Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

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By Charlotte Rae

As part of the University’s Green commitment, the Psychology Green team led by Dr Charlotte Rae is working on an action plan to tackle sustainability within the School of Psychology. In the meantime, we have started this blog post series to share tips on how to be greener while at Sussex. We hope you find it useful.

We are keen that all members of staff and students at the School are able to contribute to our green initiatives, so if you have any ideas please drop Charlotte an email (c.rae@sussex.ac.uk). We’d love to hear your thoughts on what green changes you want to see!

We all know we should recycle as much as possible. But it’s easy to forget that before we consider recycling, we should first reduce our consumption, then reuse any materials, before we recycle it at the end of any useful life. This ‘3 Rs’ mantra highlights that recycling should be the last resort, rather than our first option.
When you do come to the point of recycling, there are bins stationed throughout Pevensey corridors for the most commonly recycled items, such as paper, cardboard, plastic bottles, aluminium cans, and glass.
For other items, this SEF webpage lists your options for recycling on campus, and this map shows the locations of points to recycle specialist items such as crisp packets, tetrapaks, and batteries.
What about hard to recycle items, such as contact lens packaging and pens?
A new student society, Leave No Trace, are a student-run recycling society, who have a regular stall at the Tuesday market in the SU. They will collect your hard-to-recycle items and take them to The Green Centre for recycling. Check their facebook page for the dates that they will be at the Tuesday market. They will accept the following items:

  • Clean aluminium foil
  • Beauty packaging
  • Biscuit packaging
  • Bread loaf plastic bags
  • Contact lens packaging
  • Crisp packaging
  • Milk bottle tops
  • Pens
  • Pringles
  • Textiles (bras, bags, belts and shoes)

Do you have a Green Tip or an idea for a School sustainability initiative? Send it to Faculty Green Officer Charlotte Rae.

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Posted in Green Tips

Tackling hate – from parliament to campus

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By Carina Hoerst

Two weeks ago was National Hate Crime Awareness Week. What started in 1999 as a reaction to attacks on the Black and LGBT community has become a big event and takes place every year since. Today, it seems to be more important than ever. The UK is currently witnessing an increased level of hate crimes. According to most sources, it has doubled since 2013. Within this increase, it seems as if specific news events trigger spikes of sudden increases in hate crimes. Awareness is an important first step, yet we need to go further and understand the processes behind this pattern, allowing us to combat hate crimes more efficiently.

First of all, what do we mean when we speak of “hate crimes” in this context? The legal definition says that any attack, perceived by the victim as based on prejudice against race or ethnicity, religion or beliefs, sexual orientation, disability, and transgender identity is defined as hate-motivated. In order to counteract those attacks, we need to know what makes them most likely to happen.

On the 23rd of June 2016, the UK held the referendum on whether to leave or remain in the European Union. The unexpected result to leave was followed by an immediate rise in hate-related attacks by 57%. Since then, subsequent peaks were recorded by the Metropolitan Police. For example, there was a spike in June 2017 which seemed to be linked to the London Bridge attack. How can we explain these patterns?

The media reported that racists got “emboldened” by the referendum result. During the referendum, Brexit was presented by some as being against “foreigners” and “foreign” control. We think that after the Brexit referendum, a minority of xenophobes amongst the population perceived the nation as backing their ideology and actions, similar to what happened after the 2016 US elections. With the referendum result, they now saw the majority as sharing their values and identity, which led to the perception of support for their actions. Xenophobes became empowered to conduct attacks on people that were seen as “non-British” and “non-White”.

However, hate and xenophobia levels not only seem to remain high, but further peaks occurred. Nationalist rhetoric of those that represent the country, published polls forecasting voting behaviour, hate posts on social media, as well as the actions of hate-groups on the internet seem to foster, if not trigger, this.

Prejudice and hate crimes are not restricted to exist “somewhere else” but can likewise exist on our doorstep. The University of Sussex is known for its liberal and welcoming environment and a policy that strongly supports respect and diversity. Nevertheless, it is a place where people from over 100 nations with different cultures and religions come together, and campus is not an exception to other places; here, as much as elsewhere, there are people holding xenophobic attitudes. Students that become a victim of hate crimes deriving from those attitudes can suffer from psychological consequences which can be as severe as physical ones. Hate affects people’s well-being which can not only lead to strong emotional responses but also to a decrease in academic performance.

We need to understand hate crimes better. We need to understand their pattern, what triggers them, and why they decline as well as rise. In my PhD research, in order to understand how xenophobic attacks increased, I will be drawing upon models of empowerment – the dynamic process by which power relations change. Perceived power or efficacy can lead to the legitimization of a movement, and people´s idea of “what is right” can influence their behaviour. I will apply this framework to examine the empowerment of xenophobic white identities, focusing on those who view themselves as victims of the establishment and immigration policies. Furthermore, by comparing spikes in hate crimes, I will examine patterns that emerge, for example in regard to the target group and the circumstances that might have encouraged offenders to conduct hate-motivated attacks. This knowledge will not only further the understanding of the processes behind hate but also contribute to tackling it – from parliament to campus.

