News

Innovation and Research Round-Up

March Edition

In this month's Innovation and Research Round-Up, our researchers are really demonstrating their expertise by producing new guidance, informing government policy, successfully securing funding and so much more. 

Doctoral Thesis Award

Congratulations to Dr Bally Kaur who has won the British Education Research Association’s 2023 Doctoral Thesis Award for her thesis on “Education encounters, hybrid identities and spectral traces: contesting the myths of Aston through the accounts of South Asian Muslim Women”. British Education Research Association is a leading authority on educational research in the UK and Bally received the award in a highly competitive field. Congratulations Bally. 

Research papers used as evidence in government policy 

Dr Elina Michopoulou, Dr Kathleen McIlvenna, Claire Roe and Dr Vladimir Antchak collaborated to create a response to the recent Call for Select Committee Evidence under the heading ‘Reimagining where we live: cultural placemaking and the levelling up agenda’.

They developed an interdisciplinary approach to highlight the importance of heritage and culture for a sense of place and how this interacts with encouraging repeat visitors to an area. The written evidence provided was accepted and influenced the report published by the House of Commons.  

Read the report on 'Reimagining where we live'

A further response by Dr Michopoulou and Dr Iride Azara was submitted to ‘Promoting Britain Abroad’. Colleagues collaborated to share their expertise to address the question ‘What needs to be done to re-establish the UK as a holiday destination for international travellers?’. They argue that, to increase the attractiveness and competitiveness of the UK as a tourism destination, tourism offerings should be developed that address particular market needs.

This report prioritises different customer markets in the form of the Accessible Tourism Market and the Cultural Heritage Tourism Market. It then highlights their importance of these for the overall destination image. Finally, it proposes strategies to attract and serve those markets. The written evidence was accepted and influenced the report published by the House of Commons.

Read the report on 'Promoting Britain abroad'

New guidance for Psychologists - working with people who stalk

Dr Rachael Wheatley was the lead author on the UK’s first guidance published by the British Psychological Society for Psychologists working with people who stalk. The article discusses the experience of being stalked having a devastating psychological impact on victims and therefore highlights the importance of working with people who have stalked to prevent them from continuing. 

Find out more about the guidance

Professorial Inaugural Lectures 

Professor Keith McLay, Provost Learning and Teaching, delivered his Inaugural Lecture on ‘Amphibious Adventures: 400 years of British Warfare’, which was a fantastic event and well attended.  

Watch Professor McLay's lecture

Professor Carley Foster secures funding from the National Innovation Centre for Rural Enterprise  

Professor Carley Foster, alongside a colleague from Newcastle University, has successfully won funding from the National Innovation Centre for Rural Enterprise.

The funding is for a project that builds on Carley's work in the region with place-based regeneration as its focus. It will support research, impact and engagement with businesses, policy makers and organisations in Derbyshire and the Peak District. This project, underpinned by the notion of a ‘sense of belonging’, will look specifically at how rural enterprises attract and retain workers in the region and the extent to which these workers identify with where they live, work, shop and visit. 

This project is externally funded by the National Innovation Centre for Rural Enterprise as part of UK Research and Innovation funding.

Find out more about the place-based regeneration research project

Forensic Psychology researchers secure funding for study on engagement with domestic abuse services  

Congratulations to researchers Dr Jamie Bird, Dr Dean Fido, Dr Aleksandra Monteiro, Dr Rachael Wheatley, Dr Karin Spenser, Dr Katia Vione, Louise Wallace, Robyn Mooney, and Ashleigh Thatcher who have secured funding for a study on engagement with domestic abuse services.

The study will investigate the barriers faced by people from under-reached groups when attempting to engage with services designed to address domestic violence and abuse. The research will make use of quantitative data to identify existing patterns of access with current services, and qualitative interviews and focus-groups to identify perceived barriers and potential solutions. The research builds on an existing relationship with the Safer Derbyshire Community Safety Team and will be conducted over the next six months. 

