Aanchal Chopra is a Joint PhD student at La Trobe University’s Department of Public Health (School of Psychology and Public Health) and the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. Her doctoral research is a cross-country, community-engaged study of autism care experiences in India and among the Indian diaspora in Australia. It uses experience-based co-design to bring autistic adults, families and service providers together to develop culturally responsive strategies for improving autism services and policies, grounded in lived experience.

Before her PhD, Aanchal worked at Sangath, India, on a randomised controlled trial and an implementation programme of community-based, parent-mediated autism intervention across South Asia. Her work spans autism, neurodiversity and child development, with a focus on culturally responsive healthcare, participatory and co-design research, implementation science, and community-based, task-shared interventions in low- and middle-income countries. She also serve as a member on the Student and Trainee Committee of International Society for Autism Research (INSAR).