Application details:

Start date: 1 July 2021

Closing date: 30 April 2021

Supervisors:

Primary: Prof Stephan Lewandowsky

Secondary: Prof Adam Finn, Dr Emma Anderson, Dr Harriet Fisher

You have the opportunity to

• complete a PhD at an internationally renowned research university
• take part in a contemporary project with high practical relevance
• work in a large collaborative team dedicated to top-tier research and fostering a positive atmosphere
• partake in career development, including mentoring, feedback, and (international) conferences
• develop broad skills through professional engagement and teaching experience

Full Project Detail:

The project is called JITSUVAX. It is funded by the EU’s Horizon 2020 programme and addresses vaccine hesitancy—the delay or refusal of vaccination without medical indication. Hesitancy has been cited as a serious threat to global health by the World Health Organization (WHO), identifying misinformation on the internet as a contributing factor. JITSUVAX leverages those insights to turn toxic misinformation into a potential asset based on two premises: 1. The best way to acquire knowledge and to combat misperceptions is by employing misinformation as a teaching tool, 2. HCPs (health care professionals) form the critical link between vaccination policies and vaccine uptake.

The principal objective of JITSUVAX is to leverage misinformation about vaccinations into an opportunity by training HCPs to neutralize misinformation among HCPs and enabling them to communicate more effectively with patients. The findings from JITSUVAX will be disseminated with the aid of collaborators within WHO and UNICEF to leverage new knowledge for global impact.

The PhD student will be based in Bristol and will conduct laboratory research locally or online. The research will involve a mix of quantitative and qualitative behavioural methods. The project involves additional nodes in Cambridge, France, Finland, Germany, and Portugal with the PhD student potentially spending time at other nodes as the project requires.

Find out more: https://sks.to/c19vax & https://www.bristol.ac.uk/news/2021/february/vaccine-hesitancy.html

Entry requirements: Applicants need a first or upper second-class honours degree (or equivalent) in Psychology or related discipline (e.g., cognitive science).

Funding information: The studentship provides a stipend at the standard rate (approximately £15,000 per annum) for the duration of the studentship (3 years) plus tuition fees at the UK rate.

Contact details for informal enquiries: stephan.lewandowsky@bristol.ac.uk

How to apply: http://www.bristol.ac.uk/study/postgraduate/apply/.

About the Project: A 3 x year fully funded (stipend and fees) EPSRC PhD studentship for UK/EU students (Conditions may apply to non-UK students) in the area of Relationship Science.

In contemporary societies such as the UK, young adults increasingly report feelings of social isolation, with feelings particularly high in ardent social media users. The current project therefore aims to adopt an experimental approach to scrutinize the psychological impact of social media use. Drawing on contemporary models of social impression formation and attachment theory, in particular, it aims to investigate how high (vs. low) exposure to overly positive relationship displays as common on social media affects young adults’ own relationship ideals, satisfaction, and investment.

The project will use behavioural science experimental techniques to clarify how social media can benefit (or hinder) close relationship formation and maintenance. For more details, please discuss with the project lead.

Background: The studentship is based in the lab of Dr Susanne Quadflieg, in collaboration with Dr Angela Rowe, based at the School of Psychological Science at the University of Bristol, UK. In the 2014 REF, it was one of the UK's top ten universities for its research in psychology, psychiatry, and neuroscience. The supervisory team has an international reputation for their work in social psychology.

The person: The project is ideal for a person who is interested in receiving advanced training in experimental and social psychology. The person would ideally have an undergraduate or Master’s degree in a relevant discipline (Psychology or Computer Science). Due to the interdisciplinary nature of this work, applicants with a different scientific background but a strong interest in the topic will also be considered. Prior experience with statistical computing software (e.g., SPSS, R), behavioural presentation software (e.g., PsychoPy), and/or image processing software (e.g., Adobe Photoshop) would be desirable.

Further details and contact: Standard EPSRC eligibility rules apply. The post will ideally start in July 2021, but is flexible. This advert will remain open until a suitable candidate is recruited with shortlisting at the end of each month. For informal enquires about this post email: s.quadflieg@bristol.ac.uk

Funding Notes: Please make an online application for this project at http://www.bris.ac.uk/pg-howtoapply. Please select <PhD Experimental Psychology> on the Programme Choice page. You will be prompted to enter details of this EPSRC-studentship in the Funding and Research Details sections of the form. Please ensure that in this section you write “I would like to be considered for the EPSRC funding award in the School of Psychological Science” and specify the name of the supervisor: Susanne Quadflieg.

Microsoft Funded PhD: Using AI to develop joint attention in blind children

Application information: We are seeking a person with an interest in employing human-computer interaction methodologies to evaluate new AI technologies and their impact on children over time. The ideal person would have an undergraduate or Master’s degree in a relevant discipline such as Computer Science, Psychology or Social Science and would be interested in both quantitative and qualitative methods. Strong background in design and evaluation, experience working with children, disability, or minority population as well as demonstrated capability for research (e.g. through publication) are particularly desirable.

