Category Archives: Research

Graduate, Laura, blogs about her Psychology Technical Skills Internship at Staffordshire University

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Graduate intern, Laura, blogs about her recently completed graduate internship working with the Psychology technicians at Staffordshire University.

I graduated in the summer of 2016 from Staffordshire University with a BSc (Hons) Forensic Psychology and have been travelling and enjoying the summer free of exams, still unsure of the direction my career was going. Just before Christmas last year I saw the Psychology Technical Skills Assistant internship with Staffs Uni, and decided how this could be the opportunity I was waiting for to begin my career and taste what it is like to be an ‘adult’. Which I am sure all graduates will agree is the hardest aspect of completing university. I instantly felt at home when I returned to the university and was welcomed by all the academics and technicians, and have enjoyed every day since I started.

I have had the pleasure of working with some of my own project students with their final year projects and watched them succeed, this had by far been the most rewarding part of the last 3 months, especially after being in their position last year. This has truly opened my eyes to the different aspects of psychological research and has (finally) helped me decide my career path. I am hoping to continue as a Psychology Technician and further advance my skills or go into research and eventually complete a PhD.

I have been fortunate enough to share this experience with Sarah Higgins and Paul Gallimore, both whom are award winning Psychology Technicians and have been amazing with my training. They have embraced my enthusiasm to learn and made the internship as enjoyable and valuable as possible, also helping me overcome a number of challenges along the way. Both have been incredibly supportive of helping me to develop skills for a career and hopefully to have a more permanent career which use my knowledge from this internship.

From project building for students to using specialist equipment such as EEG or eye tracking, all of which I wish I had used in my own final year project! Both psychology technicians are happy to go one step further for each of their students and will to make your project build easier (if there is such thing as making 3rd year ’easier’ anyway). All of the psychology equipment is there for students to use, so please use it to your advantage and have some fun and learn new skills in your final year as an undergraduate.

The Department of Psychology at Staffordshire University offers a range of undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in Psychology at the University’s £30 million Science Centre in Stoke-on-Trent.

Interested in a Psychology degree? Come to an Open Day – for further details, and to book your place at an open day, please visit: http://www.staffs.ac.uk/openyourmind/

For more information about the undergraduate Psychology degrees on offer at Staffordshire University please visit the course profiles below:

World Bipolar Day 2017: Raising awareness & new research at Staffordshire University

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This Thursday (30th March 2017) is the annual World Bipolar Day, a day to raise awareness and understanding of Bipolar-related conditions and reduce stigma. World Bipolar Day is held on the same date as the birthday of Vincent van Gogh, the renowned Dutch artist who likely experienced some form of bipolar-related condition. Dr Robert Dempsey, Lecturer in Psychology at Staffordshire University, conducts research to understand the role of psychosocial factors in the experience of and vulnerability to bipolar.

Dr Dempsey comments that around one in every hundred people experiences a bipolar-related condition. People living with bipolar experience changeable moods including mania, a heightened state associated with increased behavioural activity, energy and speeded thoughts, and depression, including the experience of low mood, sleep difficulties and low energy. There are many other experiences associated with bipolar-related conditions, including increased anxiety, psychosis and other general health-related issues, so people’s experience of bipolar can vary. People living with bipolar also often report difficulties in their social and personal lives, and have an increased risk of dying by suicide compared to the general population. Estimates suggest that around 19% of people with a clinical diagnosis of bipolar die by suicide, but this could be an underestimate given that some people do not come into contact with healthcare services and may not receive a bipolar diagnosis, so the actual rate could be higher. It is important to note that many people with bipolar maintain a high quality of life, self-manage the symptoms associated with a bipolar diagnosis very well, and many attribute positives with their diagnosis such as increased empathy, creativity and enhanced emotions (Lobban et al., 2012).

The research we conduct here at Staffordshire University does not treat bipolar as an ‘abnormal’ experience, rather we see a bipolar continuum on which everyone in the general population is located, with some experiencing more severe and changeable moods than others. We focus on understanding the interaction between psychological and social factors in people’s experiences of bipolar and have conducted various studies in this area (1, 2, 3, 4).

