A5091558326- Mental Health Research Topics
- Anxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive Processes
- Eating Disorders and Behaviors
- Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development
- Obsessive-Compulsive Spectrum Disorders
- Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Behavioral Health and Interventions
- Functional Brain Connectivity Studies
- Memory and Neural Mechanisms
- Focus Groups and Qualitative Methods
- Stress Responses and Cortisol
- Pain Management and Placebo Effect
- Psychology of Moral and Emotional Judgment
- Neuroendocrine regulation and behavior
- Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior
- Disaster Response and Management
- Health and Conflict Studies
- Digital Mental Health Interventions
- Autism Spectrum Disorder Research
- Suicide and Self-Harm Studies
- Schizophrenia research and treatment
- Health and Medical Research Impacts
- Complement system in diseases
- Technology Use by Older Adults
- FinTech, Crowdfunding, Digital Finance
University of York
2022-2024
University College London
2019-2024
National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery
2021-2024
Biomedical Research Institute
2023
University of Oxford
2016-2020
Oxford Research Group
2017
Warneford Hospital
2016
It is well established that preparatory attention improves processing of task-relevant stimuli. Although it often more important to ignore task-irrelevant stimuli, comparatively little known about attentional mechanisms for inhibiting expected distractions. Here, we establish distractor inhibition not under the same top-down control as target facilitation. Using a variant Posner paradigm, participants were cued either location stimulus, distractor, or provided no predictive information. In...
Neurosurgical interventions for psychiatric disorders have a long and troubled history (1,2), but become much more refined in the last few decades due to rapid development of neuroimaging robotic technologies (2). These advances enabled design less invasive techniques which are focused, such as Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) (3). DBS involves electrode insertion into specific neural targets implicated pathological behavior, then repeatedly stimulated at adjustable frequencies. has been used...
Excessive anger is linked to adverse health outcomes, including increased cardiovascular disease risk, however, its psychophysiological mechanisms are not fully understood. This study examined the effect of on autonomic nervous system activity in male participants scoring high trait anger. Participants underwent a laboratory-based induction by recalling an intensely anger-provoking event, during which heart rate variability (HRV) was recorded. The ratio low high-frequency HRV (LF/HF-HRV)...
Background: Dysfunctional gastric interoception has been posited as a maintenance factor for eating disorders and gastrointestinal symptoms. Previous research yet to use qualitative methods ask these populations how they subjectively experience signals from their system: interoceptive sensibility. Therefore, the aim of this study was explore are sensed, interpreted, regulated in disorders, control populations. Methods: 15 semi-structured focus groups (n=96) were conducted with participants....
Anorexia nervosa (AN) is a serious psychiatric disorder with high morbidity and mortality. There are no established pharmacological treatments the neurobiology of condition poorly understood. Previous studies using magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) have shown that AN may be associated reductions in indices brain glutamate; however, at conventional field strengths (≤3 T), it difficult to separate glutamate from its precursor metabolite, glutamine. The objective present study was use (7 T)...
Acute thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura (TTP) is a life-threatening emergency and plasma exchange (PEX) the initial treatment shown to reduce acute mortality.To compare current practice in United Kingdom (UK) against standards set out 2012 British Society of Haematology guideline, better understand issues affecting prompt initiation PEX.The trainee research network HaemSTAR conducted retrospective nationwide review adults presenting UK hospitals with first episode TTP.Data on 148 patients...
Eating disorders are characterised by altered eating patterns alongside overvaluation of body weight or shape, and have relatively low rates successful treatment recovery. Notably, cognitive inflexibility has been implicated in both the development maintenance disorders, understanding reasons for this might indicate avenues development. We therefore investigate one potential cause inflexibility: an inability to adjust learning when outcome contingencies change. recruited (n = 82) three...
BackgroundAffective biases are commonly seen in disorders such as depression and anxiety, where individuals may show attention towards more rapid processing of negative or threatening stimuli. Affective have been shown to change with effective intervention: randomized controlled trials into these the mechanisms that underpin them allow greater understanding how interventions can be improved their success maximized. For informative, we must reliable ways measuring affective bias over time, so...