If you are a student affected by any kind of hate-motivated attacks, the University of Sussex institutions are there to help.

Carina is a PhD student under the supervision of Professor John Drury. She is researching the spikes in hate crime since the Brexit Referendum. This post was originally published on the Crowds and Identities Blog.

Find out more about our research on Social and Applied Psychology.

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Professor Rupert Brown’s Retirement

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Professor Rupert Brown

This coming Thursday we are celebrating the career of Professor Rupert Brown with a special colloquium. Rupert joined the recently unified department of Psychology at Sussex in 2004 and has since been an essential figure for the School both in terms of his academic work as well as his involvement in the coordination of our REF2014 submission as Director of Research and Knowledge Exchange. For the last three years, he’s been writing a biography of Henri Tajfel, one of the most influential European social psychologists of the 20th Century

Rupert’s relationship with Sussex dates back to the late 1970s when he joined the social psychology group, then within the School of Social Sciences, on a temporary contract. When he returned almost 30 years later from the University of Kent, where he had been Head of Department, a few things had changed. Most notably, the three psychology groups, which until that time had been spread across campus, had merged into one single department within the School of Life Sciences. It was precisely this union that attracted Rupert. Kent was a smaller department largely dominated by social psychology, and he liked the idea of working in a more diverse department: “it was part of being in a much broader intellectual environment which I found stimulating,” Rupert explains. 

When the department of Psychology became an independent School ten years ago, Rupert took up the role of Director of Research and Knowledge Exchange. “Being the DRaKE here for four years was great, mainly because it brought me in contact with everyone in the School,” he tells me. However, the job didn’t come without challenges and he and Pete Clifton, then Head of School, had some very distressing conversations with colleagues in the lead up to the REF2014 submission. In the end, their efforts paid off and Psychology at Sussex was recognised as one of the top 10 School of Psychology in the UK in the last REF. 

For the last three years, Rupert has been a Leverhulme Senior Research Fellow, which has enabled him to devote time to research the life of Henri Tajfel. The idea of writing Tajfel’s biography started 20 years ago, but the pressing responsibilities of academic life prevented Rupert from taking up this project until recently. Tajfel was his PhD supervisor and Rupert had always found him fascinating: “he had all sorts of flaws and was a hopeless PhD supervisor, but he was also a genuinely inspirational man.” Five years ago, Rupert was awarded the Tajfel Medal by the European Association of Social Psychology, and the idea resurrected: “I realised that if I was going to do it, I ought to get going with it because a number of the key informants about his life, his widow, some of his very elderly colleagues, some of the French orphans he cared for after the war, they were all in their 80 and 90s, and I couldn’t afford to hang about.”  

“Henri Tajfel: Explorer of Identity and Different” was published last Friday 18 October 2019

The book deals with Tajfel’s life from his birth in Poland to his academic career as a social psychologist, but it also details how Tajfel’s ideas evolved from his early studies on perception through to his latest studies on intergroup relations. This was a new experience for Rupert, who had to learn new research methods and become a biographer, interviewing people about events that took place several decades ago, diving into archives where he discovered new details of Tajfel’s life in Poland and France, and looking into more controversial areas of Tajfel’s life, including his inappropriate behaviour towards women. The work was very much like that of a detective and Rupert has made a number of discoveries about Tajfel’s family in Poland and his life during the war and after. However, the most interesting aspect of the book, which makes it very different from conventional biographies, is the time that Rupert spends in explaining how some of Tajfel’s experiments actually worked. 

For example, Tajfel argued that when you superimpose a category on otherwise neutral stimuli, it is functional for the mind to make the differences between the categories seem a bit sharper so that we can make faster decisions. In an experiment, Tajfel gave participants cardboard sheets with various lines of different lengths and asked them to estimate how many centimetres long the lines were. In some of the conditions he labelled the short lines A and long lines B; when he did that, people exaggerated the differences between the A-lines and the B-lines by making the short lines shorter and the long lines longer. “Well, take this same idea and call these white faces and black faces” explains Rupert, “and from there you can get into stereotyping, prejudice, and all the other things he was always interested in.” 