Funding: The post must start by September/October 2020 and will be funded over 4 years. The award covers an enhanced EPSRC stipend, home-based student fees and a substantial budget for consumables, travel and subsistence. The person will also have an opportunity to intern at Microsoft Research.

Eligibility: Standard EPSRC eligibility rules apply: Normally, to be eligible for a full award a student must have no restrictions on how long they can stay in the UK and have been ordinarily resident in the UK for at least 3 years prior to the start of the studentship (with some further constraint regarding residence for education). There is limited flexibility of universities to include EU students and international.  

Applicants are encouraged to contact us as soon as possible. For further details or to discuss this contact Dr Oussama Metatla including a full CV and any relevant details.

 The Chinese Scholarship Council-University of Bristol Joint Scholarship Scheme

Forty (40) fully-funded PhD scholarships for up to 48 months of research at the University of Bristol.

Eligibility: Chinese students already studying in the UK (or other countries). Chinese students attending their home universities.

Candidates apply directly to Bristol 

Deadline: Midday (UK time) on 25 January 2021.

University of Bristol Alumni Scholarship Scheme

A 10% discount on postgraduate tuition fees for University of Bristol graduates.

Students must start the programme within 10 years of graduation and be progressing from the final year of an undergraduate programme or taught masters programme. Eligible programmes include PhD and MSc by Research.

A University of Bristol-Macquarie University Cotutelle PhD Scholarship Programme

Funded PhD opportunity at the University of Bristol

Area: Optimised acquisition and coding for future immersive formats
Funder: EPSRC/BBC R&D iCASE award:
Supervisor: Professor David Bull, Professor Iain Gilchrist
Funding: EPSRC iCASE award with BBC Research and Development

For further information about this studentship, please contact:

psychology-pg-admissions@bristol.ac.uk

Trust, identity, privacy and security in large-scale infrastructures (TIPS-at-scale)

Computational Statistics and Data Science – COMPASS

Fully funded PhD studentships in Robotics and Autonomous Systems

Fully funded PhD studentship in Digital Health and Social Care

Funded PhD opportunity at the University of Bristol

Project Title: Does the experience of fasting have long-term benefits for healthy weight maintenance?
Funder: 
Supervisor: Professor Jeff Brunstrom, Dr. Natalia Lawrence, Dr. Elanor Hinton, and Professor Julian Hamilton-Shield

For further information about this studentship, please contact:

psychology-pg-admissions@bristol.ac.uk

 The Chinese Scholarship Council-University of Bristol Joint Scholarship Scheme

Twenty 4-year PhD scholarships per year, for an initial period of 5 years, with the first cohort registering in autumn 2017.

Eligibility: Chinese students already studying in the UK (or other countries). Chinese students attending their home universities.

Application process

1. Candidates apply directly to Bristol 
2. Complete a simple one-page form

EPSRC/BBC iCASE award

Optimised acquisition and coding for immersive formats based on visual scene analysis

Deadline: 2018
Eligibility: EPSRC eligibility rules apply

 ERC Fully-funded PhD studentship

Generalisation in Mind and Machine

 University of Bristol PhD Scholarships

Eligibility: Open to both home and international students
Selection criteria: academic excellence, research potential, the research proposal, collaboration/impact/engagement, ambitions and innovation.

EPSRC Fully- funded PhD Studentship

Visual perception and action research

Deadline: 29th June 2018
Eligibility: EPSRC eligibility rules apply

Funded PhD opportunity at the University of Bristol

Area: Neural dynamics of egocentric action observation
Funder: EPSRC
Supervisor: Dr. Susanne Quadflieg, Dr. Dima Damen
Funding: For 3.5 years at EPSRC standard stipend rates

For further information about this studentship, please contact:

psychology-pg-admissions@bristol.ac.uk 

EPSRC/BBC iCASE award

Understanding Audiences of the Future – development and deployment of non-invasive measures of individual or collecting immersion

Deadline: 2018
Eligibility: EPSRC eligibility rules apply

A University of Bristol-Macquarie University Cotutelle PhD Scholarship Programme

We are seeking applicants for a cotutelle MRes+PhD studentship to study the problem of converting text to speech. The project will aim to develop and test a new computational model of reading aloud. Experimental tests will examine whether this model can read words and nonwords similarly to skilled adult readers. The project will be jointly supervised by Prof. Anne Castles at Macquarie University and Prof Colin Davis at the University of Bristol (UK).

Fee-waiver scholarships

Deadline: 5pm, Wednesday 1st May 2019
Eligibility: UK and EU students - no tuition fees are payable (full fee waiver). International students - tuition fees reduced to £5,500 per annum.
Selection criteria: academic excellence, research potential, the research proposal, collaboration/impact/engagement, ambitions and innovation.

For further information about this Fee waiver, please contact:

psychology-pg-admissions@bristol.ac.uk