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The UCL Wellcome 4-year PhD Programme in Mental Health Science听is an exciting opportunity for students to train in a wide range of the latest methods and techniques in the field of mental health research. This programme, funded in 2019, is the first of its kind in the UK, representing an investment of over 拢5 million by the Wellcome Trust. It is based in the UCL Institute of Mental Health, and will recruit six students per year from 2020-2024.
A call for supervisors for the programme is issued on an annual basis, typically in March. The criteria for being approved as a supervisor are as follows:
- Be eligible to be primary supervisor according to UCL regulations, including completion of the required courses.
- Have either an open-ended position or proleptic appointment with UCL, or a听substantive fixed-term contract that would outlast the length of a studentship (for example, for students starting in September 2023, the contract must end no earlier than September 2027).
- Have experience of supervising (either as primary or as secondary supervisor) at least one PhD student to the point of thesis submission.
- Have a strong track record of research directly relevant to mental health, which is a good fit with the programme.
Additionally, once approved, all supervisors must undertake a mandatory half-day supervisor training course specifically designed for the programme and submit at least two examples of possible rotation projects.
Consistent with the interdisciplinary ethos of the programme, the steering committee is drawn from a wide range of disciplines relevant to mental health research.听
Steering committee member | 听 | |
Prof Jonathan Roiser听(Director)听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 | Professor of Neuroscience and Mental Health in the UCL Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience. He founded and directs the UCL-NIMH Joint Doctoral Training Program in Neuroscience, and previously directed the 宅男视频 MRC 4-year PhD Programme in Mental Health. | |
Dr Alexandra Pitman听(co-Director)听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 听 | Associate Professor in the UCL Division of Psychiatry and Honorary NHS Consultant Psychiatrist. She uses epidemiological approaches to identify risk factors for suicide and self-harm, and designs preventative interventions to address modifiable risk factors. | |
| Prof Sunjeev Kamboj听(co-Director) | Professor of Translational Psychology. He听works at the interface between clinical psychology and neuroscience to develop novel psychological and pharmacological treatments (and their combination) for addiction, anxiety, depression and trauma-related disorders. | |
Professor and Director of the Centre Research in Autism and Education at the UCL Institute of Education. She holds a Wellcome Hub Award on wellbeing and productivity in people with autism and learning disability, and has received awards for her public engagement and participatory work. | ||
Professor of Psychology in Epidemiology, and leader of the Mental Ageing Programme for the MRC Unit for Lifelong Health and Ageing. He is heavily involved in 宅男视频 Inclusive Advocacy scheme for black and minority ethnic (BAME) students and staff. | ||
Professor in Child Mental Health,听Head of Postgraduate Studies for the child mental health postgraduate programmes, which are delivered at the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families.听 | 听 | |
| Associate Professor in the Division of Psychiatry, with a focus on Inclusion of under-represented groups in research, psychological and complementary interventions to promote听mental health and healthy ageing. | ||
| Prof Anthony David | Professor of Mental Health, Director of the UCL Institute of Mental Health |
The supervisor list comprises around 100 leading researchers at UCL, including several early-career researchers, distributed across the three听themes of the programme.
