Dr Kevin Runions

Dr Runions is the head of the Schools and Communities team at Telethon Kids Institute and a senior research fellow with the ARC Centre of Excellence for Children and Families over the Life Course. After completing his PhD in Human Development and Education (2004; Ontario Institute for Studies in Education/University of Toronto), Dr Runions has conducted wide-ranging research to better understand the biopsychosocial factors in childhood aggression and bullying behaviour specifically and child and adolescent wellbeing more broadly. His work has included on motivation and emotion, social information processing, neurotransmitters. Starting in 2006, Dr Runions began working with Professor Donna Cross on school prevention interventions to reduce bullying and aggression and improve student wellbeing. This work has addressed parent relationships, teacher-child relationship quality, the role of peers, and how online settings afford opportunities for bullying and aggression. He is particularly interested in the school experiences of children from disadvantaged backgrounds and how schools might reduce the inequity in social and emotional wellbeing experienced by these children, as well as how schools might better engage such students and their families. His work with the Life Course Centre aims to address how to dismantle the school-to-prison pipeline experienced by some students from disadvantaged backgrounds through universal and targeted intervention.