Val Gillies is a Professor of Social Research and Director of the Families & Social Capital Research Group at the Weeks Centre for Social and Policy Research, London South Bank University. She has researched and published in the area of family, social class and at risk youth, producing a wide range journal articles, chapters and books on parenting, social policy and home school relations. She is currently co-directing the Faraday Institute funded project Brain science and early intervention: tracing the new biologisation of parenting and child care, with Rosalind Edwards from Southampton University. Most recently she has co-edited Family Troubles? Exploring changes and challenges in the family lives of children and young people (Policy Press 2013) with Jane McCarthy and Carol-Ann Hooper.