 So, Jackie, how are relationships been affected by these very uncertain economic and political times that we're in just now? Well, it's interesting. Firstly, there's never been stasis, so there's never been a static form of family, there's never been a static form of a friendship is like this or a friendship is like that. Things have always changed and I think in some ways there's this idea that there's this cornflake box packet of nuclear family that existed in the 50s. It never existed. Possibly that was the most clear cut identifiable defined. It is 2.2 children, et cetera, but actually families have always changed. So that's the first thing. So yes, there is a more dynamic environment. Yes, there are definitely adverse circumstances politically, economically, socially, which are having a very detrimental effect on personal relationships in many ways, but there's never been a static. So things are evolving and what we mean by family may be changing. We have kin-like relationships now. So yes, there are changes, but I think we should just be slightly cautious before we think there was this thing that existed and now it's all changing. But when you say kin-like relationships, that for me brings up the whole idea of community. Surely community is a good thing. Are we not seeing the re-emergence of community with families living closer together in more communities like settings? Yes and no. So we're seeing different forms of relationships. So, for example, if young people are being priced out at the housing market and are having to stay longer at home with their parents, we know that's happening as a trend. So the end of 35s are having to stay longer at home. That can be good if you have a positive relationship with your parents. That can be good if they have a house that's big enough. That can be good if you can get employment or you go to university in that area. Obviously if you study at the European University, that's not a problem. But notwithstanding that, if you don't have a positive relationship, what happens? Are you staying in a house which isn't positive? Are you staying in a house where your freedoms are being restricted? For queer couples, for example, there may be real problems of having to stay closet about their sexual orientation because parents may not be accepting or will tolerate but not be open to having a living partner with them. Also, if you are with your partner in your bedroom and the marital bed, so to speak, is in a room next door to your parents, how private is that as a space? How can you sit cuddled up on the sofa? Some of the research I've done shows the benefits to couples in sustaining their relationships by spending intimate time together cuddled up watching TV. Well, if your parents are paying the TV licence, you're watching their programmes, not yours quite often. Or is it that your intimate space has to move upstairs and what you have effectively is a bed-sit? If you're staying with friends, that can be really positive. When you invoke this idea of community, yes, you may have a friendship circle and your intimate partner relationship is embedded within that friendship circle. I've done a search which shows that can be really positive but it can also be a pressure on the relationship. Can you be cuddly in kissing your partner in front of friends? A lot of people talk about why they don't really want to be intimate as in holding hands when they've got friends there because they don't want to embarrass their friends. So it has an impact, whether it be good or bad, on the intimate relationship there is no doubt. How has all of this been affected by Brexit? What changes will we see as a result of Article 50 being triggered? How will relationships be affected in this way? For example, if I voted leave and you voted remain, we were in a relationship without a factor. I think we need research, that's the first thing on the impact of Brexit. I think what we are seeing is definitions so we have to accept that the economic impact across the UK of triggering Article 50. We are going to be worse off in households so we know that's going to be the case. What we've also got is that there are reports now coming into the relationship support organisations that do couple counselling, for example, that Brexit is one of the triggers that is now being seen as being a stressor on a relationship. That might be because of austerity, it might be people feeling worse off, it might be a precarity of employment so we know businesses are starting to say are we going to de-invest from the UK. But it is also being played out as is this a cultural difference. So are we talking about intercultural relationships, about relationships where one person says remain and one person voted leave. People are coming into the counselling rooms saying well you know, it feels like an intercultural relationship now. My partner is not the person I thought they were. They are so ideologically different to me and that's because that separation between what Brexit means to remain or to stay is so significant now that it's being seen as a stressor being put on couple relationships, for example. And that's played out in families too. So in families we know. It's been loads of stuff on the television and the press around families where one person voted this and another voted that. Well yeah, that's very sensationalist. But what it is undoubtedly doing is exacerbating generational divisions across all of society. So what we're seeing is a younger generation who is angry at an older generation. They're angry about pensions. They're angry about Brexit. So yeah, the younger people