Susan Venn joined CRAG (Centre for Research on Ageing and Gender) in September 2000 as a research administrator working on two projects. She then went on to complete her MSc in Social Research in 2004, her dissertation being based on an ESRC funded project investigating couples’ sleep. Subsequently Susan became a full time researcher on a four year project funded under the New Dynamics of Ageing initiative looking at sleep in later life (SomnIA: Sleep in ageing). Susan has also tutored undergraduate courses in Social Theory and Quantitative Methods. She is currently the Secretary of the Averil Osborn Fund, part of the British Society of Gerontology and Secretary-elect of the British Society of Gerontology.

Professor Sara Arber is Professor of Sociology, and Co-Director, Centre for Research on Ageing and Gender (CRAG) at University of Surrey. Sara has written over 200 journal articles on gender and ageing, on inequalities in health, and on sociology of sleep. She is Principal Investigator of the multi-disciplinary research project, SomnIA, on ‘Optimising quality of sleep among older people in the community and care homes’. Sara’s books include The Myth of Generational Conflict: Family and State in Ageing Societies (with Claudine Attias-Donfut, Routledge, 2000), Gender and Ageing: Changing Roles and Relationships (with Kate Davidson and Jay Ginn, 2003); and Connecting Gender and Ageing (with Jay Ginn, 1995), which won the Age Concern prize for best book on Ageing in 1996.