SCHOOL OF PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH GROUPS AND STAFF RESEARCH INTERESTS

• APPLIED SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY

• BEHAVIOURAL NEUROSCIENCE AND CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY

• COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY

• FORENSIC AND ORGANISATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY

• More detailed list of individual staff members' research interests (Word 31Kb)

APPLIED SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY (Leader: Ann Colley)
 
Attitudes and Beliefs
Colley, A. (gender and language; social and educational context of educational computing;
     development of liking for sport; gender stereotyping in musical evaluation)
Maltby, J. (personality and individual differences in social attitudes and beliefs; psychometric testing
     and measurement; psychology of religion; forgiveness)
North, A. (experimental aesthetics; music and consumer behaviour; music and adolescent
     delinquency)
Pulford, B. D. (personality factors influencing students’ self-handicapping behaviours and academic
     achievement)
Sheridan, L. (psychology of racism and religious discrimination)
 
Digital Technologies
Colley, A. (social and educational context of educational computing)
Gillett, R. (online psychological experiments and statistical test delivery on the Internet)
Maltby, J. (psychometric testing and measurement)
North, A. (digital provision of stimulation for the elderly)
 
Popular Culture
Boon, J. (influences of social and affective factors on cognition)
Colley, A. (gender and language; development of liking for sport; gender stereotyping in musical
     evaluation)
Maltby, J. (psychology of religion)
North, A. (applied and social psychology of music, particularly music and the listening environment;
     music and consumer behaviour; and experimental aesthetics; the problem music debate)
Sheridan, L. (psychology of racism and religious discrimination)
 
Positive Psychology and Individual Differences
Boon, J. (psychology of love and destruction)
Colman, A. (cooperation; social dilemmas; patient experience in the NHS)
Colley, A. (development of liking for sport; gender stereotyping in musical evaluation)
Gillett, R. (testing working memory capacity))
Linley, P. A. (posttraumatic growth; positive psychology; applied positive psychology; executive
     coaching; psychotherapy; values and materialism)
Maltby, J. (personality and individual differences in social attitudes and beliefs; forgiveness)
North, A. (music, deviance, vulnerability, and celebrity worship in adolescence)
 
Research grants since the beginning of 2001:
 
Baker, R., Mellon, J., Colman, A. M., Steward, W., Kockelbergh, R., Sinfield, P., Tarrant, C., Crosbee, L.,
     & Sproston, K. (2004-2007). £347,291 awarded by the NHS Service Delivery and Organisation
     National R&D Programme for research into “Prostate Cancer Care: Improving Measures of the
     Patient Experience”.
Linley, P. A. (2004-2005). £25,000 awarded by the Midlands Medici Fellowship Scheme for research
     and technical assistance in developing commercialisable projects.
Maltby, J. (2004). £4,000 awarded by the Psychology LTSN (Learning and Teaching Support Network)
     for a project entitled “Using Mathematical Puzzles to Support the Teaching of Statistics”.
North, A. (2001). £134,365 awarded by the European Union to study “Physical, Cognitive, and
     Psychological Well-Being in the Elderly: The Effect of Auditory Stimulation via Global Networks”.
Sheridan, L., & Boon, J. (2003-2004). £49,498 awarded by the Home Office for an “Evaluation of
     Models of Good Practice and Guidance for the Internet Industry on Chat Services, Instant
     Messaging and Web Based Services”.
 
