Who We Are

Who we are

ABS provide Psychology-specific support for consultancy as well as helping develop new consultancy work, training opportunities and external partners for research funding.

Prof. John Drury

Psychology of crowd safety management

Prof. John Drury

Psychology of crowd safety management

Professor John Drury has recently provided consultancy workshops on the psychology of crowd safety management for the Hajj (Jeddah, Saudi Arabia) and on mass emergency behaviour for Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service and FRS National Resilience. He has provided guidance and advice on typical responses in emergency evacuations and how to manage these to a number of agencies, including the Civil Contingencies Secretariat and large numbers of crowd safety managers working for such companies as the Event Safety Institute. His work has informed the training provided by The Square Metre crowd safety to dozens of managers and stewards.

Dr Matt Easterbrook

Improving educational outcomes; intervention design and evaluation

Dr Matt Easterbrook

Improving educational outcomes; intervention design and evaluation

Dr Easterbrook has been consulting, advising and collaborating with education institutions (schools, colleges, and universities), charities, and widening participation organisations to support and encourage students from economically disadvantaged and/or underrepresented groups to progress, engage, and succeed in education. He has designed, implemented, and/or evaluated bespoke interventions that aim to increase educational engagement, performance, and progression among disadvantaged and underrepresented pupils for schools, colleges, universities, and widening participation organisations; has delivered workshops on how to communicate effectively with disadvantaged students, and has presented his work to charities, policy makers, and politicians at Westminster.

Prof. Pete Harris

Changing health behaviours

Prof. Pete Harris

Changing health behaviours

I work to understand how campaigns, especially health promotion campaigns, sometimes work and sometimes don’t. I am best known for my research into how people can be encouraged to respond more open-mindedly to information (especially about their health behaviour, but also about the environment). I have advised TV and media companies on these and other issues. I am an HCPC registered Health Psychologist and a BPS Chartered Psychologist.

Dr Megan Hurst

Body image & exercise psychology

Dr Megan Hurst

Body image & exercise psychology

Dr Megan Hurst has expertise in exercise promotion and wellbeing, alongside survey design and analyses. Her consultancy work includes assisting university senior leadership with survey design for consultation with students, and statistical support for commercial research on low-cost gym users. Dr Hurst has recently worked with Sussexsport to explore the impact of their ‘This Girl Can’ campaign to engage more female students and staff into sport, collecting insights from sports centre users and providing training for female peer leaders around gender, sports, and social media.

Prof. Tom Ormerod

Interviewing skills, forensic psychology, problem solving

Prof. Tom Ormerod

Interviewing skills, forensic psychology, problem solving

Tom joined Sussex as Head of School in August 2014, after nearly 20 years at Lancaster University and a brief sojourn at the University of Surrey. He finished his term as Head of this wonderful school in July 2019, and is now focussing on teaching and research in cognitive, social and forensic psychology. Tom’s research has always tried to join theoretical and applied aspects of psychological research into problem solving, decision making and expertise. Recently, he has been focussing on investigative expertise and security screening, for which our paper in JEP: General received the best paper award by the BPS Cognitive Section. Tom is also developing a computational model of insight problem solving with colleagues at Surrey and Victoria, BC Canada. He is leading the Applied Behavioural Science theme in the School of Psychology, an initiative to provide psychological services based on School research to non-academic users.

Community and Business
Tom’s research into interviewing techniques for security screening and investigation has led to three major airlines adopting variants of the Controlled Cognitive Engagement (CCE) method devised for transatlantic passenger screening. This was reported in a paper by Ormerod and Dando (2015) which won the BPS Cognitive Section award in 2016. The method has been adopted by the EU funded ARMLET centre (Romania) for training air marshals. It has also generated $400k funding in 2016 from the US Federal Bureau of Investigation for further research into using CCE for intelligence gathering, the first output of which has appeared January 2020 in Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.

Tom is currently leading the Applied Behavioural Science theme in the School of Psychology, an initiative to provide psychological services based on School research to non-academic users.

