• Question: what breakthroughs would you want to achieve during your career and how do you think they'll effect future studies.

    Asked by anon-184188 to Tom, sarahhodge, Owen, Nathan, Lorna, Abbie on 7 Nov 2018.
    • Photo: Abbie Jordan

      Abbie Jordan answered on 7 Nov 2018:

      In my own research I don’t think that I would talk about a breakthrough as that tends to suggest something like a cure for a particular type of cancer and that’s not the type of reseach I do. As breakthroughs go though, I would love that as that would be a gamechanger.

      In my line of work, we are talking more about psychological treatments for young people who experience chronic pain and their families. I would love to see treatments that are better supported by evidence (as in research studies that show they work) for young people and their families. We have good treatments but evidence is not as great as it could be about thier ability to work and in particular, to help over time. Lots of treatments can help young people and their families to make positive changes to get their lives back on track (doing things they want to do despite pain) but lots of these gains are lost when the treatment finishes. So finding ways to maintain these changes. That might mean trying to find ways to ‘boost’ treatments in familar settings like at home. It’s fine learning techniques to manage pain in hospitla settings but they don’t mimic everyday life so it’s important that people can adapt what they learn to their own lives.

      That’s a muddled answer as I don’t think there is one thing specifically we need to discover as such.

    • Photo: Nathan Hook

      Nathan Hook answered on 8 Nov 2018:

      I’d like to keep doing experiments to gradually build up a proper understanding of how to create strong identification with fictional characters. Since we believe that makes fiction more engaging that would inform the creation of books, plays, films, games, etc. as well as have applications should as when people identify with a celeb or political leader.

    • Photo: Tom Gallagher-Mitchell

      Tom Gallagher-Mitchell answered on 12 Nov 2018:

      I think i would like some of my research to contribute to our understanding of how math anxiety develops from childhood, and provide teachers and parents with some more useful tools to support students with this condition.

    • Photo: Sarah Hodge

      Sarah Hodge answered on 14 Nov 2018:

      In my own research I have been trying to find out how people make moral decisions, knowing this would then effect how I would measure morality in the future reserach

Comments