Knowledge Exchange Units - Psychology, Health and Wellbeing

Overview of research interests and projects as part of the RKEU

The Psychology, Health and Wellbeing RKEU encompasses much of the research activity within the discipline of Psychology and contributes to the Psychology, Psychiatry and Neuroscience REF Unit of Assessment. In addition, projects in the fields of Special Education Needs and Inclusion, Health and Social Care and Counselling (all in relation to psychology) are supported and encouraged within this Unit.

Projects cover a broad range of approaches and interests, from intervention studies (e.g. mindfulness, Dunn; pets as therapy, Dimolareva) to meta-analyses (animal assisted interventions, Dimolareva; effect of sleep on autobiographical memory, Horton), lab-based experiments (virtual reality to explore episodic memory, Nastajus; targeted memory reactivation in sleep for procedural memory consolidation, Bloxham) to interview studies (lived experience of pregnancy loss, Garrod; experiences of parents of picky eaters, Cormack) to psychometric explorations of personality (The Dark Triad, Blanchard).

Conventional academic peer-reviewed publications are produced, along with more creative knowledge exchange and impact events, including podcasts (e.g. The Sleep Science Pod), webinars, consultancy work and presentations.

Recent indicative publications

Blanchard, A. E., Kibowski, F., & Dunn, T. J. (2020). Existential Threats of Immigration and Terrorism Predict Voting for Brexit and Trump. Evolutionary Psychological Science (in press)

Blanchard, A. E., Dunn, T. J., & Sumich, A. (2020). Borderline personality traits in attractive women and wealthy low attractive men are relatively favoured by the opposite sex. Personality and Individual Differences, (December 2019), 109964. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.PAID.2020.109964

Brelsford, V.L., Dimolareva, M., Gee, N.R., & Meints, K. (2020). Best Practice Standards in Animal-Assisted Interventions: How the LEAD Risk Assessment Tool Can Help. Animals, 10(6), 974. DOI: 10.3390/ani10060974

Cormack, J., Rowell, K. & Postavaru, G. (2020) Self-determination theory as a theoretical framework for a responsive approach to child-feeding, Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior. ISSN: 1499-4046 (IF 2.86; SNIP 1.09; SJR 0.89)

Dimolareva, M., & Dunn, T. J. (2020). Animal-assisted interventions and autism spectrum disorder: a meta-analysis. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders.

Dimolareva, M., Gee, N.R., Pfeffer, K., Marechal, L., Pennington, K., & Meints, K. (2018). Measuring Cortisol in the Classroom with School-Aged Children- A systematic Review and Recommendations. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 15 (5), 1025. DOI: 10.3390/ijerph15051025

Elliott, H., Winder, B., Manby, E., Edwards, H., & Lievesley, R. (2018). “I kind of find that out by accident”: Probation staff experiences of pharmacological treatment for sexual preoccupation and hypersexuality. Journal of Forensic Practice, 20(1), 20-31. DOI 10.1108/JFP-09-2017-0036

Garrod, T., & Pascal, J. (2019). Women’s Lived Experience of Embodied Disenfranchised Grief: Loss, Betrayal, and the Double Jeopardy. Illness, Crisis, & Loss. 2019; 27(1): 6-18. DOI: 10.1177/1054137318780582

Horton, C.L. (2020) Key concepts in dream research: Cognition and consciousness are inherently linked, but do no not control “control”! Frontiers in Human Neuroscience: Cognitive Neurosciences. doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2020.00259

Horton, C. L., & Llewellyn, S. (2021) Editorial: Cognition during sleep: Hyperassociativity, associativity and new connections. Frontiers in Psychology. | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.641547 https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.641547/full

Jeffery, T., & Whiteside, S. (2019). Templates and temporality: An investigation of rhythmic motor production in a young man with Down Syndrome and hearing impairment. Psychology of Music. https://doi.org/10.1177/0305735619827363

Klapilová, K., Demidova, L., Elliott, H., Flinton, C., Weiss, P., & Fedoroff, P. (2019). Psychological treatment of problematic sexual interests: cross-country comparison. International Review of Psychiatry. doi: 10.1080/09540261.2019.1591353

Lievesley, R., Harper, C., & Elliott, H., (2020). The internalization of social stigma among minor-attracted persons: Implications for treatment. Archives of Sexual Behavior. doi: 10.1007/s10508-019-01569-x

Malinowski, J.E., & Horton, C.L. (2020) Dreams reflect nocturnal cognitive processes: Early-night dreams are continuous with waking life, and late-night dreams are emotional and hyperassociative, Consciousness and Cognition.

Parrish, A. (2020). Modern foreign languages: decision-making, motivation and 14–19 schools. Cambridge Journal of Education. DOI: 10.1080/0305764X.2020.1724261

Parrish, A. & Lanvers, U. (2019). Student motivation, school policy choices and modern language study in England, The Language Learning Journal, 47:3, 281-298, DOI: 10.1080/09571736.2018.1508305

Postavaru, G. (2018). A meta-ethnography of parents’ experiences of their children’s life limiting conditions. Qualitative Research in Psychology. 16(2), ISSN: 1478-0887 (IF 1.52; SNIP 1.68; SJR 0.56)

Postavaru, G., Swaby, H. & Swaby, R. (2020). A meta-ethnographic study of fathers’ experiences of caring for a child with a life-limiting illness. Palliative Medicine.

Swaby, H. (2020). Learning to “live upside down”: Experiencing the true and false self in psychotherapy training. Psychotherapy and Politics International. doi: 10.1002/ppi.1531