Our current research has investigated the role of appraisals of an individual’s social environment in the experience of suicidality for people living with bipolar. We have conducted qualitative interview studies to understand the role of various social factors in the experience of suicidality for people with bipolar (5), the complex relationship between bipolar and social functioning and vice versa (6), as well as the experience of talking about suicidality in our interviews from the perspective of our participants (7). We are currently analysing data from a quantitative study investigating the prospective predictors of suicidality in a sample of people with bipolar, and have already reported that feelings of defeat and internal entrapment (feelings of being trapped by one’s moods and thoughts) are a predictor of increased suicidal ideation over time (8). By better understanding the psychosocial precursors of suicidality experienced by people with bipolar we can inform the development of more effective, targeted interventions to improve outcomes for people living with bipolar.

I hope that World Bipolar Day helps to raise awareness of bipolar-related conditions, improve the understanding of the varied experiences associated with bipolar, and helps to reduce the stigma that is often associated with bipolar and other related conditions.

Dr Rob Dempsey was also briefly featured on the BBC Radio Stoke news bulletins on 30th March discussing his research into suicidality and bipolar (click here to listen: from 3:15 into the programme).

WBD is an initiative of International Bipolar Foundation (IBPF) in collaboration with the Asian Network of Bipolar Disorder (ANBD) and the International Society for Bipolar Disorders (ISBD). For more information about World Bipolar Day please visit http://ibpf.org/webform/world-bipolar-day.

Dr Rob Dempsey is Co-Director of the Staffordshire Centre for Psychological Research, home to psychology-related research at Staffordshire University.  The Centre is home to a number of research-active psychologists who are engaged in research across a wide range of psychological subdisciplines. The Centre has two overarching research streams, Health and Behaviour Change, and Applied Perception and Cognition.

The Centre provides training for PhD students, Research Masters degrees, as well as Professional Doctorates in Clinical and Health Psychology (click here for more details). The Centre also provides bespoke training to private and public organisations, as well as expertise for consultancy research opportunities. For more details about the Centre, its research activities, events and consultancy, please visit our website (click here).

#HomeOfHealthPsychology on Tour: Midlands Health Psychology Network Conference, Coventry

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Dr Amy Burton (Senior Lecturer in Health Psychology & Course Director MSc in Health Psychology) blogs about a recent conference trip with staff and students from the Centre for Health Psychology at Staffordshire University.

Staff and students recently attended and presented at the Midlands Health Psychology Network Conference. The event, held at Coventry University on the 2nd March 2017, was attended by over 20 current staff and MSc, Professional Doctorate and PhD students from Staffordshire University.

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Poster contributions included: MSc Student Laura Campbell, who presented her Masters research investigating causal attributions towards people with familial Hypercholesterolaemia; Professional Doctorate student Dayyanah Sumodhee on her exploration of healthy eating in people attempting to quit smoking; and PhD students Sonia Begum, Sian Calvert and Claudia Lega. Staffordshire University also contributed to oral presentations with Professional Doctorate Student Meghan Linscott delivering a well-received talk on the benefits of applying Health Psychology to urban planning.

Meghan Linscott, Professional Doctorate in Health Psychology Student

Meghan Linscott, Professional Doctorate in Health Psychology Student

Meghan enjoyed the opportunity to deliver her first presentation at a local friendly conference: “For me, the conference was an excellent opportunity to deliver an oral presentation for the first time. Whilst I am pleased with how it went, I feel confident that my performance will be much better the next time I present at a conference, so this was a very valuable experience for me. For a relatively small conference, I am so pleased it attracts an audience from undergraduate students right through to the influential health psychology figures. I like how varied the talks were and I thought the talks about health psychology and public health were particularly insightful for the whole audience.”

A trip to the conference was built in to the MSc Health Psychology teaching programme to ensure all current students had the opportunity to attend. MSc student Riana Mansfield really enjoyed the experience: “I found the conference was a fantastic opportunity to find out about real-life applications of health psychology in various fields, in some areas which I hadn’t considered before, such as audiology. I enjoyed hearing about the many different career paths health psychology can open the door to and it gave me food  for thought on my potential next steps following my degree. Thank you for the opportunity to attend the conference and to network with professionals and fellow students from different areas sharing the same interest in Health Psychology!”

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#HomeOfHealthPsychology on Tour

MSc student Sam Ridyard also valued the opportunity to learn about future possibilities for Health Psychology careers; “I really enjoyed attending the conference. It was a good opportunity to see what others in our field are involved with and to communicate with others in Health Psychology, and I have come away with a number of ideas about post-MSc avenues to take”.  While MSc student Lucy Field valued the opportunity to network with other Health Psychologists and trainees: “The MHPN was a fantastic conference and we were very lucky to attend as part of our MSc course. It was great to listen to current researchers and connect with health psychologists”.