 
BEHAVIOURAL NEUROSCIENCE AND CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY (Leader: Andrew Young)
 
Behavioural Neuroscience
Gibson, C. L. (neurodegeneration and neuroprotection; using in vivo models of neurodegenerative
     disorders, in particular stroke, in order to investigate the resulting pathology and assess
     potential therapeutics)
Jordan, T. R. (cognitive neuroscience, with special focus the anatomical localization of the processes
     underlying written and spoken word recognition and the use of pure research to develop new
     technologies for aiding written and spoken communication)
Joseph, M. (the role of identified neurotransmitter systems in the control of behaviour; the actions of
     therapeutic drugs, and of drugs of abuse, on the brain; implications for normal behaviour)
Prados, J. (mechanisms underlying spatial learning: role of associative processes; mechanisms
     underlying perceptual learning: inhibitory learning versus stimulus differentiation; role of the
     hedonic properties of stimuli in classical conditioning (flavour and context conditioning); changes
     in stimulus effectiveness or salience using standard classical and instrumental conditioning tasks.
Young, A. (in vivo measurement of neurotransmitter release in response to physiological stimuli
     controlling behaviour and during Pavlovian conditioning; functional-MRI during cognitive
     performance: relationship to neurotransmitter function)
 
Clinical Psychology
Allen, S. (models of depression; eating disorders)
Christie, M. (drug and alcohol problems including gender differences; treatment effectiveness across
     the lifespan including involvement of family and social networks)
Robertson, N. (clinical health psychology; visual loss in diabetes; rehabilitation in cardiac and
     respiratory disease; health professional/patient communication; impact of vicarious trauma;
     health professional behaviour change)
Wang, M. (psychological aspects of anaesthesia, anaesthetic awareness, implicit emotional memory,
     consciousness and unconsciousness)
 
Research grants since the beginning of 2001:
 
Crookes, A. E. (2001-2002). £1,000 awarded by the British Foundation for Women Graduates for a
     studentship to study Kamin blocking.
Del Rio, J. A. Perez, F., Aguado, F., Guijarro, P., Fontana, X., De Castro, F., & Prados, J. (2004-2006).
     €98,000 awarded by Fundació La Caixa to study “Generation of Colinergic Cell Lines from Stem
     Cells as Therapeutic Agents in Animal Models of Alzheimer Disease”.
Moran, P. M. (2003). £750 from AstraZeneca to study “The Effect of Ecstasy on the Impulsivity in the
     Rat”.
Moran, P. M. (2004). £400 from AstraZeneca UK for “The Effects of MDMA on Impulsivity in the Rat: A
     Supplement”.
Moran, P. M., Evans, R., Talbot, C., & Pritchard, C.. (2001-2002). £100,000 awarded by the Wellcome-
     HEFCE Science Research Infrastructure Fund to study “Mouse Behavioural Phenotyping Facility”.
Moran. P. M., & Hanning, C. (2001). £25,000 awarded by the Alzheimer’s Disease Society of Great
     Britain & Ireland to study “APOE Genotyping and Cognitive Function in Alzheimer’s Disease”.
Prados, J., Sansa, J., & Artigas, A. A. (2002-2004). €22,838 awarded by Spanish Ministry of Science
     and Technology to study “Context Relevance in Spatial Learning and Conditioned Aversion”.
Wang, M., & Dent-Brown, K. (2001-2003). £80,590 awarded by Northern and Yorkshire NHSE
     Research & Development Office Training Fellowship for “Development of the Six Part Story as a
     Psychometric Technique for the Assessment of Personality Disorder”.
 
 
COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY (Leader: Andrew M. Colman)
 
Memory and Ergonomics
De Lillo, C. (comparative cognition; memory and serial order; the role of structure and organisation in
     search and human working-memory)
Garland, K. J. (long-term memory, metacognition, cognitive styles, computer-based performance)
Gillett, R. (testing working memory capacity)
 
Human Perception and Visual Cognition
Beech, J. (reading development, individual differences in reading, and assessment of reading ability;
     visual and spatial processing; selective attention)
De Lillo, C. (perceptual organisation and perceptual grouping from a comparative perspective; the
     role of perceptual organisation in human visuo-spatial working memory)
Jordan, T. R. (cognitive neuroscience, with special focus on the processes underlying recognition of
     written words, the role of visible facial movement in recognition of speech and emotion, and the
     use of pure research to develop new technologies for aiding written and spoken communication)
Kim, N-G. (perceptions of causality; the role of eye movements in perception)
Paterson, K. (psycholinguistics: syntactic processing and sentence interpretation; and eye movement
     behaviour during reading)
 
