Stéphane de Leymarie (MA, MSc, PGcert)

Thesis title: Unmasking Burnout

PhD in Counselling Studies

Year of study: 1

  • School of Health in Social Sciences
  • Center for Creative Relational Inquiry

Contact details

PhD supervisors:

Address

Street

School of Health in Social Science, University of Edinburgh
Old Medical School, Elsie Inglis Quadrangle, Teviot Place

City
Edinburgh, Scotland, The United-Kingdom
Post code
EH8 9AG

Biography

Background

Stéphane is a doctoral researcher in Counselling Studies investigating burnout. She operates at the intersections of knowledge, drawing on an interdisciplinary background in cognitive neuroscience, architecture and design, microphenomenology, and the study of psychedelics as cultural traditions and contemporary therapies. Her PhD investigates the lived experience of burnout with the aim of developing finer-grained experiential vocabulary for practitioners and patients navigating its distinct phases.

Her journey has been shaped by a lifelong fascination with exploring knowledge, combined with challenges related to multiple neurodivergences and burnout. With her research, she aims to transform insights from lived experience into actionable knowledge to hopefully help others navigate and prevent burnout.

Before turning to research, Stéphane worked in several different professions, some of which allowed her to put her lifelong passion for spatial design, the visual arts and music to good use. She worked as an international affairs analyst, as a freelance photographer and graphic designer, and as an architectural project and site manager in the hospitality sector.

Alongside her research, Stéphane is a LEGO enthusiast, a hobbyist astronomer, and an accomplished musician, playing several instruments and performing on stage. She is a multilingual scholar (French, English, German) and has a longstanding background in the performing arts, having acted and directed in theatre companies across France and Canada.

CV

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Qualifications

  • PGCert in Psychedelics: Mind, Medicine, Culture, University of Exeter (2024 – 2025)

  • Neuroarchitecture and Salutogenic Design (course), NeuroAU (2024)

  • MSc, Music Mind and Brain, Goldsmiths, University of London (2019 – 2020)
  • Foundation Year, Applied Arts, Architecture & Spatial Design, École Supérieure de Design et d'Arts appliqués (ESDAC, 2014 – 2015)
  • MA, Economic Intelligence & Geoeconomics, Institut Catholique de Paris (2009 – 2010)
  • BBA, Management & International Affairs, HEC Montréal (2005 – 2008)

Responsibilities & affiliations

  • Scottish Psychedelic Research group (since 2025).
  • Microphenomenology Lab, International Society of Microphenomenology (since 2025).
  • Wavepaths Community (since 2020), an organisation developing music for psychedelic-assisted therapy.
  • OPEN Foundation (since 2023), an organisation advancing psychedelic therapies in Europe.

Research summary

Stephane's research sits at the intersection of phenomenology, neurodivergence, and embodied inquiry. Her doctoral project aims to develop a finer-grained experiential vocabulary for the distinct phases of burnout, moving beyond the monolithic clinical concept toward a phenomenology of burnout as a temporal and somatic process. Her thesis, "Unmasking Burnout", treats the researcher's own experience of burnout as primary data and the process of inquiry as inseparable from the process of recovery. This integration of personal and scholarly purpose combines first-person experiential methods with careful attention to epistemological and ethical issues in self-research. Her broader research interests include consciousness, psychedelics, and neuroarchitecture.

Current research interests

Multiple Neurodivergence (i.e., combining autism + ADHD + dyslexia + syneasthesia, etc.) – Counselling & Psychotherapy Research – Consciousness & Sentience – Cognitive Neuroscience – Microphenomenology – Autoethnography – Embodied Critical Thinking – Extreme Mental States – Burnout – Mental Health – Psychedelic Science, Medicine and Culture – Neuroarchitecture

Affiliated research centres

Current project grants

"Unmasking Burnout", supported by the College Research Award (College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences)

In the press

Academic service & initiatives

  • Neurodivergent Burnout Workshops (2026)

    • A series of awareness and prevention workshops for students and staff at the University of Edinburgh

    • Role: Creator, Convener, and Lead Facilitator

  • The Neuroinclusivity of Microphenomenology (2025-2026)

    • Project ​​​​led by Katrin Heimann (Aarhus University) and Maciek Wodziński (Maria Skłodowska-Curie University) 
    • Role: Research collaborator

  • The Mystical Entropy Project (2023)

    • Project led by Aidan Lyon and Michiel Van Elk (Leiden University)
    • Role: Research collaborator

  • 15th Conference of Systematic Musicology (2022)

    • Responsibilities included programme development, call-for-papers, and peer review

Awards & honours

  • College Research Award (full PhD Studentship), The University of Edinburgh (2025-2028)
  • Best Research Project, University Medical Centre (UMCG), University of Groningen (2023)
  • Best Paper Nominee, joint 16th ICMPC and 11th ESCOM Conference (2021)
  • Student Orator, Graduation Ceremony, Goldsmiths University of London (2020)
  • Valedictorian, Graduation Ceremony 2010, Institut Catholique de Paris (2010)

Peer-reviewed research articles

de Leymarie, S. (in press). The Rage Remains: Burnout, the Glass Cliff, and Learning to Rest Together. The European Journal of Women’s Studies.

de Leymarie, S. (2025). The Phoenix Fallacy: Reframing the Irreversible Transformations Following Workplace Burnout in Autistic Adults. Autism in Adulthood. https://doi.org/10.1089/aut.2024.0292

Van Kerrebroeck, B., Crombé, K., de Leymarie, S. M., Leman, M., & Maes, P.-J. (2024). The virtual drum circle: polyrhythmic music interactions in mixed reality. Journal of New Music Research, 1-21. https://doi.org/10.1080/09298215.2024.2339244

Other research outputs

de Leymarie, S., Bertrand, N., Raufflet, E. (2008). CDC Biodiversité: A case study for an economic strategy for biodiversity conservation [Course Material]. Department of Management, HEC Montréal.

de Leymarie, S., Bertrand, N. (2008, May 19-30). A first step towards environmental reporting [Meeting document]. 9th Meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, Bonn, Germany. Retrieved from https://www.cbd.int/doc/meetings/cop/cop-09/information/cop-09-inf-42-en.pdf

Conference papers & posters presentations

de Leymarie, S., Liebschner, S., Sirk, M., Vasconcelos, S., Zhang, B. (2023, July 10-14). Losing my religion? The role of psychedelics in belief change in the context of rave experiences – an exploratory study [Poster abstract]. University of Groningen Medical Sciences Summer School, Groningen, The Netherlands.

de Leymarie, S., Omigie, D., Küssner, M.B., Taruffi, L., Floridou, G.A. (2021, July 28-31). The Multimodal Mental Imagery of Music Scale (MMIMS): A novel instrument assessing the multimodal mental imagery experience of music listening [Paper presentation]. 16th International Conference on Music Perception and Cognition and the 11th Triennial Conference of the European Society for the Cognitive Sciences of Music, Sheffield, UK.

de Leymarie, S., Omigie, D., Küssner, M.B., Taruffi, L., Floridou, G.A. (2021, January 17-18). The Multimodal Mental Imagery of Music Scale (MMIMS): a novel instrument assessing the multimodal mental imagery experience of music listening [Paper presentation]. Postgraduate conference of the Society for Musicology in Ireland and the Irish National Committee of the International Council for Traditional Music, Dublin, Ireland.

de Leymarie, S., Allard, P., Mistral, J. (2009). Les conséquences géopolitiques de la crise financière [Rapport interne]. Institut français des relations internationales, Direction de la prospective, ministère des Affaires étrangères de la République française.

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