Once again, as MSc Course Director I was impressed by our Health Psychology students. They all presented extremely well and made sure they took every opportunity to network and discuss their research with others at the conference. I look forward to attending again next year.

The Midlands Health Psychology Network

The MHPN hold a one day conference in February every year which is attended by around 100 members from across the Midlands and is a forum for health psychologists to share clinical and research experiences, information, knowledge and training. Existing members include MSc students, doctorate students, chartered health psychologists based at local NHS sites and regional universities, third sector employees, senior and early career academics, health practitioners and pharmacists. To learn more about the MHPN please visit their website: www.mhpn.co.uk

Staffordshire University – The Home of Health Psychology

Staffordshire University’s Centre for Health Psychology is a centre of excellence for teaching and research in Health Psychology, and is home to Staffordshire’s BPS Accredited Stage 1 MSc in Health Psychology and Stage 2 Professional Doctorate in Health Psychology. The Centre for Health Psychology is part of the Staffordshire Centre for Psychological Research.

Keep updated with the latest Health Psychology news from Staffordshire University via following us on @StaffsPsych and via the #HealthPsychStaffs hashtag.

For further information about Health Psychology courses and research at Staffordshire University please visit the following webpages:

Dr Daniel Jolley blogs about his recent research on the psychology of conspiracy theories

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Dr Daniel Jolley (Lecturer in Psychology, Staffordshire Centre for Psychological Research) blogs about his recent research:

In a recent paper published in Political Psychology by myself, Karen Douglas and Robbie Sutton from the University of Kent, we found that conspiracy theories might be a way that people can defend their everyday lifestyle when society is under threat. In other words, conspiracy theories may sometimes bolster rather than undermine support for the social status quo when its legitimacy is threatened.

Conspiracy theories are associated with almost every significant social and political event, such as the suggested theory that the U.S. government orchestrated the 9/11 attacks.  A similar thread throughout conspiracy narratives is that they point accusing fingers at authority (such as the government).  Conspiracy theories single out a small group of perceived wrongdoers who are not representative of society more generally but instead are working against us.  Believing in conspiracy theories may, therefore, give people the opportunity to blame the negative actions on these wrongdoers, thus then bolstering support for the social system in general; blaming a few bad apples to save a threatened barrel.

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This argument is in line with system justification theory which proposes that we all have a motivation to hold positive views about the society that we live in.  When our society is threatened, however, we seek to defend or bolster the status quo; for example, people may use stereotypes – which are mental shortcuts about different groups of people – to justify differences between people to maintain the status quo that we are used to.  In our new paper, we argue that belief in conspiracy theories may join the ranks of these system-justification processes.

We tested the system-justifying idea across several research studies, using both undergraduate students and members of the general public.  We found that conspiracy theories increased when the legitimacy of society was threatened, and that also being exposed to conspiracy theories increased satisfaction with the status quo when under threat.  We found that conspiracy theories were able to increase satisfaction with society in general because people blamed society’s problems on a small group of wrongdoers, rather than society in general.

This research provides a new understanding of the role that conspiracy theories may place in our society.  To directly quote the end of the paper: “The present results suggest that by pointing fingers at individuals – even groups of individuals charged with operating the system – conspiracy theories may exonerate the system, just as blaming a driver for a car crash shifts blame from the car.”

Reference: Jolley, D., Douglas, K.M, & Sutton R. (in press).  Blaming a few bad apples to save a threatened barrel: The system-justifying function of conspiracy theories.  Political Psychology.

The Staffordshire Centre for Psychological Research is home to research activity in the Psychology Department at Staffordshire Centre. The Centre is home to a number of research-active psychologists who are engaged in research across a wide range of psychological subdisciplines. The Centre has two overarching research streams, Health and Behaviour Change, and Applied Perception and Cognition.

The Centre provides training for PhD students, Research Masters degrees, as well as Professional Doctorates in Clinical and Health Psychology (click here for more details). The Centre also provides bespoke training to private and public organisations, as well as expertise for consultancy research opportunities. For more details about the Centre, its research activities, events and consultancy, please visit our website (click here).

Mental Health Research Seminar: “Bipolar Disorder & Suicidality” and “Books, Meaning and Hope”

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Dr Robert Dempsey (Lecturer in Psychology & Co-director of the Staffordshire Centre for Psychological Research) blogs about a recent seminar on mental health-related research.

