Biography

In year 2010 I graduated from Staffordshire University in Bsc(Hons) Psychology, then I studied at University of Manchester for MSc in Cognitive Brain Imaging, which I completed in 2012.

My undergraduate project was titled ‘A study to examine the relationship between the locus of control, cognitive insight and delusional ideation within the general population'; my findings supported the 'continuum approach' to delusions (Claridge, 1988), which explains delusions as quantitatively different from typical beliefs, not qualitatively as it is commonly viewed by professionals (Jasper, 1963).  Higher scores on delusional ideation were reliably predicted by the tendency to be certain of own beliefs and being open to external feedback at the same time. Patients that have diagnosis of delusional disorders are very certain of own beliefs but tend not to accept external feedback, Martin and Warman (2006) suggested that this 'openness to self-reflection' may be a protective factor against developing delusions/ psychosis.

For my master's dissertation I compared methods by which fMRI data are normalised in order to be used in group analysis, and how these methods affect statistical results. This task involved segmenting digitally 3D brain structures of 17 participants and creating an alternative template to which fMRI data were normalised to. To perform segmentation I used an ITK-Snap software and to analyse fMRI data I used Statistical Parametric Mapping (SPM) software. The results showed that data normalised to a template created with regions of interest (ROI e.g. hippocampi) were more accurate compared to a standard normalisation procedure, which is a standard brain space.

In terms of my work experience, since 2004 until when I started my PhD, I have worked looking after other people, for instance individuals with learning difficulties, autistic disorders, dementia, and mental health needs. The types of settings I worked at varied a lot, from domiciliary, residential, and nursing, to NHS mental health wards. Working in different roles I gained NVQ 3 and 4 in Health and Social Care. Other than than, I also worked as a Casual Research Assistant at the University of Manchester, assisting an experimental psychology project (2013); the project was about multimodal perception.

Publications

Research project

Dr. Jim Grange (Lead Supervisor), Dr. Andrew Rutherford (2nd Supervisor)

Title: Individual Differences in Inhibitory Control During Task Switching

The aim of the project is to establish whether inhibitory mechanism called Backward Inhibition (BI, or also known as n-2 repetition cost) is a reliable effect and whether it that can be predicted/ explained by individual differences. The BI is considered an empirical “signature” of inhibition mechanisms which seem to be related very closely to, if not responsible for, selection and switching of tasks, and therefore it is potentially a very valuable tool with which we can explore inhibitory efficiency across healthy individuals and clinical populations.

Publications and presentations

Poster presentations:  

  • Biomedical Imaging Institute, University of Manchester (September 2012)
  • School of Psychology Conference, Keele University (February 2015)