Abstract Anxiety involves the anticipation of aversive outcomes and can impair neurocognitive processes, such as ability to recall faces encoded during anxious state. It is important precisely delineate determine replicability these effects using causal state anxiety inductions in general population. This study therefore aimed replicate prior research on distinct impacts threat-of-shock-induced encoding recognition stage emotional face processing, a large asymptomatic sample ( n = 92). We...
Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are used for the treatment of several conditions including anxiety disorders, but basic neurobiology function remains unclear. The amygdala and prefrontal cortex strongly innervated by serotonergic projections have been suggested to play an important role in expression. However, behaviour SSRI-mediated neurobiological changes remain incompletely understood.
Large language models (LLMs), one application of artificial intelligence, experienced a surge in users between 2022–2023. During this time, we were conducting online focus groups which participants insisted on responding using the chat box feature. Based several responses, became concerned they LLM generated. Out 42 who typed response during group, identify 9 as potentially providing generated answers and present their responses with highest similarity score to an answer. Given growth...
Affective biases are commonly seen in disorders such as depression and anxiety, where individuals may show attention towards preferential processing of negative or threatening stimuli. have been shown to change with effective intervention: randomized controlled trials into these the mechanisms that underpin them allow greater understanding how interventions can be improved their success maximized. For informative, we must reliable ways measuring affective bias over time, so detect whether...
<strong>Background:</strong> Catastrophizing, when an individual overestimates the probability of a severe negative outcome, is related to various aspects mental ill-health. Here, we further characterize catastrophizing by investigating extent which self-reported associated with risk-taking, using online behavioural task and computational modelling. <strong>Methods:</strong> We performed two studies: pilot study (n = 69) main 263). In study, participants Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART),...
Catastrophizing is a cognitive process that can be defined as predicting the worst possible outcome. It has been shown to related psychiatric diagnoses such depression and anxiety, yet there are no self-report questionnaires specifically measuring it outside context of pain research. Here, we therefore develop novel, comprehensive measure general catastrophizing. We performed five online studies (total n = 734), in which created refined Questionnaire, used factor analytic approach understand...
The transition to principal investigator (PI), or lab leader, can be challenging, partially due the need fulfil new managerial and leadership responsibilities. One key aspect of this role, which is often not explicitly discussed, creating a supportive environment. Here, we present ten simple rules guide PI in development their own positive thriving atmosphere. These were written voted on collaboratively, by students mentees Professor Mark Stokes, who inspired piece.
Abstract Objective Eating disorders (EDs) are a heterogenous group of characterized by disturbed eating patterns. Links have been made between ED symptoms and control‐seeking behaviors, which may cause relief from distress. However, whether direct behavioral measures behavior correlate with has not directly tested. Additionally, existing paradigms conflate uncertainty‐reducing behavior. Method A general population sample 183 participants completed part in an online task, rolled die order to...
Abstract Objective: To test the hypothesis that exposure to peer self-harm induces adolescents’ urges and this is influenced by individual suggestibility. Methods: We recruited 97 UK-based adults aged 18–25 years with a recent history of self-harm, measuring baseline suggestibility (Resistance Peer Influence; RPI) perceived ability control (using an adapted item from Self-Efficacy Resist Suicidal Action scale; SEASA) before after two vignettes featuring named peers participant’s social...
There is a sharp increase in depression adolescence, but why this occurs not well understood. We investigated how adolescents learn about social evaluation and whether learning associated with depressive symptoms. In cross-sectional school-based study, 598 (aged 11-15 years) completed task the short Mood Feelings Questionnaire. developed validated reinforcement models, formalising processes hypothesised to underlie evaluation. Adolescents started positive expectation that they others would...
Large language models (LLMs), one application of artificial intelligence, experienced a surge in users between 2022-2023. During this time, we were conducting online focus groups which participants insisted on responding using the chat box feature. Based several responses, became concerned they LLM generated. Out 42 who typed response during group, identify 9 as potentially providing generated answers and present their responses with highest similarity score to an answer. Given growth...
Abstract Anxiety and stress are adaptive responses to threat that promote harm avoidance. In particular, prior work has shown anxiety induced in humans using of unpredictable shock promotes behavioral inhibition the face harm. This is consistent with idea passive avoidance —that is, withholding approach actions could lead However, can also be avoided through active , where a (withdrawal) action taken avoid Here, we provide first direct within‐study comparison effects on We operationalize as...