Name | Position | Research Area |
Clinical Research Fellow | Computational modelling of the brain and behaviour in schizophrenia (Mechanism) | |
| Professor and Director of the Institute of Behavioural Neuroscience | Neuronal substrates of perception and memory (Mechanism) | |
| Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience | Transdiagnostic cognitive mechanisms contributing to mental health (Mechanism) | |
Professor of Neuroscience and Mental Health | Biological markers for psychosis and their genetic influences (Mechanism) | |
Programme Leader | Cellular and circuit mechanisms of neuropsychiatric disorders (Mechanism) | |
| Associate Professor of Clinical Psychology | Neurocognitive mechanisms of mental ill health and treatment response in adolescence (mechanism/intervention) | |
| Professor of Human Pain Genetics | Genes for human pain insensitivity with direct links to depression (Mechanism/Intervention) | |
Group Leader,听Francis Crick Institute | Mitochondrial regulation of neuronal function in health and disease听(Mechanism) | |
Mary Kinross Professor of Neuropsychiatry | Computational and neural basis of motivation in health and disease (Mechanism) | |
| 听 | Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience | Mechanisms supporting conscious awareness and metacognition in the adult human brain (Mechanism) |
| Professor of Psychodynamic Neuroscience | Body representation and interoception in eating disorders (Mechanism) | |
Professor of Clinical and Affective Neuroscience | Emotion processing in anxiety, autism, PTSD and psychosis (Mechanism) | |
| Associate Professor | Prediction, prevention and treatment of mental disorders following trauma exposure (Mechanism) | |
Prof of Social Neuroscience | Social skills in autism, neural mechanisms of social interaction (Mechanism) | |
Professor of Neuroscience | Cellular basis of neural computation in听the mammalian brain (Mechanism) | |
Professor of Computational Psychiatry | Developing computational and cognitive methods to address clinical problems in psychiatry (Mechanism) | |
Professor of Molecular Neurobiology | The听genetic mechanisms driving synaptic dysfunction in neuropsychiatric conditions (Mechanism) | |
| Professor of Neuroscience | Central auditory processing and disruption in brain disorders affecting hearing (Mechanism) | |
Senior Research Fellow | Synaptic and circuit process in rodent analogues of mental illness (Mechanism) | |
Lecturer in Clinical Psychology | Mechanisms of mood instability and decision-making in bipolar disorder (Mechanism/Intervention) | |
Professor of Developmental Neuroscience and Psychopathology | Neurocognitive mechanisms implicated in mental health vulnerability following childhood maltreatment (Mechanism) | |
Professor of Molecular Pschiatry | Genetic underpinnings of a range of mental illnesses and substance misuse disorders using large scale molecular genetics (Mechanism) | |
| Professor of Neurology, Deputy Director Institute of Prion Dieases | Dementia, mental health consequences of prion dementias (Mechanism) | |
| Associate Professor | Mechanisms linking social hierarchy and stress, with clear implications for mental health (Mechanism) | |
| Clinical Lecturer in Neuroscience | Computational psychotherapy,听targeted research on mechanisms directly relevant to psychological therapies (Mechanism)听 听 | |
| Associate Professor | Neuronal transcription factors and long-noncoding RNA genes that modulate sensation of pain (Mechanism) | |
Professor, Programme Committee | Cognitive skills and abilities in autism and their practical application (Mechanism) | |
Professor of Neuroscience and Mental Health | The neurocognitive and computational basis of mental illness, focusing on anxiety (Mechanism) | |
Professor of Neuroscience and Mental Health, Programme Director | Neural and cognitive mechanisms driving mental illness, especially depression (Mechanism) | |
Prof of Clinical Neuroscience | Imaging and clinical correlates of anxiety and depression in Parkinson's (Mechanism) | |
Professor of the Psychology of Eating Disorders | Eating disorders (Mechanism/Intervention) | |
Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience | Information seeking and mental health, Belief formation and mental health, Affective disorders (Mechanism) | |
| Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience | Neurobiological predictors of mental health and wellbeing using pharmacological interventions (Mechanism) | |
Schild Professor of Pharmacology | The molecular, cellular and circuit basis of mental health disorders from the perspective of dysfunctional brain inhibition (Mechanism) | |
Principal Research Fellow | The development of emotion regulation in children and its role in psychological wellbeing (Mechanism) | |
Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry | Mood and the mechanisms that lead to depression, particularly in adolescents (Mechanism) | |
| Associate Professor in Intellectual Developmental Disability | Mental health and wellbeing in intellectual and developmental disabilities (Mechanism) | |
Professor of Developmental Psychopathology | Genetic, environmental and neurocognitive mechanisms contributing to the development of antisocial behaviour (Mechanism) | |
| Professor of Neurology | Systems neuroscience of auditory, socioemotional and other complex behaviours in neurodegenerative disorders (Mechanism) |
| Professor of Neurology | Mental health symptoms in Parkinson鈥檚 disease and Lewy body dementia (Mechanism) | |