and there was a significant proportion of young people obviously who did vote to remain to leave. But actually the majority we know of young people do want to be part of a wider European community. And I suppose this touches the core of people's idea of citizenship which ties in very nicely to your research, your research area, citizenship and governance. I guess people are asking, what does this mean for our whole identity? Well I think citizenship works on a macro level and a micro level. So on the macro level what we've seen is a significant increase of people going for UK citizenship. And that's because they're scared. They want certainty. They want to know their relationships are secure. Because if one partner has to leave the country what happens to that relationship? I mean there's living apart relationships and there's living apart. If you're living in different thousands of miles apart with a bit of water in between that's a very big boundary. But also if there's not freedom of movement there's going to be a significant stress on those relationships. So that's in a way that's the big divisions, the macro level change. But in terms of the micro level change for citizenship and for governance it's the everyday. What is happening on an everyday level about intimate life? So it is if we've got changes which say suddenly age is playing out as important. Age is something which we've taken for granted in this country of when you're 18 you are an adult. Well actually that's not quite true because part of the wider austerity measures which are not about Brexit they are just wider austerity measures which were a consequence of the global financial crisis. But part of what we've got is we can see that people are really struggling economically. They're struggling and that has an impact on their relationships on the sort of the everyday small things. So crisis with a capital C you know that the macro level and the micro level about the everyday lived relations about how do you connect with one another when money is scarce, when you're going to food banks not because of complicated reasons, not because it's complex but actually because you can't afford to feed your children because you have no income. You know we've got people in this country with no recourse to public funds who cannot access any welfare benefits. So yes of course all of those things around austerity are exacerbated by Brexit. And in terms of your own research is it all doom and gloom for relationships now that we're stretched in every way economically, politically. What would the take home be in terms of the positives in terms of relationships? Because I know your work brings out the positives and the good things that we can celebrate. Yes it is interesting thinking about positives. It's interesting in terms of thinking about how in the sense of precarity and austerity when we know we're going to be worse off, how can we possibly think about positives? So you know positive take homes I think it is true to say you know kin-like relationships people are looking out for one another in some shape and form in some areas. So this isn't a blanket thing you can say but you know this idea of the make and do the let's have groups that work together to do food sharing all of those things are positive but they are not wholesale change that can be adapted to everyone. So I think we should be cautious before we think about those positives. We have solidarity movements which are coming up in really interesting ways. So one for example would be lesbian and gay support the migrants which is the sort of the follow-on from the lesbian and gay support the minors which we know through the Pride movie is very popular at the moment. But what that's doing is saying we've got nothing in common in one way but actually what we have is a shared sense of oppression. There are connections and we need to look out for one another. So you've got those kin-like relationships about saying what have we got in common but more than that we should be looking out for others. We shouldn't be so self-oriented. We should be thinking about the bigger picture. So we've got people like Lauren Vrollong talking about cruel optimism. So you know when it's really hard times how do you think about the optimism and how do you remain positive? And I think we have to be resilient in terms of how we maintain our relationships and we always have been. That is the nature of it. But I think also we have to be aware that sometimes relationships break down and that's positive and we shouldn't just think so how do we remain positive and stay together and everyone has fulfilling relationships and live with their families and that's all great but to be honest about the difference in relationships and the diversity amongst what is a positive relationship. And I see that very much in my research and I see that mapping out but I think the positives are that people are finding ways to work together to support their relationships and maybe it is about saying to your partner I'm really struggling for example in couple relationships. In family relationships it is saying to your parents things are really tough can we move back home and I think people are doing that. I think what we need to be very mindful of are those that don't have choices and by saying yes I want to look out for other people I want to not just be focused on myself well that's a very privileged position in some ways but you can look outside your own experience if you're homeless how possible is it to be mindful of other people's lives it's about existence so we must be mindful of the context of survival.