Tagged / Professor

The Friday Prof-ile: John McAlaney

Welcome to The Friday Prof-ile – a chance to get to know some of our recently appointed Professors and Associate Professors a little better. Every Friday, we’ll be asking a different person the same set of questions to get an insight into their life, work and what makes them tick. 

John McAlaney

John McAlaney

This week, we’re chatting with Professor in Psychology, John McAlaney…

What are your research interests? What made you want to study these areas?  

My research looks at how and why people choose to engage in risky behaviours, with a focus on how this is influenced by social processes. As part of this I do work on a range of topics including hacking, digital addiction, fake news and online gambling.

More broadly I am interested in how to challenge misperceptions that people have about those around them.

Often as humans we assume that our peers behave and think is much more negative way than is actually the case. By documenting these misperceptions and presenting them back to a target population you empower people to make informed decisions, which is known as the social norms approach.

I am drawn to this approach because, unlike some other behaviour change approaches, it does not dictate to people how they should behave.

What has been your career highlight to date?  

Being invited to 10 Downing Street in 2012 to talk about how we can use technology to implement the social norms approach and to counter harmful stereotypes about young people.

What are you working on at the moment?  

The biggest project I am involved in at the moment is a GambleAware funded project on behaviour change and transparency in online gambling. As part of this work I have recently been the academic lead on BU’s successful application to be included on the Gambling Commission’s Research, Education and Treatment (RET) list. We are the first university in the UK to be included on this list, and only the second in the world. Our inclusion on this list opens up many opportunities for us to continue research into ways to address the harms caused by problematic gambling.

I am also working on several projects relating to cybersecurity. This work is the basis of my ongoing participant as an academic expert in the UN Committee to Elaborate a Comprehensive International Convention on Countering the Use of Information and Communications Technologies for Criminal Purposes.

If you weren’t an academic, what would you be doing?

I’ve always been interested in architecture, although I have terrible design skills. If that didn’t work out for me then I’d probably become a dog walker.

What do you do to unwind? 

Reading is something I find very relaxing – I would like to claim that I only reads the classics, but usually the more stressful a day I have the trashier my choice of book.

What’s the best thing about Bournemouth? 

I’m lucky to live within walking distance of the beach, which is great. I think I would struggle to live anywhere other than the coast now. Being from Scotland I still find the weather of the south coast to be a nice change.

If you could pick any superpower, what would it be and why?  

As someone who loves going to new places but dislikes the act of travel I would definitely choose teleportation.

If you were stranded on a desert island, what one luxury item would you take with you? 

It would have to be my Kindle. I could happily pass the years by sitting, reading under a palm tree.

What advice would you give to your younger self?

Very few things in life actually matter that much. That probably sounds quite nihilistic, but it an idea I increasingly embrace as I get older. Most of the dramas we have in our lives are things we won’t even remember in 10 years. Sometimes you are ahead, sometimes you are behind. The race is long, and in the end, it’s only with yourself. Also, wear sunscreen.

The Friday Prof-ile: John Oliver

Welcome to The Friday Prof-ile – a chance to get to know some of our recently appointed Professors and Associate Professors a little better. Every Friday, we’ll be asking a different person the same set of questions to get an insight into their life, work and what makes them tick.

A headshot image of Professor John Oliver

John Oliver

This week, we’re chatting with Professor in Media Management, John Oliver…

What are your research interests? What made you want to study these areas?

My current research has examined the hidden effects of crisis events on organisational innovation and performance. It’s been very successful in terms of businesses engaging with the findings and it has influenced the UK Government’s new Innovation Strategy (2021).

Why this topic? Well, my research has taken a highly original and perhaps unusual approach to the topic. Doing something new is what keeps me motivated!

What has been your career highlight to date?

Developing my current research idea on the hidden effects of a crisis on firm innovation and performance been a struggle because its based on a truly original approach. That has meant a lot of critical feedback and even derision from many circles. So, to have the research inform the UK Government’s new Innovation Strategy has been pleasing to say the least.

What are you working on at the moment? 

A lot! But, an ESRC grant and publications on business innovation in a post-pandemic environment.

If you weren’t an academic, what would you be doing?

Management Consultant

What do you do to unwind?

Surfing, skateboarding, yoga and the gym

What’s the best thing about Bournemouth?

The beach

If you could pick any superpower, what would it be and why? 

Time travel – how cool would that be?!

If you were stranded on a desert island, what one luxury item would you take with you?

A surfboard

What advice would you give to your younger self?

Never, ever give in.

