Professor Margaret O’Brien is the Director of the Thomas Coram Research Unit in UCL, Institute of Education. Previously she co-directed the Centre for Research on the Children and Families at the University of East Anglia, UK.
Her research areas are: fatherhood and work-family policy; fathers, parenting and family support. Margaret seeks to understand how fathers and mothers can work and care together for the welfare of children and gender equality.
Recent projects include: Comparative studies of paternity leave systems; evaluations of programmes supporting engagement with fathers in early years children’s centres and for separated fathers; fathers of very low birth weight infants. She serves on a wide range of local, national, and international advisory groups for example: The Equality and Human Rights Commission Working Better: meeting the changing needs of families, workers and employers in the 21st Century project; United Nations Programme on the Family, preparations for International Year of the Family 2014, contributing to its first global report on men in families.