Reasoning, Judgement, and Decision Making
Colman, A. (psychological game theory, experimental games, and interactive decision making;
     context effects on cognitive processing of information)
Gillett, R. (collective choice; testing matching performance; reasoning, judgement and decision
     making; meta-analysis; statistical power analysis)
Pulford, B. D. (communication and perception of confidence and the resulting effects on decision
     making; moral judgment in the young and elderly; ambiguity aversion in decision making)
 
Research grants since the beginning of 2001:
 
Bolger, F., & Gillett, R. T. (2004-2006). £47,125 awarded by the Economic and Social Research
     Council for research into “News, Mood and Consumer Confidence”.
Colman, A. M. (2004). £532 awarded by the Royal Society to contribute to “FUR XI: 11th
     International Conference on the Foundations and Applications of Utility, Risk and Decision
     Theory”, 30 June to 3 July 2004.
Colman, A. M. (2005-2006). £2,600 awarded by the Royal Society of Edinburgh (Auber Bequest
     Award) to study “Evolution of Cooperation Through Coordinated Turn-Taking”.
Colman, A. M., & Al-Nowaihi, A. (2004-2005). £12,054 awarded by the British Academy Larger
     Research Grants Fund for research into “Cooperation in Multi-Player Minimal Social Situations: An
     Experimental Investigation”.
Colman, A. M., Pulford, B. D., & Bolger, F. (2003-2005). £121,563 awarded by the Economic and
     Social Research Council for research into “Confidence in Interactive Decisions”.
De Lillo, C. (2004). £1,750 awarded by the Experimental Psychology Society Undergraduate
     Bursaries scheme for a project on “Spatial Grouping, Executive Functions and Data-reduction in
    Spatial Working Memory”.
De Lillo, C. (2004). £1,650 awarded by the Nuffield Foundation for an Undergraduate Research
     Bursary to study “Executive Functions and Hierarchical Organisation in Serial-spatial Working
     Memory: A Study Based on Structured Versions of the Corsi Task”.
De Lillo, C. (2004). £3,400 by the University of Leicester for two undergraduate research bursaries.
De Lillo, C. (2005). £1,400 awarded by the Nuffield Foundation Undergraduate Research Bursaries
    scheme to study “Executive Functions and Cross-Modality Binding in Serial Temporary Memory”.
De Lillo, C. (2005). £ 1,400 by the University of Leicester for an undergraduate research bursary.
De Lillo, C. (2005-2006). £42,892 awarded by the BBSRC to study “Executive Control, Grouping and
     Hierarchical Organisation in Serial Short-term Memory for Spatial Locations”.
Garland, K. (2006). £6,922 awarded by the Nuffield Foundation to study “The Effects of Processing
     Priming Bias in Recognition Memory Performance”.
Jordan, T. R. (2000-2005). £217,938 awarded by the Wellcome Trust to study “The Use of Coarse
     Visual Information in Word Recognition by Adults of Different Reading Abilities”.
Mayall, K., & Beech, J. R. (2003-2004). £59,056 awarded by the BBSRC to study “The External
     Feature Advantage in Visual Word Recognition: Word Shape or Constituent Letter Features?”
Paterson, K. B. (2005). £1,750 awarded by the Experimental Psychology Society Undergraduate
     Bursaries scheme for a project on “The Processing of Presuppositional Information in Reading:
     Evidence from Eye Movements”.
Paterson, K. B., & Liversedge, S. P. (2005). £7,476 awarded by the British Academy to study
     “Discourse Context and the Processing of Contrastive Focus in Silent Reading”.
Paterson, K. B., & Webb, T. (2005-2006). £7,476 awarded by the Nuffield Social Science Small Grants
     scheme to study “Age-of-Acquisition Effects in Visual Word Recognition”.
Pulford, B. D. (2001). £4,915 awarded by the University of Wolverhampton Sabbatical Fund for
     research into “Confidence, Decision Making and the Ellsberg Paradox of Ambiguity Avoidance”.
Pulford, B. D. (2002-2005). £21,000 awarded by the University of Wolverhampton Studentship Fund
     for a postgraduate studentship.
Todd, K. (2001). £3,100 awarded by the British Academy to study “Subjectivity and Intentional Ludic
     Reading”.
Treffner, P. J. Barrett, R. S. Adams, L., Thornton, J. R., & Kim, N.-G. (2003-2005). Australian $140,000
     awarded by the Australian Research Council for research into “Dynamics of Locomotion:
     Visualisation in Skill Acquisition & Rehabilitation”.
Watanabe, T., Andersen, G. J., Kim, N.-G., & Tootell, R. (2004-2006). US $305,847 awarded by the
     National Science Foundation for research into “Multiple Stages of Information Processing”.
 