The Friday Prof-ile: Roman Gerodimos

Welcome to The Friday Prof-ile – a chance to get to know some of our recently appointed Professors and Associate Professors a little better. Every Friday, we’ll be asking a different person the same set of questions to get an insight into their life, work and what makes them tick. 

A photo of Roman Gerodimos

Roman Gerodimos

This week, we’re chatting with Professor in Global Current Affairs, Roman Gerodimos… 

What are your research interests? What made you want to study these areas? 

I’m interested in the relationship between the individual citizen and the world at large: the things that motivate us to engage with others, with politics, with global affairs, and the things that stop us from doing so: fear, disappointment, cynicism, apathy. I’ve been an avid consumer of politics and world news since I can remember myself and for a long time just assumed that everyone else would be, too. We know, of course, that that’s not true. Ironically though it is now perhaps more important than ever that people engage with politics and global issues; that we assume our share of responsibility for the future of the planet, and that we put themselves forward to lead.

Identifying those factors that can motivate us to engage – whether that is through psychology or a better understanding of history or communication and media or art or even user-oriented design – is key to finding and implementing solutions.

What has been your career highlight to date? 

I have several highlights, but if forced to choose I would pick two. One would be producing Deterrence – a feature-length documentary on European security and the past, present and future of NATO that we co-created with staff and students at BU. I’m very proud of our work. It was a very intense but unique experience, we got to cover a major NATO summit from the front row (quite literally), and I loved every minute of the creative and filmmaking process.

My other top highlight would be organising Human Library workshops at the Salzburg Academy on Media & Global Change – an annual summer school that BU co-founded back in 2007, which brings together students, faculty and leaders from all over the world. Creating a space with the simplest ingredients in which a hundred people, over the course of an evening, have some of the most meaningful, personal discussions of their lives is one of the most rewarding things I’ve ever done.

What are you working on at the moment? 

I’m just about to complete an edited volume on the relationship between shame and violence (Interdisciplinary Applications of Shame/Violence Theory: Breaking the Cycle, Palgrave Macmillan), which brings together brilliant contributors from different countries and disciplines so as to find innovative ways of breaking that cycle.

I’m also working on my next film project called A Probable Outcome – a meditation on fate, love, otherness and persistence – and on the associated research project on ‘Black women, dwarfs and other misfits of the Old West’ that is informing the script.

If you weren’t an academic, what would you be doing?

For some reason most of my friends are architects – I seem to be collecting them – so maybe life is trying to tell me something!

However, if I weren’t an academic, I would probably be working as a full-time professional scriptwriter or filmmaker or composer for the screen. I love great writing, films and music, so it would be something creative.

I have to say, though, one of the privileges of working at the Faculty of Media & Communication is being able to develop my creative skills and my media and storytelling practice while being an academic. Not many universities give academics that kind of space and freedom, and it’s one of the reasons I’ve stuck around for 20 years.

What do you do to unwind?

To misquote Maggie Smith in Downton Abbey, ‘what is “unwind”‘? I’m joking, of course. I do unwind – I read a lot, I walk, and I love travelling and photography.

What’s the best thing about Bournemouth?

I think it is the university, actually. During the last couple of decades, I have seen how BU – through our diverse student population, our iconic new buildings across both campuses, and crucially our engagement with local businesses, charities and communities – has helped the town modernise and grow.

I think BU can play a leading role in providing space, convening capacity and creative input to nourish Bournemouth’s cultural life – working with artists to put together or support festivals and events, such as the Arts by the Sea festival.

BU is at the heart of a conurbation of three towns – Bournemouth, Poole and Christchurch – with hundreds of thousands of residents, including children, students, and professionals. There is definitely the market and the demand for more culture and BU can help provide that.

If you could pick any superpower, what would it be and why? 

My recent research has shown me the literally ubiquitous role of shame in driving negative emotions, such as anger, and violent aggression, including against the self. I’d like my superpower to be the ability to heal people: to make them aware of their own trauma and insecurity, and how that is driving their negative feelings about others and themselves, and how they can gain self-esteem and a sense of responsibility about others and about the world.

If you were stranded on a desert island, what one luxury item would you take with you?

A typewriter. I love writing – no, let me rephrase: I couldn’t live without writing, it’s like therapy for me. The added bonus of a typewriter is that I wouldn’t have any distractions, so I could finally write a proper monograph.

What advice would you give to your younger self?