Intergroup relations, prejudice and social perception have also been the centre of Rupert’s research activity, but his interests have evolved since his return to Sussex. In the late 00s the University organised a research ‘speed dating’ event for people with similar research interests, which had been previously collated by the Research Office: “The bell would ring and you had to go to the next table, you sat down and opposite you would be another colleague, and you had five minutes to introduce each other and to tell each other what you were about.” As a result of this evening, Rupert met a colleague in Law who was interested in hate crime, which matched his own interest in prejudice. She retired not long after that, but Rupert began working with her successor, Mark Walters with whom he started the Sussex Hate Crime Project funded by the Leverhulme Trust. In the same evening, he also met Michael Collyer (Geography) and Linda Morrice (Education), which led to collaborating on an ESRC project on refugee resettlement, studying how these refugees managed to adapt to life in the UK and how their host communities adapted to them in the first five years after their resettlement.   

Listening Rupert talk about Tajfel’s experiments or his own research, it is easy to appreciate how passionate he is about his work, but also his ability to make complicated topics easy. “I always loved teaching, I love the big set-piece lectures, but the teaching I really liked best was in small groups,” he says “when you get a really lively group, who are interested and ask awkward questions and spark each other, that genuinely turns the teaching session into something quite stimulating.” 

He is, nevertheless, looking forward to retirement and spending more time with his grandchildren. His involvement with refugees will also continue as a volunteer with a charity in Canterbury helping a Syrian refugee family to resettle in the UK. From everyone from the School, we wish him the best in this new phase of his life. 

Find out more about our research on Social and Applied Psychology.

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My thoughts after my first month as an intern at the School of Psychology

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By Chloe Ilsley

So I’ve completed my first month of being an intern for the School of Psychology and wow, it’s gone by so quickly but first, let me explain…

The university has a scheme called ‘FGS Summer internships’ which provides 2nd year First Generation Scholar students with internships in and around the Sussex area in a number of different fields. The initiative is designed to help individuals gain experience within a sector they wish to enter when they later graduate. This year, and for the first time, the School of Psychology participated in the scheme. They advertised for an individual who would help to plan and coordinate events taking place in the upcoming Welcome Week.

summer intern 2019
Chloe at her desk in the School of Psychology Office

I couldn’t believe how perfect it sounded as I’m a Psychology with Education student and this opportunity was a combination of both of my disciplines. I immediately wrote a cover letter explaining my interest and edited my CV. I proofread, passed it onto someone else to proofread and checked again before I was brave enough to send. Am I the only one who has that little bit of nervousness as soon as the application is sent? 

The interview

It wasn’t for another week or so until I had an email inviting me for an interview. I can remember feeling excited and a bit nervous – I knew I wanted this position and I spent the days leading up to the interview convincing myself I was the only possible person for the role and that the interview was the time for me to get to know my future colleagues. The day of the interview, I had a few hours in the morning to get ready and think about what I wanted to say. I sat and reflected on my past work experiences and looked back on the lessons I’d learnt. It was a pep talk that I went back to when, later on, I was sat in a room with a panel of 3 people in front of me.

My first day

It was a bizarre feeling walking into the building knowing I was there for work and not for revision (incoming flashbacks of exam time). I was greeted with hellos and handshakes and made to feel very welcome. A highlight of the afternoon was a farewell staff party for Tom Ormerod – I say lucky because I got to taste some delicious cake (not because our Head of School was leaving, I think I need to make that clear because I would really like a good reference at the end of this experience :)).

A new job is a big change

I know everyone says that a new job is a big change, and they are right – it really is! But I can’t dwell on that because this will be a great chance to learn some valuable skills. Despite having worked for a few years, all my previous experience has been customer-facing, which means I’ve never worked a 9-5 job. It’s the first time I’ve had my own desk!

Apart from the new working environment, I’m also learning to get used to a different way of managing time. The office I work in operates on flexi-time, which is refreshing as I am free to be independent with the structure of my day. This flexibility is also reflected in the way my workload is allocated – throughout the week, I have been given many tasks to do but I’ve been able to prioritise them how I see fit. It’s a great experience working in a trusting atmosphere like this one.

What have I learnt so far?

I appreciate that I am in a very interesting position, being a student and an employee at the same time. This internship provides a great platform for the School to hear a student voice and I want to make sure as much student feedback as possible is used to make all current and future psychology students studies as good as possible. It is surprising how quickly I have seen how much time and effort goes into the School of Psychology Student Experience, something that as a student I had never realised before. I believe this appreciation for the entire faculty will continue growing as I progress.

As you may or may not be able to tell, I am very excited about the next few weeks. I am enjoying testing my abilities adjusting to a new working environment and I’m loving how many projects I’m currently involved in. I am looking forward to the ever-approaching Welcome Week and the beginning of the new teaching term, I cannot wait for the hustle and bustle of new students arriving on campus and seeing everyone enjoy the events we’ve been planning all summer. 

