Email: portico-services@ucl.ac.uk
Help Desk: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/ras/portico/helpdesk
- Student
- Div of Psychology & Lang Sciences
- Faculty of Brain Sciences
I have a BA Honours in Psychology, which I completed with a scholarship before completing a MSc in Clinical Mental Health Sciences at UCL. However, before finding my passion in mental health research, I was on a BSc programme in Maritime Economics where I studied economics, statistics and logistics.
I have worked as an assistant psychologist in the NHS at Saint Ann's Hospital for people with severe anxiety and depression, and I have also worked as a research assistant in a psychiatric hospital in Athens, working on a research protocol for women with postnatal depression. After completing my MSc, I undertook a short-term research assistantship working with learning disability at UCL.
My work with Dr Vaughan Bell during my MSc was extremely fulfilling and along with my keen interest in psychosis research, inspired the continuation of our collaboration in a Welcome Trust-funded research assistantship and an ESRC-funded PhD on illusory social experiences in psychosis.
Understanding Illusory Social Experiences in Psychosis: Phenomenology, Cognitive Mechanisms and Impact on Social Functioning
One recent advance in psychosis has been a focus on why delusions and hallucinations are primarily social experiences that involve being troubled by illusory social agents, commonly appearing as voices or persecutors (Bell, 2013; Wilkinson & Bell, 2016; Bell et al., 2017). Indeed, these are now emerging as a target for therapy (Craig et al., 2017)
My current research supervised by Dr Vaughan Bell and Dr Nichola Raihani takes a data-driven and experimental approach to three important questions:
1. What are the characteristics of illusory social agents in psychosis?
2. To what extent do psychotic symptoms predict over-detection of social agents?
3. How does the presence of illusory social agents affect social functioning on the population level?
I worked as a statistics tutor helping undergraduate students become familiar with several statistical tests on SPSS. This experience helped me to steadily built up my statistical and research knowledge, which continues to fascinate to this day.
2017 | Master of Science | University College London | |
2016 | Bachelor of Arts (Honours) | The American College of Greece Deree and Junior Colleges |