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Rob presenting research at the CHAD seminar in November 2016

I was pleased to be able to present some of our ongoing bipolar disorder and suicidality research at a seminar hosted by Staffordshire University’s Centre for Health and Development, a collaboration between the University and local councils (Stoke-on-Trent City and Staffordshire County councils) which focuses on addressing health inequalities. We held the seminar for the second time at the Staffordshire County Council Buildings in Stafford in February 2017, with myself and researchers from the South Staffordshire and Shropshire NHS Foundation Trust presenting research to a mixed audience of academics, service-users, charity workers, public health staff and representatives from the local councils. (Click here for a write-up of the first seminar)

My talk presented some of the latest findings from our research focusing on understanding the experiences of suicidality amongst people with a bipolar disorder diagnosis, including the need to better understand the psychological pathways to suicidality for people living with bipolar disorder (especially to design appropriate interventions to reduce suicidality). I presented some findings from a new paper investigating the mediating role of perceptions of defeat and entrapment on the experience of suicidal ideation at a four month follow-up amongst a sample of people with bipolar disorder.

Our paper is the first to investigate the role of defeat and entrapment in the experience of suicidality for people with bipolar disorder, despite defeat and entrapment being key predictors of suicidality according to several key theories of suicide and being previously associated with suicidality amongst other groups (e.g. people living with psychosis and post-traumatic stress). Our findings suggest that a sense of ‘internal entrapment’, being trapped by your own thoughts and feelings, explains the relationship between defeat (a sense of low social rank) and suicidal ideation. Interestingly, ‘external entrapment’ (by social circumstances, for example) did not mediate this relationship, suggesting that there is a pathway to suicidality through feeling entrapped by your own thoughts and moods when feeling defeated – which makes sense in the context of bipolar disorder, where many people experience changeable moods and other symptoms which may not always be easy to predict or manage. One possibility is that the experience of bipolar disorder may be a defeating one for some individuals.

I also briefly presented some ongoing analyses into the role of perceived social support on these pathways to suicidality, which seem to indicate that perceptions of social support are important in reducing feelings of defeat and entrapment (prior to feeling suicidal) but not after someone feels defeated/entrapped. We are continuing to analyse this data, but it appears that perceived social support has a specific role in the pathway to suicidality suggesting that boosting individuals’ awareness of their social support resources may lower the risk of feeling defeated/trapped by their thoughts, feelings and current circumstances.

Our defeat/entrapment mediation paper is currently in press and we hope to publish further articles on our suicidality data in the near future:

  • Owen, R., Dempsey, R., Jones, S., & Gooding, P. (in press). Defeat and Entrapment in Bipolar Disorder: Exploring the relationship with suicidal ideation from a psychological theoretical perspective. Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior.

It was also pleasing to hear about some service-user led research into the role of ‘book indexclubs’ for individuals in recovery from various mental health conditions. Dr Joy Thorneycroft and Dr David Dobel-Ober talked about how these book clubs were co-produced between service-users and healthcare staff and aimed to help support service-users in recovery and post-discharge from trusts. Joy and David’s talk included some very interesting qualitative data about the challenges and benefits associated with running these groups, including good practice for running other co-produced groups in the future. What seemed particularly important was that the book groups were informal, unpressured (in terms of having to read a certain number of books per month), and were run in a ‘non-mental health’ setting (i.e. a local library). Their evaluation of these groups suggested that they were particularly helpful with boosting the attendees’ self-confidence and social interaction, if not with more specific issues like concentration difficulties associated with the experience of and recovery from depression.

Both talks highlighted the importance of social support and interaction for improving mental health outcomes and recovery – irrespective of whether support is perceived or based on actual, in-person interactions with others. Giving opportunities for social interaction for those experiencing an ongoing mental health issue, and reinforcing their available support resources, may be critical for improving mental health outcomes.

Staffs-Uni-Hi-Res_45-1024x683The Staffordshire Centre for Psychological Research is a hub for research excellence for psychology research at Staffordshire University. The Centre is a lively and active research community, including established academic researchers, early career researchers and postgraduate students. The Centre runs a regular series of public engagement events, including research seminars and Psychology in the Pub talks which are open to the public (click here for more details).