I don’t have major regrets – I’ve always followed my heart and my gut instinct, so I wouldn’t change anything, at least career-wise. But I think we can always, always be better listeners, so I would advise me to be a better listener of the things not said – the omissions, the pauses – and a better observer of the things not seen. These can be as revealing as the things that are said and seen.

The Friday Prof-ile: Janice Denegri-Knott

Welcome to The Friday Prof-ile – a chance to get to know some of our recently appointed Professors and Associate Professors a little better. Every Friday, we’ll be asking a different person the same set of questions to get an insight into their life, work and what makes them tick. 

This week, we’re chatting with Professor in Consumer Culture & Behaviour, Janice Denegri-Knott… 

Black and white profile image of Janice Denegri-Knott

Janice Denegri-Knott

What are your research interests? What made you want to study these areas?

My main research focus is the intersection between digital media and everyday living – in particular consumption. I have studied the role of platforms in stimulating desire for digital and material goods, and the value that people derive from their ongoing interactions with digital media.  In particular, I have been very keen to understand why there should be demand for digital goods and why people would form attachments to them – something that when I first began my studies, was deemed unorthodox, and even foolish. Throughout my career I have been a keen observer of transformations (positive and negative) happening at the very porous, or leaky, points of that intersection, where people and digital media come together.

My initial interest in the area came about as a result of an animated seminar I held with C&J students back in the early 2000s where we avidly discussed why somebody would ever buy a virtual chair that they couldn’t physically sit on.  From there on the examples became more extreme. Today, we have grown more accustomed to the idea that under certain conditions (uniqueness and scarcity), a digital piece of art like Pak’s ‘The Merge’ could have a transactional value of $91.8 million, or why 30,000 people across the world would want to pitch in together to buy it. Evidence of this shift abounds. Today, we have a vibrant market for Non Fungible Tokens (NFTs) which have become very desirable investments. Just in the first four months of 2021 NFTs had been traded over 2 billion times, an increase of ten-fold from 2020.

What has been your career highlight to date?  

I am immensely proud of the many projects that I have carried out over the years in close collaboration with colleagues in the C&J Department in the Faculty of Media and Communication – Dr. Rebecca Jenkins, Dr. Chris Miles, Dr. Mel Gray, Dr. Sae Oshima and Stuart Armon.  We have delivered high impact research, supporting positive transformation in the promotion and media industries. In particular in areas to do with the monetisation of digital content (for ITV), and metrics to measure advertising effectiveness and rethinking recall and recognition as measures of attention. Of note is work undertaken for Exterion Media (now Global) and Transport for London (TfL) that helped Exterion Media secure a £2,000,000,000 contract to manage the TfL advertising estate, improved advertising effectiveness by format, location and time by 70%-80% and making advertising during travel journeys more relevant and enjoyable for 1,300,000,000 TfL users annually.

What are you working on at the moment?  

Right now I am working on two projects.  I am writing a couple of papers reporting findings from a British Academy/Leverhulme funded intergenerational study into the value parents, children and their grandparents ascribe to their digital possessions. Thanks to this study we have found that value is not wedded to meaning only – in terms of sentimental associations that remind people of loved ones or expresses aspects of their identity- as is the case for material possessions.  Value is also firmly rooted in affordances – what people anticipate their digital possession will enable them to achieve.  I am also working with a key player in the NFT market on a study of people’s desire for and attachment to NFTs across a diverse group of users.

If you weren’t an academic, what would you be doing?

I would be working with food – possibly running a Peruvian restaurant with the help of my husband and daughters.

What do you do to unwind? 

Long walks, meditation, long distance calls with family and impromptu dances in my kitchen with my daughters.

If you could pick any superpower, what would it be and why?  

Tele-transportation, so that I could beam myself to Peru and back (where my parents and family live)

If you were stranded on a desert island, what one luxury item would you take with you? 

My silk kaftan.

What advice would you give to your younger self?

To be less concerned in anticipating all that can be wrong with your research, and focus more on all that is good.

The Friday Prof-ile: Tom Wainwright

Welcome to The Friday Prof-ile – a chance to get to know some of our recently appointed Professors and Associate Professors a little better. Every Friday, we’ll be asking a different person the same set of questions to get an insight into their life, work and what makes them tick. 

This week, we’re chatting with Professor in Orthopaedics Tom Wainwright.

Tom Wainwright

Tom Wainwright

What are your research interests? What made you want to study these areas?  

Primarily I am interested in helping to improve the treatment of patients with hip and knee arthritis. Firstly, looking at strategies and interventions that can help patients avoid the need for surgery, and then secondly, when surgery is indicated, looking at how surgical recovery can be optimised. Arthritis is a significant socioeconomic and health burden, and at a patient level can have a hugely detrimental effect on a patient’s quality of life and daily activities. It is therefore, in my opinion, both an interesting and important research topic.

