Strand 1: Publication or Presentation
Winner: Ciara McEnteggart
Ciara applied for the postgraduate award for publication or presentation, on the basis of her involvement in the above two invited publications and an invited plenary address (below). The three papers refer to how clinical psychological science faces an ongoing internal struggle that centres on two key issues: what constitutes an explanation of the phenomena we are interested in; and who is to lead the search for these explanations (e.g. by therapists or researchers). The authors reflect on the scientist-practitioner model which has dominated clinical psychology for the past number of decades, and while this is the optimum model in principle, it has produces little fruit in practise. In these papers, the authors reflect on the issues surrounding middle-level terms and how they believe that producing a bottom-up, functional-analytic approach to psychological suffering is the answer that scientists and practitioners need to advance our understanding clinical psychology. It is believed that these papers will have a tangible impact on the future of the basic science of psychology through inspiring other basic researchers to expand their respective accounts.
(1) Barnes-Holmes, Y., Hussey, I., McEnteggart, C., Barnes-Holmes, D., & Foody, M. (in press). Scientific ambition: The relationship between relational frame theory and middle-level Terms in acceptance and commitment therapy. In Hayes, S.C., Barnes-Holmes, D., Zettle, R.D., & Biglan, A (Eds.). Handbook of contextual behavioral science. Nevada: Blackwell-Wiley.
(2) McEnteggart, C., Barnes-Holmes, Y., Hussey, I., & Barnes-Holmes, D. (in press). The ties between a basic science of language and cognition and clinical applications. Current Opinion in Psychology.
(3) Barnes-Holmes, Y., Hussey, I., McEnteggart, C., Barnes-Holmes, D., & Foody, M. (2014). Relational Frame Theory: a functional-analytic tool for clinical psychology. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and Contextual Behaviour Science conference. Dublin, Ireland.
Strand 2: Public Outreach and Contribution to the Scientific Field
Winners (joint): Elizabeth Walshe and Francesca Farina
Elizabeth Walshe received the postgraduate award for Public Outreach and Contribution to the Scientific Field. Elizabeth has been engaged in a number of public events including giving a voluntary Psychology career talk at the King’s Hospital career event, and also giving an introduction to Psychology as part of the King’s Hospital summer school programme. Elizabeth has been previously involved in engaging the public as part of Maynooth University’s Science Week events, and organising public school talks on studying the brain as part of 2014’s European Month of the Brain. Elizabeth has also played a role in establishing and developing the Maynooth Neuro Lab blog (maynoothneurolab.wordpress.com) and an ongoing role in maintaining the Maynooth Neuro Lab Twitter account (@MaynoothNeuro) which engages both the public and the neuroscientific community. Within her own research area, Elizabeth also contributes to the scientific field as the Twitter representative and student representative seat on both a Strategic Planning committee and Communications committee for the International Society for Posture and Gait Research (ISPGR).
Francesca Farina’s application to the Psychology Postgraduate Awards outlined her contribution to the organisation of the Young Neuroscientists Symposium (YNS), held in Trinity Biomedical Sciences Institute last September. The YNS was the first event in Ireland specifically aimed at promoting the research of early career neuroscientists and neuropsychologists. As a member of the organising committee, Francesca was actively involved in obtaining sponsorship for the symposium, inviting keynotes speakers and contributors to our Careers workshop, liaising with trade exhibitors, preparing the venue and event advertising. Francesca also helped to arrange for the publication of delegate abstracts in the international journal ‘Frontiers in Neuroscience’ as a Special Event. In terms of impact, the YNS event served to encourage collaboration and facilitate the progression of the field by bringing together over 160 scientists from a broad variety of areas and geographical regions. In addition, as a result of the positive feedback received, the YNS will now be continued a biennial symposium.
Strand 3: Contributions to the Maynooth University Department of Psychology
Winner: Aoife Cartwright
Aoife Cartwright received a Department of Psychology postgraduate award for her contributions to the Maynooth University Department of Psychology over the past 12 months. The award recognizes Aoife’s unpaid contribution to the department involving the lowering of administrative load, enhancing student experience, and improving research output. Most notably, this has involved working closely with the undergraduate year coordinators and Head of Department to design a number of improvements to the undergraduate tutorial system. These improvements were based on detailed feedback from previous and current undergraduate psychology students as well as discussions with other Maynooth University departments. Additionally, following extensive research into procedures for the recruitment of research participants across national and international universities, Aoife drafted a proposal for a new participation-for-credit system that could potentially be incorporated into the upcoming 2015 curriculum review.