A new form of self-esteem

University of Derby researcher Dr Peter Macauley and Professor Mike Boulton from the University of Chester have established a new form of self-esteem, 'authentic self-esteem'. This is a person's beliefs about their past, present and future experiences of facing challenges (and problems) and the associated evaluations of themselves that arise out of those experiences. The academics have recently published their work on authentic self-esteem in the British Journal of Educational Psychology.  

Find out more about authentic self-esteem

The academics' latest study aimed to test if a new measure of authentic self-esteem can buffer the negative effects of bullying victimization on social anxiety and disrupted classroom concentration concurrently and across time. The study showed that positive self-views that arise out of engaging in challenges, that we call authentic self-esteem, moderated the association between bullying victimisation and two important outcomes of it, social anxiety and disrupted classroom concentration. 

Publications

Discover our researcher’s publications released in February.

Discover all of our publications

Joshua Jackson, Overcoming the Exploitation of Passion in Videogame Labor: Playing with Passion 

Kenneth Curley, Rory Colman, Annabel Rushforth and Yasuhiro Kotera 2023. Stress Reduction Interventions for Parents of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Focused Literature Review. Youth. 31 (1), pp. 246-260. 

Valvano, S., Alaimo, A. and Orlando, C. 2023. Higher-order models for the passive damping analysis of variable-angle-tow composite plates. Computers & Structures. 280, pp. 1-8. 

Owusu, A. and Zalata, A 2023. Credit rating agency response to appointment of female audit partners: Evidence from the UK. Journal of International Accounting, Auditing and Taxation. 50, pp. 1-18. 

Andrews, T. 2022. ‘Cops and clobbers’: an attempted “knock-out for politics” between inter-war Britain and Germany. Transactions of the Thoroton Society. 126.

Bello Musa Yakubu, Majid Iqbal Khan, Khan, A., Adeel Anjum, Madiha Syed and Semeen Rehman 2023. A Privacy-Enabled, Blockchain-Based Smart Marketplace. Applied Sciences. 13 (5), pp. 1-16.

Ahmed, I., Umer, J., Altamimi, A., Rana, A. R. K., Khan, Z. A., Imran, M., Awais, M. and Alyami, S. 2023.  A Critical Analysis of the Energy Requirements of a Commercial Building Based on Various Types of Glass Insulations. Sustainability. 15 (4), p. 121. 

Stephen Lokier and Sarah Giles 2023. Seds Online Student Webinars – Creating impactful opportunities for students to share their geoscience research. European Geosciences Union. 

Adrian Immenhauser, Yisi Zhong, Lokier, S., Dominik Hennhoefer, Chelsea L. Pederson and Mathias Mueller 2023. Abiogenic aragonite crystal habit – Novel archive of precipitation environment? European Geosciences Union.

Hill, J. and Smith, K. 2023. Visions of blended learning: identifying the challenges and opportunities in shaping institutional approaches to blended learning in higher education. Technology, Pedagogy and Education . pp. 1-15. 

Scott Nicholls, Pote, L., Edward Thomson and Nicola Theis 2023. The Change in Test Cricket Performance Following the Introduction of T20 Cricket. Sports Innovation Journal. 4, pp. 1-16. 

Lloyd, C. 2023. Stories Matter: A Novel Approach to Exploring Perceptions, Discourses, and the Symbolic Social Order in Pastoral Psychology. Pastoral Psychology. pp. 1-20. 

Geng, X., Zhang, K., Ma, J., Yang, H. and Chen, Z. 2023. Blue, Rather Than Red Light Can Nudge Employees to Choose Delayed But Larger Wage Payment. Environment and Behavior. 54 (9-10), pp. 1227-1250. 

Zhao, L., He, Q., Guo, L. and Sarpong, D. 2023. Organizational digital literacy and enterprise digital transformation: Evidence from Chinese listed companies. IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management.

