Rate My Professor Ruqayya Sulaiman-Hill

Dr. Ruqayya Sulaiman-Hill serves as a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Psychological Medicine at the University of Otago, Christchurch. She earned a BA Honours from the University of Canterbury, a Postgraduate Diploma in International Health, and a PhD in International Health from Curtin University in Perth, Western Australia. Prior to her academic career, she worked professionally in Medical Laboratory Science. Her research specializes in the psychological impacts of traumatic events, with a particular emphasis on refugee, migrant, and minority ethnic communities, including the Muslim population in New Zealand.

Sulaiman-Hill is co-Principal Investigator on the Health Research Council (HRC) and Canterbury Medical Research Foundation (CMRF)-funded March 15 Project, which investigates the psychosocial consequences of the 2019 Christchurch mosque terrorist attacks on the local Muslim community. She leads as Principal Investigator the project 'Which hijab am I wearing today?', a qualitative study examining dual relationship challenges faced by Christchurch Muslims in professional support roles following the attacks, involving participants from government agencies, research, community services, and advisory roles. Additionally, she coordinates an international effort to validate translations of the newly developed COVID Psychosocial Impacts Scale in several Muslim-majority countries. Following the attacks, she actively contributed to the Muslim community's response, collaborating with local health authorities and government agencies in advisory and liaison capacities. Her key publications include 'Navigating dual roles: qualitative exploration of the psychological impacts on Muslim professionals supporting their community after a terror attack' (BJPsych Open, 2025, with F. Ali, R. Lotfy Ahmed, S.M.A. Kabir); 'Post-traumatic growth and religious coping in Muslims exposed to the March 15 terror attacks in New Zealand' (Australian & New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 2025, with B. Beaglehole et al.); 'Factors associated with mental health outcomes in a Muslim community following the Christchurch terrorist attack' (BJPsych Open, 2024, with C. Bell et al.); 'A comparative assessment of AI and manual transcription quality in health data' (New Zealand Medical Journal, 2025, with S.M.A. Kabir et al.); and 'Exploring the use of AI in qualitative data analysis' (International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 2025, with S.M.A. Kabir et al.). She has received major project grants from CMRF in 2022 and HRC funding for her research initiatives.