| MRC Career Development Fellow at Experimental Psychology | Neurocomputational mechanisms of social cognition (Mechanism) | |
Senior Research Fellow | Cognitive and neural mechanisms underlying autism (Mechanism) | |
| Associate Professor of Dementia Epidemiology | Application of causal inference methodology to understand genetic and non-genetic determinants of Alzheimer鈥檚 disease and other causes of dementia (Population) | |
Associate Professor in Population Health | Effects of societal changes in physical and mental health (Population) | |
| Professor of Clinical Psychology and听Cognitive Neuropsychiatry | Mental health outcomes of neurological disorders, neuropsychiatric disorders of psychosis, armed conflict and mental health (Population) | |
| Senior Research Fellow in Statistics/Epidemiology | Health impacts of social assets and deficits, non-medical interventions, such as social prescribing (Population) | |
| Professor of Global Mental Health and Social Justice听 | 听Mental wellbeing, experience of common mental disorders, social interventions in Global Mental Health (Population) | |
| Senior Research Fellow in Behavioural Science | Relationship between social support and health outcomes and the development and testing of psychosocial interventions to improve outcomes for people with mental health problems (Population) | |
| Professor of Medical Statistics | Appliation of methods for causal inference in epidemiological and clinical research (Population) | |
Associate Professor of Psychobiology & Epidemiology | Links between social, cultural and community engagement and psychological, biological, social and behavioural factors (Population) | |
Professor of Developmental Psychology | Social and biological influences on children鈥檚 emotional and behavioural problems (Population) | |
Associate Professor in Epidemiology and Public Health | Mental health of ageing populations and social inequality (Population) | |
Professor of Psychiatric and Social Epidemiology | Social epidemiology of psychotic disorders, including migration, ethnicity and urbanization (Population) | |
Associate Professor | The genetics of depression in diverse populations (Population) | |
Associate Professor听in psychiatric epidemiology | Epidemiology of common mental health disorders (Population) | |
Professor of Epidemiological Psychiatry | Epidemiology of psychiatric disorders and randomised clinical trials of depression (Population) | |
Associate Professor | How genes and the environment impact habits, obesity and mental health (Population) | |
Associate Professor | Applied statistics in randomised control trials and digital healthcare records in mental health听 (Population/Intervention) | |
| 听Associate Professor of Statistics and Psychological Methods | Applied statistics in psychology, epidemiology, and health services research (Population/Intervention) | |
| Associate Professor of Psychology | Role of risky, promotive and protective environments in the longitudinal patterns of mental health and behaviour of typically-developing children and children with special educational needs (Population) | |
Professorial Research Fellow | Development and application of machine learning models to neuroimaging (Population) | |
Professor of Primary Care and Population Science | Mental health in lower & middle income countries (Population) | |
Professor of Developmental Disorders of Language and Communication | Developmental relationships between language disorder and social, emotional, and mental health outcomes (Population) | |
Associate Professor in Developmental Psychology | Child and family factors in association with children and young people鈥檚 emotion regulation and mental health (Population/Intervention)听 | |
Professor of Psychiatric Epidemiology | Mental health epidemiology including outcomes in psychosis and physical comorbidity (Population) | |
Professor of Population Health and Wellbeing | Mental health across the lifecourse; inequalities; societal drivers and mechanisms (Population) | |
Professor of Epidemiology and Health Informatics | Links between physical and mental health in primary care (Population) | |
Professor of Developmental Psychopathology and Genetics | Genetic and environmental pathways to childhood and adolescent mental health (Population) | |
Associate Professor in Population Health and Applied Statistics | Understanding (i) long-term implications of child maturement, (ii) the inter-play between physical and mental health and (iii) well-being and mental health during the pandemic (Population) | |
Professor of Population Health and Statistics | Antecedents and consequences of common mental disorders over the lifecourse (Population) | |
Professor of Psychology in Epidemiology, Programme Committee | Life course approaches to mental ageing: depression and cognitive function (Population) | |
Chadwick Chair of Civil Engineering | Understanding human/environment interactions听 considering the physical and sensory state of the environment and the sensory, cognitive and physical state of the | |
Professor of Primary Care & Epidemiology | Predicting and improving mental health outcomes in people with complex needs 听(Population) | |
| Associate Professor of Developmental Psychology and co-Director of the Centre for Education and Criminal Justice | Social and developmental causes, correlates, and consequences of psychosis,听schizotypal traits,听and antisocial behaviour听in relation to听child听and adolescent听mental health听across cultures听(Population) | |