The Centre houses experts from a variety of psychological disciplines, including our renowned Centre for Health Psychology, and offers Postgraduate Training in Research, including Applied Masters by Research courses, MSc in Health Psychology, MPhil/PhDs, as well as taught Professional Doctorates in Health and Clinical Psychology.

For more information or details of the wide range of Psychology degrees on offer at Staffordshire University please visit our website and our courses page.

Guidelines on children’s screen time need to be built on evidence

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Dr Sarah Rose (Lecturer in Developmental Psychology & Director of the Staffordshire Children’s Lab) blogs about a recent debate in the media regarding the effects of screen time on children’s development and wellbeing:

A letter published in the Guardian on Christmas day claimed that ‘Screen-based lifestyle harms children’s health’. This was signed by a group of forty writers, psychologists and charity heads who argued that national guidelines on screen based technology are required.

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The claims for the links between and increasing screen-based lifestyle and children’s wellbeing are not supported by the evidence. I am delighted to have been able to add my support to this response from a group of academics and expert practitioners published by the Guardian last week. In this we argue that screen time guidelines need to be built on evidence, not hype or scaremongering.

Of course the wellbeing of children is important and the impact of screen-based lifestyle requires investigation but currently there is insufficient research evidence on which to base National Guidelines. Rather than focusing on quantity alone, evidence is needed regarding context of use (where, when and how digital media are accessed), content (what is being watched or used), and connections (whether and how relationships are facilitated or impeded).

Staffs-Uni-Hi-Res_45-1024x683Interested in Psychology? Come to an Open Day & find out more about Psychology courses at Staffordshire University.

Intrigued by Dr Sarah Rose’s research? Wonder whether screen time is actually having more negative than positive effects on child health and development? Thinking about taking a Psychology degree or a related course?

Come to one of Staffordshire University’s Open Days and find out more! Book your place via: www.staffs.ac.uk/openyourmind/

Find out about our Psychology degrees, including our highly rated BSc Psychology & Child Development degree and our Undergraduate and Postgraduate courses.

Opportunity for a Paid Internship as a Graduate Psychology Technical Support Assistant

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The Psychology Technical Skills Specialists at Staffordshire University are looking to recruit a Graduate Psychology Technical Support Assistant to begin in January 2017. This is an exciting opportunity to develop your practical and applied psychology related technical skills by supporting student learning, research and enterprise activities and developing technical materials.

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This is a 12 week full-time graduate paid internship available to Staffordshire Graduates with a bachelor’s degree from 2016. If you consider yourself to be enthusiastic, an excellent team player and have a willingness and interest in developing psychology related technical skills then this may be the role for you!

Closing date: 18th December 2016 with interviews week commencing 19th December 2016.

For more information and to apply for this internship please go to: https://www.unitemps.com/Search/JobDetails/11946

Staffs-Uni-Hi-Res_45-1024x683The School of Psychology, Sport and Exercise at Staffordshire University is a leading School in the UK for Psychology degrees and is situated in the heart of England.  We produce internationally recognized research which is driving knowledge in this area forward and we work with a variety of healthcare providers, charities, international sports teams and private sector organisations.

Interested in a Psychology degree? Come to an Open Day – for further details, and to book your place at an open day, please visit: http://www.staffs.ac.uk/openyourmind/

For more information or details of the wide range of Psychology degrees on offer at Staffordshire University please visit our website and our courses page.

“They think I’m a square for eating them” – New research into children’s beliefs about fruit and vegetables

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Dr Rachel Povey

This month, Dr Rachel Povey and Lisa Cowap have had their article “They think I’m a square for eating them”: Children’s beliefs about fruit and vegetables in England published in the British Food Journal. The article was written together with Lucy Gratton, a Public Health Development Officer from Staffordshire Public Health.

The article describes the results from an interview study where 9-11 year old children were asked about their views of fruit and vegetables. The children were all attending an after school club associated with a primary school in a deprived area in the West Midlands.

The results from the study were encouraging in that the children seemed to have a very good awareness of the health benefits of eating fruit and vegetables. However, children were also found to hold negative beliefs towards fruit and vegetables. Some of these beliefs were associated with the senses (such as taste and texture), for example, one child described eating a mushroom to be like “eating a small furry animal” and another suggested that mushrooms tasted like “slimy worms”.

