by rbartels | Jun 30, 2022 | Other
In March, Ross Bartels was invited to collaborate on a funded project entitled “Can you tell me more? The development of a Virtual Conversational Agent (VCA) for assessing and monitoring sexual interests and fantasies of sex offenders‘).
Ross joins PI (Prof Jean-Pierre Guay) from the University of Montreal (and others) on the project, which received funding ($249,488) from the Government of Canada (under the ‘New Frontiers in Research Fund’).
by rbartels | Jun 30, 2022 | Publications
On the 25th Feb 2022, PhD student, Matthew King-Parker (along with with Ross Bartels and Tochukwu Onwuegbusi), published a paper entitled “The Burglary Cognitive Distortions Scale: Its association with burglary proclivity and other key variables” in the journal ‘Psychology, Crime, and Law’.
Cognitive distortions play a key role in offending but have not been researched in relation to burglary. Using the literature on offence-related cognition as a guide (which is primarily focused on sexual offending), the present two studies aimed to develop and validate the Burglary Cognitive Distortions Scale (BCDS). Drawing upon the burglary literature, an initial pool of 36-items was produced. Two online studies using community-based participants were then conducted. Each study involved administering the BCDS, along with measures of burglary proclivity, general criminal beliefs, empathy, and human needs. In Study 1 (N1 = 306), an exploratory factor analysis of the BCDS produced two factors: (1) Acquisitive Entitlement, and (2) Survive by any Means. In Study 2 (N2 = 266), confirmatory factor analysis confirmed the two-factor structure and helped refine the item pool. In each study, the 24-item CFA version of the BCDS was found to be associated with general criminal beliefs and burglary proclivity. Factor 1 of the BCDS, as well as general criminal beliefs, independently predicted proclivity scores. Future research should now aim to validate the BCDS using a sample of people who have committed burglary, as it holds promise for use in forensic settings and research.
by rbartels | Jun 30, 2022 | Other
In Feb 2022, Amanda Roberts (and colleagues) were awarded the Psyche Award for Most Valuable Paper on the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic by the Journal of Contemporary Psychotherapy.
They will receive a shiny certificate and feature in the spring edition of the journal.
The winning paper was:
Roberts, A., Rogers, J., Mason, R., Siriwardena, A.N., Hogue, T., Whitely, G., & Law, G. (2021). Alcohol and other substance use during the COVID-19 pandemic: A systematic review. Drug and Alcohol Dependence. 229 (Part A). p. 109150. ISSN 0376-8716.
by rbartels | Jun 30, 2022 | Publications
On Feb 4th 2022, Lauren Smith and Amanda Roberts (along with Jim Rogers from the School of Health and Social Care, and Steve Sharman from Kings College London) submitted a response to the Ministry of Justice Prison Strategy White Paper calling for screening and support for gambling harms to be included in the strategy.
The response is also available on the repository.
by rbartels | Jun 30, 2022 | Funding Success
In Feb 2022, Lauren Smith and Amanda Roberts (along with colleagues from the School of Health and Social Care and a colleague from the School of Architecture) were awarded £10,000 from The Tudor Trust and developmentplus.
The funding will be used to complete a review of potential venues for ongoing delivery of Project Compass, providing support to people who are homeless in Lincoln City.