Michael J. O. Pocock, Iain Hamlin, Jennifer Christelow, Holli‐Anne Passmore and Miles Richardson 2023. The benefits of citizen science and nature‐noticing activities for well‐being, nature connectedness and pro‐nature conservation behaviours. People and Nature. pp. 1-16. 

Deniz Karagöz and Haywantee Ramkissoon 2023. Loneliness, travel nostalgia, subjective well-being and prevention regulatory focus: a moderated mediation model analysis. Current Issues in Tourism. pp. 1-17. 

Clare H. Robinson, Jonathan P. Ritson, Danielle M. Alderson, Ashish A. Malik, Robert I. Griffiths, Andreas Heinemeyer, Angela V. Gallego-Sala, Anne Quillet, Bjorn J.M. Robroek, Chris Evans, Dave M. Chandler, David R. Elliott, Emma L. Shutttleworth, Erik A. Lilleskov, Ezra Kitson, Filipa Cox, Fred Worrall, Gareth D. Clay, Ian Crosher, Jennifer Pratscher, Jon Bird, Jonathan Walker, Lisa R. Belyea, Marc G. Dumont, Nichole G.A. Bell, Rebekka R.E. Artz, Richard D. Bardgett, Roxane Andersen, Simon M. Hutchinson, Susan E. Page, Tim J. Thom, William Burn, Martin G. Evans and Elliott, D. 2023. Aspects of microbial communities in peatland carbon cycling under changing climate and land use pressures. Mires and Peat. 29, pp. 1-36.

da Silva, R. M., Frederico, G. F. and Garza-Reyes, J. 2023. Logistics service providers and Industry 4.0: A systematic literature review. Logistics. 7 (1), pp. 1-26. 

McLean, R., Jiju, A., Garza-Reyes, J. and Samadhiya, A. 2022. A Continuous Improvement Implementation Framework for Manufacturing Companies: a Delphi Study-Based Approach for Development and Validation. International Journal of Quality and Reliability Management. pp. 1-25. 

Hogan, S. 2023. Short communication: Birth Shock! Elseveir.

Yasuhiro Kotera, Jessica E. Jackson, Ann Kirkman, Ann-Marie Edwards, Rory Colman, Ann Underhill, Jessica G. Jackson, Denise Baker and Akihiko Ozaki 2023. Comparing the Mental Health of Healthcare Students: Mental Health Shame and Self-compassion in Counselling, Occupational Therapy, Nursing and Social Work Students. International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction. 

Robinson, S, Williams, S., Hallam, J. and Jackson, J. 2023. Exploring the lived experiences of mothers of extremely preterm infants within the UK: An interpretative phenomenological analysis. Journal of health visiting. 11 (2), pp. 74-81. 

Fido, D. and Wallace, L. 2023. The Unique Role of ChatGPT in Closing the Awarding Gap. The Interdisciplinary Journal of Student Success. pp. 1-7. 

Funding

In February, many of our researchers were successful in receiving funding for a wide range of research projects.

  • ‘Winchester Migration, Pollution, and Decapitations’, Dr Kori Filipek - £4,333.93 funded by Winchester Excavations Committee

  • ‘Networking Grant’, Professor Susan Hogan - £7,558.62 funded by Arts and Humanities Research Council

  • ‘Phase 2 - Motivational Interviewing (Behaviour Change)’, Dr Fiona Holland - £9,380.56 funded by Thrive Tribe

  • ‘Inside Government Short Course Delivery’, Dr Amanda Baxendale£720.00 funded by Inside Government

  • ‘AddQual KTP 2’, Dr Wajahat Ali Khan - £176,320.81 funded by Innovate UK

  • ‘Health Education England - Mental Health Conference’, Claire Carter - £48,000.00 funded by Health Education England

  • ‘Gatsby Benchmark Project’, Professor Siobhan Neary - £27,861.57 funded by Gatsby Education England

  • ‘Data Analysis Service Provision’, Craig Hughes - £7,608.40 funded by College of Policing

  • ‘Advancing downstream process for therapeutics’, Dr Vikash Yadav - £800 funded by the University of Loughborough