King's College London

About us

About the Department of Psychology 

The Department’s research interests span a wide range of mental health disorders and physical health problems, including anxiety disorders, trauma, somatoform disorders, pain, psychosis, depression, antisocial personality, disorders in childhood and adolescence, emotion and personality, and neurodegeneration. In physical health, we work at the interface between physical health and mental health and wellbeing, focusing on the development and evaluation of new psychological treatments and on understanding the mechanisms that maintain psychological distress. Much of our past work has informed UK national treatment guidelines in mental and physical health. The breadth of research expertise has broadened considerably with the recruitment of ‘basic’ cognitive and social psychologists whose interests intersect with and extend our existing profile in translational and applied research.

Link to Department of Psychology webpage: https://www.kcl.ac.uk/psychology

This work forms part of a larger grant led from the Social, Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry Centre, link:  https://www.kcl.ac.uk/sgdp

About the Faculty 

The Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience (IoPPN) is a Faculty of King's College London and the largest academic community in Europe devoted to the study and prevention of mental illness and brain disease.

The IoPPN pioneers research into new and improved ways of understanding and treating mental illness and brain disease.  The IoPPN's greatest strength is the interdisciplinary nature of both its research strategy and educational activities, providing unique opportunities for students and staff.

Link to IoPPN webpage:www.kcl.ac.uk/ioppn/index.aspx

About the role

This is an exciting opportunity to be part of a new Wellcome Trust funded Discovery Award to examine prediction of clinical outcome. A key psychological mechanism that maintains anxiety is the tendency to generate negative interpretations of unclear or ambiguous information (known as interpretation bias). We have developed a novel online intervention using cognitive bias modification of interpretations (CBM-I) to ‘train’ people with anxiety problems to develop a more helpful cognitive bias to generate positive interpretations, which effectively reduces anxiety and depression. This low-intensity intervention is straightforward, accessible and can be offered at scale. In the current project we will use cognitive, genetic, clinical and demographic information to predict clinical outcome at the end of the CBM-I intervention and at follow up. This is something people with lived of anxiety have told us that they would like, to help inform their decisions selecting a treatment option. 

Specifically, in this project we will adapt and tailor the intervention for people suffering from anxiety who have different ethnic identities. The research programme will involve a large-scale study to examine prediction of individuals’ outcome from a course of CBM-I.  The study will recruit 4300 anxious people to complete CBM-I intervention developed by Hirsch et al 2021 that involves 12 online sessions, each around 20 minutes long, completed over four weeks. 

The successful candidate will be a clinically qualified psychologist who has clinical experience working with people with anxiety. They will be able to support people with lived experience of anxiety who will be contributing to the research. They will also have experience supervising others working with anxious individuals, and on the management of risk. They will have excellent communication and presentation skills, together with an ability to organise and motivate others. They will demonstrate enthusiasm, innovation and leadership when faced with challenges and will provide strategic, tactical and clinical input in the project. The project has co-design embedded within it, and the post holder will take a lead on this. They will take a lead role in refining the intervention, working closely with people with lived experience of anxiety, leading on public and patient involvement and engagement activities, dissemination, policy labs with stakeholders and contribute to a range of other dissemination and implementation planning activities. The successful candidate will be part of Prof Colette Hirsch’s Cognition in Emotional Disorders and Resilience group, at the Department of Psychology. They will also work closely with other members of the Wellcome Discovery award team at KCL, led by Prof Thalia Eley who runs the Emotional Development, Intervention and Treatment (EDIT) Lab, KCL. 

The post holder could register for a part time PhD if they wish. 

This is a part time post (80% FTE), and you will be offered a fixed term contract until 30/06/2030.

About you

To be successful in this role, we are looking for candidates to have the following skills and experience:

Essential criteria

1.      Degree in psychology at least at 2.i level or higher and be a Clinical Psychologist with a Doctorate in Clinical Psychology or equivalent.

2.      Registered (or option to register before start date) with the HCPC as Practitioner Psychologist, and evidence of continuing professional development as required by the HCPC.

3.      Good understanding of issues around equality, diversity and inclusion, along with experience of PPIE involvement in clinical service planning or research and dissemination.

4.      Promotion of effective multi-disciplinary team working using a flexible, adaptable team-working attitude, with an ability to supervise and monitor a team with tact and diplomacy.

5.      Ability to use initiative, to prioritise work, to predict, identify and resolve problems that are critical to a large-scale study and plan strategically to avoid them. As well as an ability to maintain concentration, show attention to detail and have high standards of accuracy in all aspects of work.

6.      Excellent interpersonal skills, report and scientific writing skills, ability to persuade and deliver information effectively through presentations.

7.      Experience of recruiting and conducting high quality clinically relevant research.

8.      Experience conducting high quality CBT with a range of individuals with anxiety.

9.    For Clinical Psychologist 2:  Worked as a Clinical Psychologist providing support and supervision to less experienced clinical psychologists

10.  For Clinical Psychologist 2: A number of high-quality publications

11.  For Clinical Psychologist 2: Experience of leadership alongside undertaking complex clinical work

Desirable criteria

1.  A PhD in Psychology or related discipline.

2.  Experience using digital psychological interventions in clinical work and/or conducting research related to digital interventions (particularly cognitive bias modification).

3.  Experience of designing and conducting high quality experimental research related to anxiety.

4.  Ability to develop and use complex multi-media materials for presentations in public, professional and academic meetings.

Downloading a copy of our Job Description

Full details of the role and the skills, knowledge and experience required can be found in the Job Description document, provided at the bottom of the next page after you click “Apply Now”. This document will provide information of what criteria will be assessed at each stage of the recruitment process.

Further information

We pride ourselves on being inclusive and welcoming. We embrace diversity and want everyone to feel that they belong and are connected to others in our community.

We are committed to working with our staff and unions on these and other issues, to continue to support our people and to develop a diverse and inclusive culture at King's.

We ask all candidates to submit a copy of their CV, and a supporting statement, detailing how they meet the essential criteria listed in the advert. If we receive a strong field of candidates, we may use the desirable criteria to choose our final shortlist, so please include your evidence against these where possible.

To find out how our managers will review your application, please take a look at our ‘How we Recruit’ pages.

Interviews are due to be held on 18th September 2024

We are able to offer sponsorship for candidates who do not currently possess the right to work in the UK.

This post is subject to Disclosure and Barring Service and/or Occupational Health clearances.