| Associate Professor in Clinical Psychology | The use of clinical decision making tools to support the delivery of routine psychological therapies for depression and anxiety disorders (Intervention) | |
| Associate Professor | Behaviour change and stigma in dementia听(Intervention) | |
| Associate Professor | Translating novel methods of targeting maladaptive neuroplasticity into experimental interventions in drug use and stress disorders (Intervention) | |
Professor of Mental Health | Insight and awareness, depersonalisation disorder and functional neurological disorders (Intervention) | |
Professor in Child Mental Health and Wellbeing | Evaluation of interventions to support mental health and well-being in children (Intervention) | |
Professor of Evidence-Based Child and Adolescent Mental Health | Evaluations of new treatment and approaches for young people with multiple needs, particularly mental health and forensic needs, within community services and also secure settings (Intervention) | |
Professor of Contemporary Psychoanalysis and Developmental Science | Psychosocial treatments for youths and individuals with persistent mental disorders (Intervention) | |
| Professor of Psychological Therapies | Psychological interventions in mental and physical health disorders (Intervention) | |
| Professor of Applied Developmental and Health Psychology | Mental health and wellbeing; risk and resilience; and intervention development, implementation and evaluation, with a strong emphasis on diversity and inclusion for children, adolescents and young adults (Intervention) | |
Associate Professor听in Psychology | Developing treatments for eating disorders through understanding their cognitive, social and emotional mechanisms (Intervention) | |
Professor of听 Psychiatry of Intellectual Disability | Interventions and epidemiology of neurodevelopmental disorders and intellectual disability (Intervention) | |
Senior Research Fellow in Behavioural Science and Health | Personalised care and community mental health (Intervention) | |
| Prof听Joseph Hayes | Professor of Psychiatry | Epidemiology, data science, ecological momentary assessment, severe mental illness (Intervention) |
| 听 | Associate Professor in Child Mental Health | Complex child trauma and mental health,听听improving the identification and support of the mental health needs of care-experienced young people (Intervention) |
Professor of Old Age Psychiatry | Improving treatment for psychosis, anxiety, depression and symptoms of dementia (Intervention) | |
Professor of Social and Community Psychiatry | Development, evaluation of psychosocial interventions; social influences on mental health (Intervention) | |
Professor of Translational Clinical Psychology | Memory modification as a therapeutic strategy for psychological disorders (Intervention) | |
Professor of Rehabilitation Psychiatry | Evaluation of effectiveness of specialist services for people with complex mental health needs (Intervention) | |
Professor of Clinical Cognitive Neuroscience | Virtual reality embodiment as a tool for modifying self-compassion in mental illness (Intervention) | |
| Professor of Translational Neurophysiology | Deep Brain Stimulation mechanisms using invasive and non-invasive neurophysiology (Intervention) | |
Professor of Psychiatry of Older People | Life course interventions to prevent and delay dementia, treat neuropsychiatric symptoms in dementia and improve mental health of family carers (Intervention) | |
Senior Lecturer | Mental health services research, especially crisis care (Intervention) | |
Professor of Neurodevelopmental Conditions | Improving recognition and clinical care of autistic people (Intervention) | |
Associate Professor | Inclusion of under-represented groups in research, psychological and complementary interventions to promote听mental health and healthy ageing. (Intervention) | |
Professor of Psychological Therapies with Children and Young People | Child and adolescent psychotherapy (Intervention) | |
| Professor of Qualitative Mental Health Research | Psychiatric medication experiences and management; shared decision-making; qualitative research methods in mental health Intervention) | |
Associate Professor听 | Psychological and psychosocial interventions for people with dementia,听risk factors for dementia, trauma and ageing.听(Intervention) | |
Professor of Clinical Psychology and Clinical Effectiveness | Effectiveness of psychological interventions, including prognosis and prediction of response (Intervention) | |
Clinical Associate Professor, Programme Committee | Risk factors for suicidality; links between loneliness and mental illness (Intervention) | |
Professor of Primary Care and Health Services Research | Dementia and common mental disorders in primary care and complex interventions: epidemiology and trials (Intervention) | |
Professor of Clinical Psychology and Stigma Studies | Stigma associated with disability and mental health problems (Intervention) | |
| Associate Professor in Mental Health Data Science | The use of data science to understand mental health disorders and improve the delivery of treatment (Intervention) | |
Professor of Translational Psychology | Development and evaluation of psychological interventions (Intervention) | |
| Professor of Clinical Psychology of Ageing | Development and evaluation of psychosocial interventions in ageing (a) dementia and b) menopause transition)听(Intervention) |
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