Hi! I’m a doctoral research scholar in Psychology at the Department of Liberal Arts at Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad (IITH), India. I have a Master’s degree with specialization in counselling psychology from Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai, and a Bachelor’s from University of Delhi. I was drawn to qualitative research ever since my rookie attempts at conducting studies during my undergrad. By the time I was in my masters, I knew that ideating research questions and the means to tackle them, and interacting with participants, captured me more than clinical practice did. For my Master’s thesis I explored children’s experiences of childhood in the context of high academic expectations. It was during a stint as a research assistant at IITH in a project studying resilience among young adults with childhood trauma, that I developed an interest in positive psychology.

I was about to begin my doctoral research with a broad idea of studying resilience among a select vulnerable population, when my home state of Kerala experienced massive floods due to unprecedented levels of rainfall. The disaster broke our personal fables about safety and how we related to our land, the celebrated monsoons, and our homes, among many other things. Through my own identity as a relief work volunteer and in partaking in the collective loss that echoed across the state, I naturally gravitated towards wanting to study the experience through research. My current work explores adaptation to loss, collective response, altruistic behaviour and community resilience in the aftermath of climatic disaster events, such as like floods and landslides.

As someone who is interested in positive outcomes in the wake of hard times and how people make meaning of these adverse experiences, I’ve found INPM to be a niche platform that seeks to address human wellbeing from these angles and brings together researchers and practitioners united in this endeavour. It is my privilege to be a part of this community and its activities! The 11^th Biennial Meaning Conference was a wonderful experience, and I look forward to many more such events!

Adeeba Hakkim

Doctoral Research Scholar (Psychology)

Department of Liberal Arts

Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad

Telangana, India

Email: adeebahakkim@gmail.com

Website: https://sites.google.com/iith.ac.in/adeeba-hakkim/home