• Question: How will your research help people?

    Asked by anon-215103 to Laura, Kathryn, Ian, Bogdana on 10 Jun 2019.
    • Photo: Bogdana Huma

      Bogdana Huma answered on 10 Jun 2019:

      My research focuses on persuasion and resistance in commercial encounters. I’m working to discover the strategies that salespeople use to influence us to buy things we don’t need (often with money we don’t have). I’m also looking at how some people resist these influence attempts to see what exactly they do and how that can be turned into strategies. Ultimately, I’m aiming to design workshops that help people to develop such resistance strategies for dealing with sales persuasion in their daily lives.

    • Photo: Ian Cookson

      Ian Cookson answered on 10 Jun 2019:

      By understanding why people make the transport choices they do, hopefully we can better understand how to affect those behaviours, and encourage more people to walk, cycle and use public transport. I don’t want to sound big headed but I’m saving the planet, not just helping people 😀

    • Photo: Kathryn Atherton

      Kathryn Atherton answered on 10 Jun 2019:

      The entire purpose of my work is to help people.
      Some things I’m working on at the moment are:
      *How to empower more girls to consider taking science, maths and computing A levels
      *How to help Further Education college students to be more motivated and engaged in maths classes
      *How to help 5 and 6 year-olds get more sleep
      *How to encourage companies to offer more, and better, apprenticeship opportunities to people from disadvantaged backgrounds
      *How to encourage teachers to learn more about the fast-paced world of computer science
      *How to help young people decide on a career that’s right for them

    • Photo: Laura Fisk

      Laura Fisk answered on 11 Jun 2019:

      My main bit of research at the moment is a bit of a weird one in some ways: I’m not really doing experiments, but rather capturing information about how people use a clinical psychology service. That means I’m measuring who comes to see me and why (though everyone’s personal details are kept confidential – private). Capturing this information lets me – and people who design services – see what works for people, and what doesn’t. Knowing what services work best for people lets us design services that suit people better – rather than just assuming we know how things work, or designing services to fit staff, or organisations.

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