Posted in Undergraduate

Time flies…

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By Tom Ormerod

So, after five years as Head of the School of Psychology, I come to the end of my term.  It has (mostly) been a genuine pleasure to hold the role, and there cannot be a better School of Psychology anywhere to lead.  I have loved working with colleagues, and feel genuinely proud of our students and the things they and my colleagues have achieved.  When I arrived five years ago (from Lancaster, where I was Head of School for six years, via a brief sojourn at Surrey), I was apprehensive about how I would be received. My anxieties were reinforced when a social network analysis of research topics and links within the School revealed four tightly knit clusters with lots of interaction between them, and me as a complete outlier! My fears have proved unfounded: I have never felt like an outsider for a single day, such is the strength of the school community.

Tom opening his card at his leaving do
29.07.2019

What’s it like to be a Head of School? It is undeniably busy. In term time, my diary has on average 24 hours of meetings per week, of which at least 12 are scheduled by people from outside the school. As Head of School, I am a member of the University Leadership Team, and this takes up a lot of time and energy. In addition, there are lots of unscheduled things like student and staff complaints to handle, unexpected visitors and dignitaries to greet, people wanting advice about promotions, dead seagulls to remove from the toilets (advice to the incoming Head – always keep a pair of Marigolds in your office: you have to do the jobs that no one else would want to), etc.. The best bit of the job is the problem-solving. There is nothing quite as satisfying as being able to deal with a problem and have someone leave my office much happier than when they arrived.  The worst bit? Apart from the interminable emails, 5% of the people bring 95% of the extra workload, and there’s not a lot one can do about it because it’s just in their nature! But overall, the good bits far outweigh the bad bits.

What has been achieved in the past five years?  I took over in August 2014 from Pete Clifton who had done a magnificent job in leading the department of Psychology into becoming an independent School. This was a hard act to follow, but I was incredibly lucky in having a team of directors and subject leads who really have functioned as a team to guide changes in the School. Since 2014, the School has doubled in terms of student numbers and in monetary turnover. We got our Athena Swan bronze, in the process greatly increasing the number of female professors and women in senior roles. Our research income has also doubled, and we continue to produce large numbers of 3* and 4* research outputs, and will be in a great position for REF 2021. Our PhD students and research staff continue to provide a strong research culture within the School. The appointment of a group of teaching fellows (now lecturers/senior lecturers, since the titular distinction is being removed) has enabled us to cope with increasing student numbers while enhancing the learning experience they receive.  Innovations such as the placements scheme, retreats and houses are the envy of the other schools and are largely down to these highly committed colleagues.  We have radically reshaped professional services in the school, and have the best group of professional services staff I could possibly imagine, with all of them taking a leading role in enhancing the student and staff experience across the School. I think the thing I am most pleased about is that, despite the growth and concomitant increases in workload, we have maintained a collegiate, caring and professional spirit in the school. I wanted to name-check individuals in this blog for their particularly notable contributions, but I realised that the list would include almost every member of the School! These achievements are a result of the whole School working together professionally and collegiately.

Not everything has worked out as I had hoped, and there is still much to do.  Our strategy for growth was based on raising revenue to persuade the University to invest in a refurbishment and additional space for Psychology. Although the need is now recognised by the centre, we are still some way from any action on this front. We also need to do something about our NSS, particularly around assessment and feedback, which despite innovations and enhancements continues to hold us back in the league tables. Robin Banerjee takes over as Head of School at a very challenging time for Higher Education (well, a very challenging time, full stop!).  He will need the very high levels of support you have shown me during my tenure.  

Wishing Tom good luck for the next stage in his life

What’s next for me? After my sabbatical I will continue as a Professor of Psychology in the School, doing teaching and research (and admin I guess!). When I first arrived, I held one-to-one meetings with faculty, and in those I realised the huge potential for collaborations with colleagues, but I just haven’t had time to follow them up.  So, lock your doors if you don’t want me annoying you with collaborative research and teaching ideas! I’m really looking forward to having time to talk to people, join in with research groups, and generally make a menace of myself!  Finally, thank you to everyone who has been so welcoming to this stranger parachuted into the school five years ago.

Best wishes

Tom

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Posted in History of Psychology at Sussex

Psychology in the Media: June 2019

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The month of June started with an article about Ian Hadden’s research on the Times Education Supplement: “Positive writing “boosts poorer pupils’ maths scores”. Ian and his PhD supervisor Dr Matt Easterbrook investigated whether self-affirmation writing exercises could improve the performance of low socio-economic status school students. Their study found that a series of short targeted writing exercises can reduce the attainment gap for students from low-income families by 62%.

Only five days later, on the 10th of June, the 2019 Active Learning Network conference took place on campus. The event, organised by Dr Wendy Garnham, attracted a large number of professionals interested in active learning who were able to network and discuss innovative pedagogical methods.