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Parents were found to be positive influences on children’s eating habits, but surprisingly siblings and friends were sometimes shown to have negative influences, including teasing children for being “square” for eating fruit and vegetables. Recommendations from this study are to make fruit and vegetables more appealing to children, and also to develop interventions which focus on the influence of friends and siblings. Rachel Povey and Lisa Cowap are now developing this research further by designing and evaluating class-based healthy eating workshops for primary schools.

Both Rachel and Lisa are members of the Staffordshire Centre for Psychological Research and the Centre for Health Psychology based at Staffordshire University. For more details of their study, please click on the below link:

Staffordshire University – The Home of Health Psychology

Staffordshire University’s Centre for Health Psychology is a Psy1centre of excellence for teaching and research in Health Psychology, and is home to Staffordshire’s BPS Accredited Stage 1 MSc in Health Psychology and BPS Accredited Stage 2 Professional Doctorate in Health Psychology.

The Centre for Health Psychology is part of the Staffordshire Centre for Psychological Research and the School of Psychology, Sport and Exercise, one of the leading research-active academic schools for Psychology and Sport degrees situated in the heart of England.

For further information about Health Psychology courses and research at Staffordshire University please visit the following webpages:

New research explores the reciprocal relationship between Bipolar Disorder & Social Interaction

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Dr Robert Dempsey (Lecturer in Psychology & Co-Director of the Staffordshire Centre for Psychological Research) blogs about a newly published study in the journal Clinical Psychology & Psychotherapy investigating the relationship between the experience of bipolar disorder and social interaction (and vice versa):

As part of our ongoing research into the role of psychosocial factors in the experience of suicidality by people with a bipolar disorder diagnosis, we have recently published a qualitative study exploring the relationship between bipolar disorder and social interaction (and the other way, the effects of social interaction on people’s experience of bipolar disorder). We have previously published data on the impact of social factors and interaction on the experience of suicidality for people with bipolar disorder (read more here), but we were also interested in exploring the general relationships between social functioning on bipolar disorder, and the effects of bipolar-related experiences (e.g. mood symptoms like hypomania, depression and mania) on our participants’ social functioning.

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Social functioning can take many forms – including relationships with friends, family and work colleagues, to being able to be socially active.

We know that having social support is key for improving wellbeing, irrespective of whether you have a diagnosed mental health condition or not. Social support, which can take many forms (e.g. family support, friendships, online relationships), may help buffer against the experience of negative thoughts, low mood, even suicidality. However, we also know that the experience of bipolar disorder can put a strain on social relationships (especially for close relatives and/or caregivers as applicable) as well as on the individual’s ability to maintain their social relationships and current functioning. Our study consisted of a series of interviews with 20 people with lived experience of bipolar disorder, where we asked about their social experiences, the effects of bipolar disorder on their social experiences, and the effects of social experiences on their experience of bipolar disorder (especially the experience of bipolar mood symptoms). We interviewed our participants, transcribed the data and analysed the interviews using an inductive thematic analysis approach (Braun & Clarke, 2006).

We organised our themes into four groupings, including:

(1) positive effects of bipolar disorder on social experiences, where our participants discussed how their bipolar disorder gave them social advantages – especially when feeling more self-confident which our participants attributed to be a result of feeling more hypomanic. Having a diagnosis of bipolar disorder was, for some of our participants, beneficial for helping family and friends understand their experiences.

(2) negative effects of bipolar disorder on social experiences which were experienced by all our participants – often where the symptoms of a major mood episode had a negative impact on relationships, sometimes due to behaviours which may have negatively affected other people (e.g. loss of friendships when flat sharing when manic). The label of having a bipolar disorder diagnosis could also create stigma and social disadvantages – with participants discussing how others (e.g. work colleagues) withheld opportunities from them as they were perceived to ‘just get unwell again’, when actually the participant was fully able to complete such activities.

(3) positive effects of social experiences on bipolar disorder; for many, social support from others, especially when others were empathetic and showed understanding towards the individual, facilitated our participants’ wellbeing and personal coping. Friends and family were key in offering support, helping the individual to challenge their own negative thoughts about themselves by boosting their positive self-worth.

(4) negative effects of social experiences on bipolar disorder; some participants discussed experiences of other people perceiving that their behaviour was due to their bipolar disorder when actually their behaviour was benign and non-mood related. Our participants felt that some people failed to see the difference between the individual and their mood symptoms (which some participants referred to as their ‘illness’).

