Mind Lab Newsletter First Edition

CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGIST TALK On Friday 18th October, Elizabeth Field delivered a talk to students interested in Psychology, particularly Clinical Psychology. Elizabeth is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist for the Kent and Medway NHS Trust. Many students attended the talk and learned more about working as a chartered psychologist. PSYCHOLOGICAL EXPERIMENTS Mr Khan has been working with Year 12 A-Level Psychology students during the lunch hour every other Friday. The students have been replicating famous psychological experiments and are now preparing to run their own. Their knowledge of Psychology is developing quickly and they are enjoying going beyond the confines of the specification. PSYCHOLOGY AT OXFORD On Wednesday 18th September, Lauren Charters (undergraduate at The University of Oxford) delivered a talk on studying Psychology at Oxbridge and conducting real-world psychological research. Lauren, a former student, recently published a paper in the Routledge Journal “Research in Science and Technology Education” on “The experiences of active participation in academic conferences for high school science students”. The talk was very well attended and many students felt inspired to pursue their dreams of studying Psychology at a higher level.

DENTAL RESEARCH - INFORMING NHS POLICY Year 9 students took part in a ‘Psychology Research and Education’ day on Wednesday 2nd October. As part of this, they took part in NHS- funded research into the impact of misaligned teeth on peer-relations. The results will be used to inform NHS policies on orthodontic treatment for teenagers. The students also participated in research investigating possible links between feelings of moral elevation and prosocial behaviour and got to experience the use of virtual reality headsets to practise mindfulness. THE PSYCHOLOGY SOCIETY WRITING COMPETITION The Psychology Society, run by This term, we ran a psychology Maddy, Alia and Angel in Year article writing competition. 13, started in September. It Students had to select from one runs every Wednesday at of a number of titles and write a 12:25pm in Lab 8 and members 1000-word article. The winner of the society take part in was Lucy Jordan in 11P, who demonstrations and research, wrote about conspiracy theories. review studies and watch films Congratulations, Lucy! related to Psychology. New members are most welcome! STUDENT LED RESEARCH: INSTAGRAM LINK Year 10 students investigated the possible link between the average number of minutes spent on Instagram per day and attractiveness ratings given to photos of strangers. The research is ongoing….

So far this year we have worked with: Lauren Charters - (published psychological researcher and under- graduate student at The University of Oxford) Dr Elizabeth Field - (Consultant Clinical Psychologist for the Kent and Medway NHS and Social Care Partnership Trust) Shazza Ali - (Postgraduate Researcher in Social Psychology at The University of Kent) Zaffie Cox - (Research Associate, Postgraduate Researcher and Lecturer at The University of Kent) Amir-Homayoun Javadi - (Senior Lecturer in Cognitive Neuroscience at The University of Kent)