New research led by Dr Silvana De Pirro from the Sussex Addiction Research and Intervention Centre (SARIC) shows that drinking just one pint of beer or a large glass of wine is enough to significantly affect an individual’s sense of feeling in control of their actions. The study has significant implications for alcohol limits and safe driving. Since their research paper was published at the end of June, several national and international journals have covered this important discovery, including The Daily Mirror and The Daily Express, as well as specialised publications such as DevDiscourse, Slashgear, Medical Xpress and Scienmag.

June was also a good month for our developmental psychologists, and several of them were contacted by journalists to provide their expertise:

The Guardian interviewed Dr Jessica Horst for an article on the latest Teletubbies’ film, which came out last month. On the article Again again! Why the Teletubbies film may not be all that it seems, Jessica explains the role of contextual repetition on child development.

Max Lui interviewed Prof Alison Pike for his article in The Guardian Escaping my messy childhood: ‘There were apple cores down the sofa and slugs in the sink’, where he recounts his experience of growing up in a chaotic household.

Prof Sam Cartwright Hatton was interviewed by Claudia Hammond in an All in the Mind feature about Sam’s Flourishing Families Anxiety Clinic on 25 June. The episode is available to listen to and download on BBC Sounds.

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There are no rioters in Hong Kong

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By Patricio Saavedra Morales

In June this year, thousands of Hongkongers hit the streets to protest against a controversial extradition bill promoted by the Chief Executive of the former British colony, Carrie Lam. During those days, Hongkongers, as well as people worldwide, cried out in fury after seeing how riot police beat peaceful protesters and indiscriminately threw tear gas canisters into the crowd. While some protesters remained peaceful, many others fought back against police brutality. Under these circumstances, each day more and more people joined massive demonstrations not only to show their disagreement with the bill but also to complain against the authorities’ measures regarding protests. Despite the fact that on 16th June the Chief Executive declared the extradition bill would be suspended, protests continued to demand Mrs Lam’s resignation, an independent investigation of police brutality during the previous days, and the withdraw of the controversial extradition bill (see “Hong Kong protests”, 2019, for an overview). 

Although most of the subsequent protests were aimed at the Hong Kong government and its failure to satisfy protesters’ demands, it worth noting that a different group of people (alleged supporters of the Mainland Chinese Government) organised a series of rallies to support the Hong Kong police’s actions against protesters (Zhao & Zhang, 2019).   

This summary of the actions that took place before 1st July in Hong Kong is useful for three reasons. First, it highlights the crucial role of authorities (i.e., the government and the police) in setting up the scenario where protests take place, and how people’s perceptions about this scenario may lead people to support protesters’ actions and join demonstrations. Second, it shows that during mobilisation processes, people may carry out different actions (i.e., non-violent and violent) depending on the restrictions people need to confront and the interaction between protesters and the police. Third, it provides context for the situation Hongkongers had to face on the 22nd anniversary of the handover of Hong Kong from Britain to China, on 1st July 2019.

In terms of research in collective action, although Lee and Chan (2018) have reported that the use of tear gas against protesters was one of the main reasons for people to join the ongoing demonstrations during the Umbrella Movement in 2014, researchers have barely explored how non-participants may support protesters’ actions in relation to perceived restrictions authorities impose on the right to protest. In an attempt to address this gap, my PhD research at Sussex University (which includes data from Chile, Germany, and the UK) has demonstrated that non-participants will support the use of violence against the police the more they perceive the authorities try to hinder demonstrations and that public opinion legitimises the occurrence of protests. More interestingly, we found that under those circumstances, people support protesters’ violence against the police as self-defence after facing a dilemma between the pervasive idea that protests need to be peaceful and the principle of defending the right to protest. The dilemma implies that people may hold contradictory ideas about protest violence; and similar to what happens with actual protesters (ESIM; Drury & Reicher, 2000; see Drury, Ball, Neville, Reicher, & Stott, in press, for a review), non-participants may change their norms about the use of violence depending on protesters’ interactions with the police, public opinion’s legitimisation of protests, and the measures authorities take to guarantee (or not) people’s right to protest. To put it differently, people’s support for protest violence is contextually situated.

We think that there are three main implications of considering the support for protesters’ violence as contextually situated. First, support for protest violence may not only depend on the efficacy of peaceful (alternative) actions to reach protesters’ goals (e.g., Saab, Spears, Tausch, & Sasse, 2016) or grievances on the issue (see Thomas & Louis, 2014) but on the restrictions imposed the right to protest by a third party, authorities. Second, norms about the legitimacy of different protest actions can change within a single mobilisation process. Thus, actions previously forbidden may gain legitimacy among protesters and non-participants. However, this does not mean that every action is allowed. For instance, even though people had the capability to throw petrol bombs at the police, this action might not be by any means acceptable for Hongkongers, but admissible for some part of the French of population, for example, or even appropriate for those who fought against the Chilean dictatorship. In other words, what protesters can do is culturally and historically situated according to the interactions people have had with authorities (see Tilly, 2008, for a discussion). Third, even though media outlets are fundamental mediators between protesters’ actions and those who do not take action (see Cammaerts, 2012, for a discussion), it does not mean that non-participants are passive receivers of media information. Instead, non-participants are active readers of collective action who may support or join protesters’ actions after evaluating the political scenario protesters have to face. The latter idea represents a direct challenge to some approaches that, without considering the political context where collective action takes place, have argued that protest violence necessarily represents a backward step in terms of influencing others to participate (see Stuart, Thomas, & Donaghue, 2018) and support collective action (see Feinberg, Willer, & Kovacheff, 2017; Simpson, Willer, Feinberg, 2018).

