MsVita Pilkington

Dr Vita Pilkington (she/her) is a Research Fellow whose work focuses on mental health, trauma, suicide, men's health, and sport, with a particular interest in using research to inform effective mental health service provision. She completed her PhD in 2026, examining boys' and men's experiences of child sexual abuse and adult assaults, with a focus on mental health outcomes and experiences of disclosure. Her current work at Deakin is part of a partnership with Movember and seeks to understand strategies for effectively recognising and responding to mental ill-health in early fatherhood. This work will inform practitioner training in supporting paternal perinatal health and wellbeing. 

In addition to working closely with Movember, Vita has led several commissioned research projects for Australian elite sport organisations such as the Australian Institute of Sport, Australian Football League, and Cricket Australia. These projects examined the prevalence of mental ill-health and highlighted key risk and protective factors for mental ill-health in high-performance sport contexts, and informed the development of frameworks for mental health in elite sport.

The projects she has been involved in cover a range of methodologies, including reviews, qualitative studies, quantitative studies, and mixed-methods service evaluations. She values developing meaningful partnerships and research that has a strong knowledge translation focus - from informing practitioner-facing resources, to developing evidence-based recommendations for sporting organisations, to delivering webinars to frontline professionals in health, child protection, criminal justice, and education sectors.

Vita welcomes enquiries from Honours and PhD students interested in topics related to mental health, suicide risk, masculinities, gender-responsive care, violence perpetration, parenting, trauma and abuse, trauma-informed care, and health systems. If your interests sit outside these areas but you'd like to explore working together, please reach out for a chat.