Our seminars explore a wide selection of topics and feature guests from a range of different backgrounds.

All seminars take place in 10 West, Room 1.10 on our University of Bath campus at 12.15pm to 1.05pm, unless otherwise stated.

Upcoming seminars

Professor Ayse Uskul (University of Sussex)

Title: Honor in the Mediterranean region and beyond: Implications for self-related, cognitive, and interpersonal processes
Date: 4 February 2026

During this seminar, Professor Ayse Uskul will present an overview of a multi-study project conducted in the Mediterranean (e.g., Spain, Italy, Greece, Cyprus, Turkey, Egypt), East Asian (e.g., Japan, Korea) and Anglo-Western (e.g., UK, USA) regions to highlight core findings concerning a) the prevalence of honor values (perceived normative and personally endorsed) in these regions, and b) the predictive role honor plays in psychological processes related to self-construal, social orientation and cognitive style, as well as interpersonal processes such as competition and cooperation, and offering of apologies. He'll draw on five studies (total N = 13,045), which used economic games, experiments, or surveys with sample sizes around 200 participants per study/country and a comparable number of men and women from a wide age range. He'll also highlight several key take-aways including the distinctive predictions by different facets of honor (e.g., defence of family reputation vs. self-promotion and retaliation) and challenge that the Mediterranean region is a homogenous entity where honor is valued equally and operates similarly across its different subregions. He'll discuss the findings to situate the understudied Mediterranean region within the larger cultural psychological literature, which has been largely dominated by east-west comparisons.

Sarah Bennett (King's College London)

Title: Tailoring therapy: How modular approaches can enhance mental health care for children and young people
Date: 11 February 2026

During this seminar, Sarah will discuss the below research:

There are increasing calls for mental health treatments to be adapted for different groups to maximise their acceptability and benefit to patients. However, new adapted treatments may reduce service capacity at a time when there is unprecedented unmet need. An alternative method is personalisation on an individual level. Modular treatments, in which therapists and/or clients can select the elements of protocols most suited to their presentation and needs, allow protocolised, standard interventions to be delivered flexibly, accommodating client variation. They may support increased access to evidence‑based therapy as therapists can develop, add and train in modules to address the needs of specific populations or presentations rather than training in entirely new interventions. Decisions regarding which modules or elements are used may be based on a combination of clinical judgement, patient choice and data from outcome measurement. This talk will describe how a modular approach was used successfully to treat mental health conditions (anxiety, depression and behavioural difficulties) within the context of physical healthcare services, and specifically for children and young people with epilepsy. The intervention was successful across the age range (3–18 years old), for children and young people with intellectual disabilities, and for autistic children and young people and is now being piloted within NHS services as part of routine care.

Dr Ali Khatibi Tabatabaei (University of Bath)

Title: TBC
Date: 25 February 2026

Bihui Jin (University of Bath)

Title: TBC
Date: 4 March 2026

Professor Quentin Huys (University College London (UCL))

Title: TBC
Date: 11 March 2026

Jamie Chapman (University of Bath)

Title: TBC
Date: 18 March 2026

Yu Shuang Gan (University of Bath)

Title: TBC
Date: 25 March 2026

Dr Mark Horowitz (University College London (UCL))

Title: TBC
Date: 15 April 2026

Dr Joanna McHugh Power (Maynooth University)

Title: TBC
Date: 22 April March 2026

Professor Gerben van Kleef (University of Amsterdam)

Title: TBC
Date: 29 April March 2026

Sarah Dance (University of Bath)

Title: TBC
Date: 6 May 2026

Previous seminars

Professor Mike Quayle (University of Limerick) — How are social issue attitudes (e.g. about vaccines; climate etc.) absorbed into social identities? Social identity networks and identity compression in social information systems
Darja Wischerath (University of Bath) — How conspiracy narratives enable violence
Professor Louise Arseneault (King's College London) — A gateway to thousands of datasets from across the world: The Atlas of Longitudinal Datasets
Dr Emma Soneson (University of Oxford) — Understanding the role of school-based mental health support within adolescents’ wider networks of care
Dr Jon Roozenbeek (King's College London) — “Bad Bot” apocalypse: the online manipulation economy and how to disrupt it
[Dr Emily Rempel (University of Liverpool) — How to put trustworthiness into practice: Case Studies from the Liverpool City Region Civic Data Cooperative
Professor Tracey Wade (Flinders University) — Broadening our perspectives on early intervention in eating disorders
Dr Steve Westlake (University of Bath) — The power of leading by example on climate change
Professor Tim Smith, University of the Arts London — The attentional theory of cinematic continuity
Dr Tamsin Newlove-Delgado, University of Exeter — Children and Adolescent Mental Health: Public Health Aspects
Professor Ellen Townsend, University of Nottingham — Mental Health: Self harm
Professor Alison Heppenstall, University of Glasgow — Agent-Based Modeling for Understanding Urban Complexity
Dr Charles Ogunbode, University of Nottingham — Climate justice now! Examining public understanding of climate justice and the implications of climate justice beliefs for action and policy support

Department of Psychology seminars

We host experts in different areas of psychology, including academics and practitioners from around the world. View our upcoming seminars on this page.