We think the ideas mentioned above are useful to understand what is going on Hong Kong in recent days, but especially to know what may happen next considering the events that took place there on 1st July. In short, on that day, around 550,000 people turned out on the streets to protest against the Hong Kong government (see Zhao, Cheung, & Chan, 2019). Whereas some people took part in non-violent protests, others clashed with the police. However, the most eye-catching action happened at the end of the day when a group of young protesters decided to lay siege to a strategic location, the Legislature Council (LG). Unlike what happened a couple of weeks ago with the siege of the Hong Kong Police Headquarters, this time protesters decided to occupy the LG. During the occupation, protesters carried out selective actions including smashing pictures of some past authorities, raising the British colonial flag, spray-painting the symbols of Hong Kong, and displaying banners such as one that read ‘there are no rioters, only a tyrannous government’(see “Hong Kong protesters occupy”, 2019). In the meanwhile, instead of trying to prevent the escalation of this situation, authorities were busy condemning ‘the mob’ and the ‘radical’ protesters.

Once the police officers took over the LG and protesters left the place, Mrs Lam expressed the idea of a broad dialogue with all sectors, while she announced that the police would pursue those who took part in the occupation (see “Angry Hong Kong leader”, 2019). In light of this announcement, we suggest that the Chief Executive was not able to understand the reasons behind people’s decision to occupy or support the LG occupation. In particular, what Mrs Lam and other authorities have neglected is there are no ‘rioters’ in Hong Kong but only people that have decided to go beyond non-violent actions in response to the imposed restrictions on the right to protest and authorities’ unwillingness to respond to people’s demands. Consequently, what comes next in Hong Kong will mainly depend on how local authorities set up the scenario for protests, although if there is no significant change, Hongkongers’ actions would not be so different to what people worldwide saw on 1st July 2019.   

Patricio Saavedra Morales is a doing a PhD in Social Psychology under the supervision of Prof John Drury. His research focuses on how perceptions of the political context can predict people’s support for protesters’ violence against the police. This post was originally published on the Crowd and Identities Research Group blog.

Find out more about our research on Social and Applied Psychology.

References

Angry Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam emerges after day of unprecedented violence and slams protesters but she is willing to listen (2019, July 2). South China Morning Post. Retrieved from https://www.scmp.com

Cammaerts, B. (2012). Protest logics and the mediation opportunity structure. European Journal of Communication, 27(2), 117-134. doi: 10.1177/0267323112441007

Drury, J., Ball, R., Neville, F. Reicher, S., & Stott, C. (in press). How crowd violence arises and how it spreads: A critical review of theory and evidence. In J. Ireland, C. Ireland, and M. Lewis (Eds.). International handbook on collective violence: Current issues and perspectives. Routledge.

Drury, J., & Reicher, S. (2000).  Collective action and psychological change: the emergence of new social identities. British Journal of Social Psychology, 39, 579-604. doi: 10.1348/014466600164642 

Feinberg, M., Willer, R., Kovacheff, C. (2017). Extreme Protest Tactics Reduce Popular Support for Social Movements. SSRN. doi:10.2139/ssrn.2911177

Hong Kong protesters occupy legislative chamber after smashing windows, vandalising corridors. (2019, July 1). Hong Kong Free Press. Retrieved from https://www.hongkongfp.com

Hong Kong protests: Thousands surround police headquarters (2019, June 21). BBC News. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.co.uk

Lee, F. L. F., & Chan, J. M. (2018). Media and protest logics in the digital era: The Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.  

Saab, R., Spears, R., Tausch, N., & Sasse, J. (2016). Predicting aggressive collective action based on the efficacy of peaceful and aggressive actions. European Journal of Social Psychology, 46(5), 529-543. doi:10.1002/ejsp.2193.