 
FORENSIC AND ORGANISATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY (Leader: Ray Bull)
 
Forensic Psychology
Bilby, C. (development and evaluation of government funded offending behaviour and crime
     reduction programmes; the maintenance of programme integrity on one-to-one OB programmes
     and programme implementation processes)
Boon, J. (crime analysis and psychological profiling; eyewitness testimony)
Bull, R. (investigative interviewing of suspects and witnesses/victims; witness testimony including
     voice identification; questioning in court; police training; the assumed relationship between
     criminality and facial appearance)
Cooke, C. A. (policing; private security; gun control; informant handling; cross cultural research)
Davies, G. (eyewitness testimony and identification; witness competencies of adults and children and
     their implications for judicial process and police training; use of videotaped evidence in court;
     video surveillance; stalking behaviour and deterrence)
Grant, T. (forensic linguistics, particularly authorship attribution in a forensic context; the language of
     deception; personality profiling from linguistic production)
Hatcher, R. (evaluation of effectiveness of offending behaviour programmes)
Sheridan, L. (stalking behaviour; factors that exacerbate and alleviate harassment; the stalking of
     celebrities; offender profiling)
Woodhams, J. (stranger sexual offending, particularly with regard to juvenile offenders; behavioural
     crime analysis and the analysis of offenders’ speech; distinguishing confirmed false from true
     allegations of sexual assault)
 
Organisational Psychology
Coffey, M. (development of professional teams; personnel selection techniques; identification and
     realisation of potential; the professional practice of educational development)
Stammers, R. (task analysis methodology; the design of simulators for training; team training and
     performance; cognitive ergonomics; the history of occupational psychology and ergonomics)
 
Research grants since the beginning of 2001:
 
Bilby, C., & Woodhams, J. A. (2005). £480 awarded by the Leicester Youth Offending Services for
     research into “Juvenile Sex Offending”.Brooks-Gordon, B., & Bilby, C. (2002-2003). £33,918
     awarded by the Department of Health for a “Systematic Review of Psychological Treatment for
     Sex Offenders”.
Brooks-Gordon, B., & Bilby, C. (2002-2003). £33,918 awarded by the Department of Health for a
     “Systematic Review of Psychological Treatment for Sex Offenders”.
Brooks-Gordon, B. & Bilby, C. (2003-2004). £25,423 awarded by the Department of Health for a
     “Systematic Review of Psychological Treatment for Juvenile Sex Offenders”. [extension]
Hatcher, R., Hollin, C. R., Palmer, E. J., McGuire, J., & Bilby, C. (2005-2006). £79,345 awarded by the
     Northern Ireland Office for “The Evaluation of Offending Behaviour Programmes”.
Hollin, C., Bilby, C., McGuire, J., & Palmer, E. (2002-2004). £199,640 awarded by the Home Office for
     an extension of the contract to evaluate the Crime Reduction Programme (Offender) Pathfinder
     projects within the Probation Service.