Who we are

About me

Marita Husso, professor (Faculty of Social Sciences, Tampere University), is the leader of the ERASE GBV -project. Her research focuses on interpersonal violence, institutional and affective practices, welfare service work, organization studies, social theory and gendered agency.

About me

Satu Lidman, PhD and Adjunct Professor (Faculty of Law, University of Turku), is senior researcher at the Faculty of Social Sciences, Tampere University. Her research interests include historical and present-day contexts of criminal law and human rights, especially related to gender-based and sexual violence, collectivity and attitudinal change.

About me

Helena Päivinen, PhD in Psychology, is acting as university researcher at the Faculty of Social Sciences, Tampere University. Her study focuses on group and couple treatment and gendered positioning in treatment of intimate-partner violence. She has also worked as a clinician in the field of violence interventions for many years.

About me

Eppu Heikkilä, an intern in ERASE-GBV project, is doing their master’s degree in gender studies in the Faculty of Social Sciences, Tampere University. Their study and future work interests focus on institutionalized normativities and a vast array of thematics surrounding LGBTQAI+ rights, kinship, gender, sexuality, and intersecting positions of marginalizations.

About me

Merja Pihlajasaari is the coordinator of domestic violence prevention and the coordinator of mental health and substance abuse services in the city of Jyväskylä. The work includes planning and development, training, data collection and reporting on the above themes. The work also includes chairing expert networks.

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Päivi Kalilainen is a service director at preventive of social and health services for families in city of Jyväskylä.

About me

Dean Ajduković, PhD, emeritus professor of psychology (Department of Psychology, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb) studies violence in intimate relations. He has pioneered work with perpetrators of gender-based violence in the region and developed a large-scale program for prevention of violence in adolescent romantic relationships.

About me

Jana Kiralj, mag. psych (Department of Psychology, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb) studies inter-group relations and violence in intimate relations. She worked with high-school students as a part of a program for prevention of violence in adolescent romantic relationships.

About me

Nataša Bijelić is a sociologist with a masters degree in gender from The London School of Economics and Political Science. She is an Expert Associate at CESI-Center for Education, Counselling and Research, Zagreb, Croatia. She has been working as a researcher and educator on the issues of gender, gender-based violence, sexual and reproductive health and rights and was involved in a number of advocacy activities regarding sexual and reproductive health and rights and prevention of GBV.

About me

About me

Berta Vall Castelló PhD is a clinical psychologist. She is the Research and Development Manager at the European Network for the Work With Perpetrators (WWP EN) and is associate professor at Blanquerna University (Barcelona). She has participated and coordinated several work packages in European Projects and has several scientific publications. She has mainly focused her research on the analysis of the treatment of men who have used violence towards their partners.

About me

Anna Sala-Bubaré is a PhD in Educational Psychology currently working as a postdoctoral researcher and adjunct professor at Blanquerna-Ramon Llull University. She participates in the European Network for the Work With Perpetrators (WWP EN). Other research interests involve researchers’ development and academic writing.

About me

About me

Heinrich Geldschläger is psychologist, psychotherapist and founding partner of the CONEXUS Association in Barcelona, Spain, where he currently is research and international projects director. Since the year 2000, he has been active in the field of gender-based violence, specifically regarding prevention and interventions for men who use violence. He has been working directly with men, coordinating services, delivering presentations and trainings on this work nationally and internationally and researching it. He is member of the board of the European Network for the Work with Perpetrators of domestic violence (WWP EN) and has been on the steering committee of MenEngage Europe. He has participated as an expert in several European projects such as “Work with Perpetrators of Domestic Violence in Europe – WWP” ,“IMPACT: Evaluating European Perpetrator Programs”, and “ENGAGE frontline professionals to provide a coordinated multi-agency response to perpetrators”.

About me

Oriol Ginés Canales is a psychologist and Advanced Studies Diploma in the Doctoral Program “Cognition, emotion and interpersonal conflicts” at the University of Barcelona. He was the co-founder of the CONEXUS Association in 2010, where he is currently President.  He has been a group therapist for male aggressors in the Barcelona City Council’s Men’s Support Service and the Boys ‘and Girls’ Support Services. For this city he created and managed the first Catalan institutional prevention project with men CANVIEM-HO (CHANGE it)  and a program for the inclusion of paternity in the Sexual and Reproductive Health Care Program. He has participated in the European project DAHPNE “IMPACT” and now ERASMUS+ “Gender Education Teenage Boys”, as well as developing the training for professionals of the “Model Objective Violence 0” for the Junta de Castilla y León. He is also currently coordinating the GBV prevention programs in Conexus.

About me

Juha Holma, PhD, professor at the Department of Psychology, University of Jyväskylä, Finland. His research focuses on interventions of gendered violence, especially on group treatment for batterers and on couple treatment. He is a founder of the batter intervention programme in Jyväskylä and has worked as a clinician over 20 years in these interventions.