The relationship between bipolar-related experiences and social functioning was a complex one for our participants, with a number of positive and negative effects. A key strength of our findings is that these are based on our participants’ own personal experiences. We did note that all of our participants discussed that their experience of bipolar disorder had a negative impact on their social functioning, however, there were a number of positives which our participants felt gave them a social advantage (e.g. increased confidence, increased resilience and better relationships with friends and family). This is consistent with prior research which has highlighted a number of positives associated with the experience of bipolar disorder (including increased creativity and inspiration, and enhanced perception; Lobban et al., 2012).

We are currently analysing data from a prospective study investigating the predictors of suicidality over a four month period in a sample of 80 people with bipolar disorder (including predictors like social functioning, self-appraisals, appraisals of social support and resilience), which we will blog about at a later date. You can read more about our current qualitative study via the journal’s website:

Staffs-Uni-Hi-Res_45-1024x683The School of Psychology, Sport and Exercise at Staffordshire University is a leading School in the UK for Psychology research and is situated in the heart of England.

The School is home to the Staffordshire Centre for Psychological Research, a hub for research excellence for psychology research at the University. The Centre houses experts from a variety of psychological disciplines (including our renowned Centre for Health Psychology) and offers Postgraduate Training in Research, including Applied Masters by Research courses, MSc in Health Psychology, MPhil/PhDs, as well as Taught Professional Doctorates in Health and Clinical Psychology.

Interested in a Psychology degree? Come to an Open Day – for further details, and to book your place at an upcoming Open Day, please visit: http://www.staffs.ac.uk/openyourmind/

For more information or details of the wide range of Psychology degrees on offer at Staffordshire University please visit our website and our courses page.

New research investigates the role of education in developing children’s drawing abilities

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Dr. Sarah Rose (Lecturer in Developmental Psychology and Director of the Staffordshire Children’s Lab) discusses research carried out with Dr Richard Jolley (Senior Lecturer in Psychology) which investigates the extent to which children’s drawing abilities differ in two contrasting educational settings.

Dr Richard Jolley and Dr Sarah Rose

Dr Richard Jolley and Dr Sarah Rose

Dr. Rose explains that although there has been over 100 years’ of research investigating how children’s drawing develop, very little attention has been given to the influence of education on their development. In order to address this gap in our understanding drawings produced by pupils (age 6 to 16 years) who attended Mainstream and Steiner schools were compared.

These two school types were chosen as they have contrasting approaches to teaching drawing. Whereas in the Mainstream schools observational and expressive drawing skills are taught concurrently, in the Steiner schools the emphasis is on imaginative and expressive drawings, with observational drawing skills not being taught until children are 12-years old.  In addition, the amount of time, and the artistry of the teachers have also been identified as defining features of Steiner schools.

Pupils were asked to complete six drawings; three expressing a particular mood (happy, sad and angry), an observational drawing of an artist’s mannequin, a representational drawing of a house that they had seen and a free drawing. Local artist were involved in scoring all the drawings for the level of drawing skill demonstrated.

Considering the differing emphasis of the art education experienced by the pupils at the two school types the results of the research were somewhat surprising.  Steiner pupils, including those in the younger age groups, were better at the observational and representational drawing tasks compared to those in Mainstream schools.  However, their expressive and free drawings were rated very similarly. This evidence suggests that maybe art teaching does not have as much impact on drawing ability as might be thought. However, it is also possible that actually the approaches to teaching drawing in these two schools may not be as different as the curricula suggest.

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Two free drawings by 16-year-old pupils: one attending a Mainstream school (right) and one attending a Steiner school (left)

Drs Rose and Jolley are hoping to carry out further research in this area to investigate the impact of differing experiences of art education within Mainstream schools.

Rose, S. E. & Jolley, R. P. (2016).  Drawing Development in Mainstream and Waldorf Steiner Schools Revisited. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity and the Arts, 10, 447-457.

The Children’s Lab is home to developmental psychology research at Staffordshire University and is part of the Staffordshire Centre for Psychological Research.

Interested in Psychology? Come to an Open Day & find out more about Psychology courses at Staffordshire University.

Intrigued by Dr Sarah Rose’s research? Wonder whether screen time is actually having more negative than positive effects on child health and development? Staffordshire University offers a range of psychology degrees which are characterised by our research-informed teaching by active research staff.

Come to one of Staffordshire University’s Open Days and find out more! Book your place via: www.staffs.ac.uk/openyourmind/

Find out more about our Psychology degrees here!