Simpson, B., Willer, R., & Feinberg, M. (2018). Does protest violence backfire? Testing a theory of public reactions to activist violence. Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World, 4, 1-14. doi: 10.1177/2378023118803189

Stuart, A., Thomas, E. F., & Donaghue, N. (2018). ‘I don’t want to be associated with the self-righteous left extreme’: Disincentives to participation in collective action. Journal of Social and Political Psychology, 6(1), 242-270. doi: 10.5964/jspp.v6i1.567

Thomas, E. F., & Louis, W. (2014). When will collective action be effective? Violent and non-violent protests differentially influence perceptions of legitimacy and efficacy among sympathizers. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 5, 1-14. doi: 10.1177/0146167213510525

Tilly, C. (2008). Contentious Performances. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Zhao, S., Cheung, E., Chan, A. (2019, July 1). Anatomy of a divided city: extradition protesters say frustration with government brought them to the streets. South China Morning Post. Retrieved from https://www.scmp.com

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Sussex Psychology in the media: May 2019

Posted on by Maria Balboa Carbon — 1 Comment ↓

May was a really productive month for the School of Psychology in terms of media coverage, from local publications to interviews on international tv channels.

“We are drawn towards equality” – Jo Cutler told The i. The newspaper asked Jo about altruism and what moves people to donate, in relation to MacKenzie Bezos’ announcement that she would give half her multi-billion dollar divorce settlement to charity. Jo Cutler is a PhD student in the Social Decision Lab, where she studies the neuroscience of charitable giving, altruism and decision making under the supervision of Dr Daniel Campbell-Meiklejohn. Jo also researches how our brains process good and bad news, which was mentioned in the May issue of Brighton’s Viva Magazine.

Why do we love some animals, but loathe others? Emeritus Professor Graham Davies says that disgust is a learned emotion, probably transmitted socially, culturally and within families. Graham’s research into phobias received international coverage in May, including the Manila Times, the Inquirer and Yahoo News.

“Koala” by abigella is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Dr Sophie Forster explained why parents believe their babies have the most delicious smell in the world in The Phoenix Newspaper and Bounce Magazine. Sophie was asked to comment on the scientific evidence of the new market research by eco-cleaning brand Ecover that showed that 70 per cent of respondents preferred their baby’s natural fragrance to their favourite perfume or aftershave.

Research carried out by Prof Anna Franklin’s Baby Lab inspired a theatre play for babies aged 6 – 18 months called Kaleidoscope, which was performed at the Northern Stage in Newcastle Upon Tyne on 18 May. And Alice Skelton, who researches infant colour perception and colour categorisation in Prof Anna Franklin’s Colour Lab, spoke with The Daily Telegraph about how brands like McDonald’s use bold primary colours to influence consumers.

Amidst the controversy of the cancellation of the Jeremy Kyle show, the New Scientist published an article on the accuracy of lie detectors. Polygraph machines have long been discredited as reliable lie detectors, and professionals use alternative methods focusing on behavioural and linguistic cues. The article mentions an experiment carried by Prof Tom Ormerod (who is stepping down as Head of School in August), and Dr Carol Dando (from the University of Westminster), where they asked 200 people to pose as passengers and lie at airport security. Officers looking for behavioural signs detected less than 5 per cent, whereas those agents using Ormerod and Dando’s interviewing method identified 60 per cent of the lying passengers. You can read more about the experiment in their research paper: “Finding a needle in a haystack: towards a psychological informed method for aviation security screening.”

Dr Darya Gaysina’s study into the link between anxiety, depression and Alzheimers was included in a feature in Turkey’s Daily Sabah. You can read more about Darya’s research in the post on Psychology in the Media from March 2019.

Prof John Drury was interviewed live on air by Kay Burley on Sky News on 7 May to explain why passengers stopped to collect their luggage when escaping from a burning plane in Russia. In the five minute interview, he explained that public transport operators need to rethink how they instruct people in emergency situations, to address them as a group with responsibility to others and not as a collection of individuals. His research into crowd behaviour was also quoted in this thoughtful blog, How a crowd crush occurs (and 10 tips to survive one) published on Scroll.in and originally written for The Conversation.

Prof Drury was also interviewed by Indus News in Pakistan regarding the increasing number of lynching incidents against minorities in South East Asia. John challenged the term ‘mob mentality’ and the idea that people become more emotional and irrational in crowds, which leads them to do things that they would not do on their own. Rather, John explained, being in a group empowers individuals to enact beliefs that they already had as they feel supported by other like-minded people.

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Green exercise and wellbeing: make the most of campus!

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By Dr Megan Hurst

As part of the Psychology Student Experience team’s wellbeing events during the assessment period, we’ve had several nature walks, exploring the many walking routes on the beautiful University of Sussex campus.

In case you missed them, here’s a summary by Dr. Megan Hurst on the benefits of getting some exercise in natural environments during the assessment period.

