Dr Michelle Cowley-Cunningham
Dr Michelle Cowley-Cunningham
Dr Michelle Cowley-Cunningham CPsychol AFPsSI is a chartered and professions-led psychologist. As postdoctoral researcher at DCU 2022-24, her research examined how sustainable business values affect creativity, well-being and succession in family business.
Research: Michelle was a principal investigator on the Family Business Succession Project, conducting the first all-island practitioner-led study of Irish family business succession (Clinton et al., 2024). Other projects addressed: how sustainable business values promote child and adolescent mental health, via their health and participation rights, in the climate crisis context (UN submission, 2023; Cowley-Cunningham et al., 2023); and the impact new mental health legislation may have on business models that draw on principles of community-led care (Rogers et al., 2023). Michelle also co-authored a professions-led overview, introducing new legislative and framework-driven developments for children’s participation rights in the Rep. of Ireland, with psychology colleagues for The Irish Psychologist (Carey et al., 2024).
Recent collaborative work with Dr Eric Clinton and Dr Catherine Faherty has produced a new model of creative entrepreneurial behaviour founded on the psychological capital that families (or familiness) possess(es) (Cowley-Cunningham et al., 2024, BCERC). While at the NCFB, she was also research administrator as Irish delegate for the GUESSS global student entrepreneurship consortium’s survey report 2023/24 (Sieger et al., 2024).
Impact: Michelle's postdoctoral research has featured in The Conversation UK, RTE.ie, The Sunday Times, Business Post, and The Irish Psychologist as a cover article. Her practitioner-led research with the NCFB on the topic of family business resilience was submitted as part of, and won, the Small Business Charter Excellence Award 2024 in the 'Outstanding Stakeholder Engagement' category.
Engagement: Michelle sits on the Psychological Society of Ireland's International Affairs Committee, and is a committee member of Royal Statistical Society Northern Ireland. She is also the secretary, and a founding member, of the Psychological Society of Ireland's Special Interest Group in Human Rights & Psychology. Michelle presently serves on the Editorial Review Board of the Market Research Society's flagship journal International Journal of Market Research. See portfolio of academic, policy and practitioner works with corresponding professional duties here.