhD in 2021, funded by a Medical Research Council studentship. Her thesis, supervised by Professor Carmine Pariante, focused on biological correlates of antenatal depression, and the effects of maternal mental illness on the mental health and development of the child. Prior to her PhD, she graduated with a BSc(Hons) in Pharmacology from Newcastle University, during which she undertook a placement year at GlaxoSmithKline, and conducted her dissertation research at the Pasteur Institute in Paris.

Kristi currently works in the Perinatal Psychiatry section at King’s, with a particular interest in the biological correlates of perinatal mental health and offspring outcomes. She is currently working on the Wellcome trust funded SHAPER study, aiming to test the effectiveness of a group singing intervention for postnatal depression, and is now also leading KCL’s contribution to the Happy Mums Project.