Recharge your batteries

Green exercise might be particularly helpful if you’re currently studying and revising hard. This kind of focus is referred to as ‘directed attention’, and it takes cognitive energy to maintain it. Attention restoration theory (Kaplan & Kaplan, 1989) suggests that green exercise encourages ‘soft fascination’ – a form of involuntary attention which is not so draining. Natural environments with greater biodiversity may be particularly associated with these feelings of restoration (Marselle et al., 2016).

Boost this benefit: aim to walk in areas with lots of different plants (and animals!). You can also purposefully extend your attention outside of your body while you are exercising – what can you see around you? You might find the woodland portion of the boundary walk (near the Falmer Sports Complex) a particularly nice place to do this.

Focus on feeling

One of the great things about having a campus in the South Downs is the incredible landscape, which sometimes comes with some impressive hills to climb, or tree roots to clamber over. The challenges posed by the outdoors can help us to focus on our experience within our bodies and how they feel, rather than how they look. Lots of my research investigates how focusing on appearance in exercise settings can have negative consequences for how we feel about ourselves (e.g., Hurst et al., 2017). Avoiding this appearance focus can be easier away from classic exercise environments, like gyms or fitness centres (Prichard & Tiggemann, 2008).

Woodland in the South Downs

Boost this benefit: as you are walking, focus on how your body feels, and what you are experiencing right now. You might notice and enjoy the sun on your skin (if you’re lucky!), the burning in your legs or the rasp of your breath as you climb a hill. There’s a good one at the north end of campus on the Boundary walk for just this experience!

Master the challenge

The ecological dynamics approach to green exercise (Brymer et al., 2014) suggests that exercise in natural environments is good for us because of what these environments encourage. Natural surroundings provide more opportunities to engage in challenges (like those hills we mentioned earlier!) and in simple, enjoyable activities. Interviews with recreational road cyclists highlight the ‘uncomplicated joy’ experience by tackling physical challenges with nature as a backdrop (Glackin & Beale, 2018).

Boost this benefit: Take a moment to appreciate the view, and what you’ve achieved when you reach the top of a hill – like the beautiful view out over Stanmer Park on the Boundary Walk. Or indulge your inner child by running down the hill in the woods at the northeast end of campus – wheee!

Fulking Hill in the South Downs

Finally…

Research suggests that just 10 minutes of green (vs. indoor) exercise can be beneficial for wellbeing (Focht, 2009), so it is worth taking even a short break outside while you’re revising in the assessment period, or if you’re one of our PGT students writing up your dissertation over the summer.

You can see more information about walking and running routes on campus here.

Dr. Megan Hurst is a Lecturer in Social Psychology and module leader for the final year option “Psychology of Exercise and Wellbeing”. Outside of work, Megan enjoys walking in the South Downs, and further afield, tackling long distance routes like Hadrian’s Wall Path and classic challenges like the Lyke Wake Walk.

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Sussex Psychology in the Media: April 2019

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Research carried out by Dr Graham Hole with Dr Gemma Briggs and Dr Jim Turner from the Open University shows that using a hands-free mobile phone while driving is as dangerous as calling on a hand-held device. Gemma and Graham wrote a post for the blog of Brake the road safety charity last month explaining the results of their research and proposing that the use of hands-free devices behind the wheel should be banned. The Evening Standard includes a prominent quote from Graham in an article saying that drivers are four times more likely to crash when taking phone calls.

“Lawrence driving in England”by Lawrence Sinclair is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

LADBible, the biggest publisher of news on Facebook, interviewed Dr Richard De Visser for a piece they were writing on how people should prepare for Bachelor parties. According to The Guardian, at least 30 British men died on stag dos between 2008 and 2018, while many others have suffered severe injuries. Richard pointed out how stag and hen dos tend to be seen as timeout (especially if the celebration involves travelling abroad) where the usual individual limits are lessened, and how this might lead to risk-taking behaviours.

istolethetv from Hong Kong, China [CC BY 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)]

Prof Robin Banerjee discussed the nature of kindness in Positive News: “Time to be kind: why kindness matters.” Robin, who is the director of Sussex Kindness, explained that kindness is subjective and that what is a kind act for some might be an unkind act for others. The same article mentions PhD student Jo Cutler’s research on altruism. Jo and her supervisor Dr Daniel Campbell-Meiklejohn examined fMRI scans of more than 1000 people making kind decisions, whether for strategic reasons (i.e. expecting something in return) or completely altruistically. The study showed that both types of kindness activate our endorphin-reward system, but purely altruistic acts made other parts of our brain to become even more active, creating what it has sometimes been described as a warm glow.

The popular science website IFL Science talked about The World’s Favourite Colour Project, a collaboration between the paper merchant G. F. Smith and the Sussex Colour Lab led by Prof Anna Franklin. The IFL Science article focuses exclusively on the most relaxing colour (spoiler alert: it’s navy blue) and quotes Anna’s blog post on Theories of Colour Preference.

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Posted in Psychology in the Media

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