School of Psychology
MSc. Forensic Psychology
Initial Research Interests Form
This form MUST be completed and returned with the
application. Any application that does not have this form
completed will NOT be considered.
Please attend to the ‘Research Interests of the Programme
Team’ sheet at the end of this document when you complete
this form as it may give you some ideas for potential areas.
IMPORTANT – PLEASE READ CAREFULLY
As part of the MSc. programme you are expected to produce an empirical
dissertation within the area of forensic psychology.
At this stage of the application process we expect you to have a ‘general’ idea
about the topic you wish to address and the population that you wish to sample.
This allows us to allocate you a dissertation supervisor as soon as your
enrolment is complete. Of course, you can change your mind on your chosen
topic but you need to have a fixed idea and written proposal by the end of the
first semester (for part-time students, obviously there is more flexibility on this
as you do not do your project until year 2).
We encourage students to be realistic about the population that they wish to
sample. Gaining access to applied populations can be difficult and timeconsuming with no guarantee that you will actually secure access. Applied
populations include prisoners, prison staff, patients detained in forensic
hospitals, solicitors, police officers and probation officers, to name but a few.
Although supervisors will try to help and do have links with a range of
applied settings, it is the responsibility of the student to ensure that they
can obtain access to the research population of their choice. So, you
need to think about this issue very carefully from the outset and remain
realistic about what you can achieve.
As a general rule we would state that, unless you are employed in a
forensic service, we would not consider you using an applied forensic
sample. You will therefore have to focus on a student/general population
sample.
It is also important to highlight how using general population samples, including
workplace and student samples do have considerable utility as a potential
research population. Examples of forensic research topics that have been
completed by MSc. students, using such populations include:
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Experience and perceptions of stalking behaviours
Perceptions and experience of domestic violence
Fear of crime
Attitudes towards offenders
Eyewitness testimony
Beliefs about sentencing
Lie detection
Beliefs and attitudes towards sexual offending
Perceptions of terrorism risk and dangerousness
You can also explore the possibility of obtaining access to populations that are
‘forensic’ and yet are not always an obvious choice. These include:
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Security firms
Customs and Excise
Transport Police
Store Detectives
Crime and Disorder Teams (Council)
Neighbourhood Watch schemes
Fire Service
With the above in mind, please complete the following form.
INITIAL RESEARCH INTERESTS FORM
SECTION 1: Topic area
Below are some general topic areas. If your idea does not fit into any of these,
please just complete the ‘other’ box. You can tick more than one box if your
idea falls across topics.
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Domestic violence
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Lie detection

Stalking
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Occupational health/stress

Beliefs/Attitudes about rape

Forensic mental health

Attitudes towards offenders

Courts

Beliefs about sentencing

Forensic risk assessment

Victimology
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Driving offences
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Bullying
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Fear of crime
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Beliefs/Attitudes regarding arson 
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Fraud
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Eyewitness testimony
___________________________
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Substance abuse
___________________________
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Credibility assessments
___________________________
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Linking animal and child abuse
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Terrorism
Personal attributes of offenders
Other (please specify)
SECTION 2:
Population *Consider feasibility of access, and as noted above*
You can tick more than one box if you want to use more than one population.
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General
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Security Firms
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Student
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Customs & Excise
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Prisoners
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Store Detectives
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Forensic Patients
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Transport Police
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Prison Officers
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Other (please specify)
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Police
___________________________
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Probation Officers
___________________________
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Solicitors
___________________________
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Crime and Disorder Teams
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Neighbourhood Watch Schemes
PLEASE TURN OVER
Based on what you have indicated in Sections 1 and 2, please provide a 200word abstract outlining a study that you would be interested in completing.
Remember, this is only a basic outline that you are providing. You will work on
a more detailed and specific proposal following enrolment.
Why do you feel this area of research may be important?
How you would aim to secure access to your sample? (again, consider
feasibility….)
School of Psychology
MSc. Forensic Psychology
RESEARCH INTERESTS OF PROGRAMME TEAM
Dr Zainab Al-Attar
Terrorism, extremism, and radicalisation. The psychology of terrorism and counter-terrorism.
Forensic mental health. Mental illness and dangerousness.
Dr Joanne Bryce
Forensic aspects of new technologies including the internet - online sexual exploitation of
children, cybercrime, cyberstalking, bullying and harrassment. Developing profiles for children
and young people vulnerable to online sexual exploitation and other risk categories; Intellectual
property crime - risk communication and consumer perceptions; Media violence - effects and
consequences, role in aggressive behaviour and offending.
Dr. Nicola Graham-Kevan
Risk factors for aggressive behavior; family violence, early adverse childhood experiences and
adult functioning, psychological trauma and violence, stalking; personality and aggression.
Dr. Roxanne Khan
Risk factors for physical and sexual violence/aggression in the family (e.g. sibling violence,
child-to-parent violence, intimate partner abuse) and community (e.g. 'honour'-based violence,
cyberstalking).
Potential risk factors include (1) personality disorders (e.g., Psychopathy, Borderline PD,
Antisocial PD), (2) attitudes (e.g., hostile sexism, hyper-masculinity, right-wing authoritarianism),
(3) lifestyle factors (e.g. use of violent pornography, alcohol misuse) or (4) expressions of anger
(e.g. physical aggression, self-harm).
Dr Carol A. Ireland: Course Director
Violent and sexual offenders; Sexual exploitation; cognitive deficits in sex offenders; mentally
disordered offenders; attitudes towards sex offenders; trauma; coping and health among
offenders; sexual exploitation; critical incident management and terrorism (fear, perceptions of).
Professor Jane L. Ireland
Aggression; self-injury; personality disorder and psychopathy; gambling.
Stasia Osiowy
Young and juvenile offenders; Application of cognitive skills packages with offenders; violent
and drug offenders.
Dr. Paul Seager
Psychology, investigation and the courtroom; the psychology of deception; forensic lie
detection; jury/juror processes.
Dr. Sarita Robinson
Hostage taking and human adaptation to extreme environments, public beliefs regarding
terrorism, coping and health among police and related services and changes in human physical
and mental performance during acute stress (for example, changes in memory, the visual
system or cortisol levels during exposure to crime).
Dr. Polly Turner
General offending; attitudes; aggression; personality disorder; mental health.
Dr. VJ Willan
Traditional sexual scripts, sexual communication and consent; Acquaintance rape, pornography
and 'soft' BDSM; Attributions towards rape victims/perpetrators; Fear of crime.
Dr. Rachel Worthington
Violent and sexual offending; Staff-client relationships and burnout; Prison Officers; actuarial
versus clinical decision making; Forensic cultures; Personality Disorder; Suicide and self-injury;
Trauma; Aggression; Therapeutic Interventions for Personality Disorder (including dialectical
behavior therapy, schema therapy and EMDR).
Gail Derefaka
Violent and sexual offending; Stalking; Attitudes towards offenders; Juvenile delinquency and
gang membership; Personality; Female offenders - risk assessment and treatment.
Ioan Ohlsson
General offending behaviour, young offenders, aggression, deliberate self-injury, sexual and
violent offending, trauma, professional boundary issues in forensic practice, offence paralleling
behaviours, personality disorder.
Dr. Abigail Thornton
intimate partner violence; general violence; women's offending; stalking and the individual
differences associated with these (e.g. personality, personality disorder, trauma, empathy,
control, low self-control, anger, attachment).