Prof. Nicola Yuill

Classroom interaction & engagement, learning & technology

Prof. Nicola Yuill

Classroom interaction & engagement, learning & technology

Professor Nicola Yuill’s CHAT lab has worked with a number of education providers, including St Anthony’s School in Chichester, where we designed and evaluated a new playground for children with autism. We were able to show that the new design supported higher levels of social interaction and less solitary play. The lab also supports regular free research briefings, close networking with local authorities and parent groups across the south coast. We also provide tailored staff and parent training, with twilight sessions and particular expertise in video analysis of interaction.

Dr Richard de Visser

Drinking behaviour & alcohol policy evaluation

Dr Richard de Visser

Drinking behaviour & alcohol policy evaluation

Dr Richard de Visser conducts research into how people prepare to change their behaviour, and how they actually carry out changes to their behaviour. He has developed and evaluated interventions to increase people's understanding, and use, of alcohol intake guidelines. Recently, he has expanded his focus to guidelines for diet and physical activity. He is also contributing to large-scale studies to improve people's engagement with health services. He has expertise in applying quantitative survey-based methods and qualitative methods focused on group and individual interviews.

Prof. Martin Yeomans

Food & beverages, flavour & taste

Prof. Martin Yeomans

Food & beverages, flavour & taste

Martin joined University of Sussex in 1989, where he is currently Professor of Experimental Psychology. He has established a strong research group exploring various aspects of human eating and drinking, with over £3 million in grant income at Sussex to date. You can find more details of his research at the Sussex Ingestive Behaviour Group web page: http://www.sussex.ac.uk/psychology/sibg/
He currently supervises three DPhil students, and most of his 20 previous DPhil students have gone on to research careers in academia or industry.
He has published over 100 peer-reviewed publications and around 20 book chapters, and co-edited a recent book on Flavour, Satiety and Food Intake
Martin has a long history of engagement with the food, beverage and pharmaceutical industries internationally, with consultancy and contract work with many international companies.
An important outcome of the research has been the development of bespoke software (the Sussex Ingestion Pattern Monitor: SIPM) which facilitates experimental studies of appetite control, flavour evaluation etc. For details, please go to the SIPM website: http://www.sipm.co.uk/Home/index.xalter

Dr Graham Hole

Motorist & cyclist behaviour analysis

Dr Graham Hole

Motorist & cyclist behaviour analysis

Dr Graham Hole has close links with Brighton and Hove Road Safety Department. Recent studies have included a survey investigating cyclists’ perceptions of cycling in the city, and an observational study of conflicts between drivers and cyclists at junctions which had previously been identified as problematic for cyclists. On a number of occasions, he has also acted as a consultant for IAM Roadsmart, advising on issues to do with vulnerable road users, such as cyclists and motorcyclists. He is currently working with a number of insurance companies on research into factors affecting the riskiness of drivers.

Prof. Julia Simner

Screening & support for synaesthesia

Prof. Julia Simner

Screening & support for synaesthesia

Prof Simner has been researching, consulting, and advising on matters relating to the five senses, in the general population and in populations with unusual sensory experiences. Her speciality is in sensory integration: how do the five senses interact? What types of colours, tastes, sound etc. are judged as pleasing together? Which clash? Which colours suggest high pitch sounds? Which shape is sour taste?

Prof. Simner has worked with agencies wishing to better brand their products and also with groups of people wanting to understand synaesthesia. Synaesthesia is an inherited neurological condition that alters the development of white and grey matter in the brain and gives rise to a ‘merging of the senses’. Synaesthetes might experience colours when they hear sounds, or think about letters, or they might experience tastes in the mouth when they see colours and so on. Synaesthesia can offer profound insights into everyday sensation because all people experience crossed sensations to an implicit degree, and often in ways that mimic synaesthetes. Prof. Simner has an international reputation in the study of synaesthesia, and has conducted research identifying synaesthesia in children and adults.

She is currently advising on how children with sensory differences might be better supported in schools. She has co-written the NHS choices website on Synaesthesia, and is working in collaboration with The West Sussex Council Autism and Social Communication Team to produce a definitive guide on synaesthesia for school, SEND teams, and Educational Psychologists. She has created a web interface providing key information for teachers and parents of children with synaesthesia and a platform which can facilitate conversations between them.