Fixed term contract for 12 months, 29.2 hours per week.

The University of Warwick is seeking to appoint a 12-month fixed term FTE 0.8 graduate Research Assistant (Project Co-ordinator) role at the Department of Psychology on a project investigating student mental health and resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic.

COVID-19 and associated social distancing measures have presented varying levels of stress and uncertainty to society worldwide. We know that the previous SARS epidemic in China led to significant and long-lasting psychosocial consequences. Within Warwick, discussions with subgroups of students staying on campus amid university closure have revealed a high level of anxiety and unease. It is unclear whether the levels of stress and uncertainty students experience is comparable to those normally associated with trauma, i.e., whether it can negatively affect important pillars of health (e.g., mood, sleep, physical activity), and whether it may aggravate psychiatric symptoms or extreme behaviour that warrant clinical attention. Our project will use survey and digital health technologies to investigate these questions.

The successful applicant will work as a team for the delivery of the project and the dissemination of the findings. This will include setting up, advertising and running the surveys, collecting and analysing data and writing the work up for, pre-registrations, publications and presentations, liaising with other student representatives, stakeholders, and academic, clinical and commercial partners of the project, as well as wider members of the Warwick Sleep and Pain Lab and the Warwick University Mental Health Research Centre.

We are looking for candidates with research experience in health settings, as well as great people, organisational and project management skills.

Please send informal queries to Dr Nicole Tang n.tang@warwick.ac.uk. Closing date: 26th May 2020.

In the Sleep and Health (PS362) third year undergraduate module this year, groups of students were asked to produce a five-minute educational video introducing a sleep-related topic of their choice to the general public.

My colleagues and I were motivated to put together a simple poster to share some tried and tested strategies for protecting sleep during stress at this exceptional time.

In the midst of a major battle, it’s hard to think of sleep as a priority, but it is true! Tired soldiers make mistakes. Tired doctors, nurses and healthcare workers don’t function optimally and get sick.

For students to whom we have a pastoral role, we hope the tips will help them think of sleep and give themselves permission to rest properly and stay healthy.

New paper published at BMJ Open: Implementing a hybrid cognitive-behavioural therapy for pain-related insomnia in primary care: lessons learnt from a mixed-methods feasibility study.

Open Access here.