What has been your career highlight to date? 

Being the lead author of the highly cited/downloaded ERAS Society international consensus guidelines for hip and knee replacement surgery. I was the first, and I am still, the only non-surgeon to ever lead the formation of an international ERAS Society guideline.

What are you working on at the moment? 

I am currently leading a number of externally-funded research studies. These include a trial of how best to provide physiotherapy for patients with hip arthritis, and two studies that will reveal brand new insights into the post-operative functional recovery trajectories of patients following hip and knee replacement.

If you weren’t an academic, what would you be doing?

I would probably be working clinically as a physiotherapist.

What do you do to unwind? 

Spend time doing activities outdoors with my family and friends. I like to run, bike, and spend time in the sea. I love to snowboard and surf, and play cricket and football. I also like to cook and travel.

What’s the best thing about Bournemouth? 

The beach and surrounding coastline and countryside. We are so lucky to live in such a beautiful spot.

If you could pick any superpower, what would it be and why? 

To be able to teleport! I could surf in Portugal before coming to work, and pop to Canada at the weekends to snowboard! It would also save on my carbon footprint and mean I don’t have to do any travel booking paperwork for work trips!

If you were stranded on a desert island, what one luxury item would you take with you? 

A piano. I played as kid and would love to have the time to pick it up again and practice.

What advice would you give to your younger self? 

Remember to be present, and enjoy the small moments.

The Friday Prof-ile: Bryce Dyer

Welcome to our new series, The Friday Prof-ile – a chance to get to know some of our recently appointed Professors and Associate Professors a little better. Every Friday, we’ll be asking a different person the same set of questions to get an insight into their life, work and what makes them tick. 

Bryce Dyer

This week, we’re chatting with Associate Professor in Product Development, Bryce Dyer 

What are your research interests? What made you want to study these areas? 

My research interest is the design or debate surrounding the technology we use for sport and physical activity. I love it as it bolts together my constant inquisitive inner dialogue and my hobbies.

What has been your career highlight to date? 

There have been a few, but winning and then giving the Brunel Award Lecture at the British Science Festival a few years ago was one that stood out for me. The talk brought together everything I’d done in teaching, research and my professional practice at that point in my career and I then had one of those great days where the talk went really well, I got a few laughs and I had a very large and positive crowd giving me a real grilling. It was a lot of fun.

What are you working on at the moment? 

I did a lot of research and projects on the run up to the 2021 Paralympic Games – I’m now writing them all up and publishing them all before my attention turns to seeking out new opportunities ahead of the next Olympic & Paralympic Games.

If you weren’t an academic, what would you be doing?

I would have pursued my ‘sliding doors’ decision of serving in the armed forces or have wanted to have been a professional athlete if I’d have been good enough. I was good enough to crawl through a ditch or go marching through the snow somewhere for hours on end but despite making a school team once for throwing the discus (due to what I still call one single ‘hand of god’ throw that could never be repeated), I never chose my parents well enough to have the physical capacity of being an Olympian.

What do you do to unwind?

Competitive sport and the training needed to then not come last doing it.

What’s the best thing about Bournemouth?

The huge variety of terrain, geography, and landscapes within a small radius of the town.

If you could pick any superpower, what would it be and why? 

Immortality. It’s always a struggle to have enough time to cram in everything I’m wanting to do. The list just keeps getting longer.

If you were stranded on a desert island, what one luxury item would you take with you?

My MP3 player with an abundance of questionable choices of music on it (despite then having to come up with how I’m going to power it when the battery runs out).

What advice would you give to your younger self?

Just keep going – you’ll make all the right judgement calls in the end.

If you’re a recently appointed Professor or Associate Professor and you’d like to be featured in the series, please contact research@bournemouth.ac.uk to find out more and get involved. 

The Friday Prof-ile: Anna Feigenbaum

Welcome to our new series, The Friday Prof-ile – a chance to get to know some of our recently appointed Professors and Associate Professors a little better. Every Friday, we’ll be asking a different person the same set of questions to get an insight into their life, work and what makes them tick. 

Professor Anna Feigenbaum with a microphone and headphones on

Professor Anna Feigenbaum

This week we’re chatting with Professor of Digital Storytelling, Anna Feigenbaum. 

What are your research interests? What made you want to study these areas? 

My research looks at communication, technology and social change. I’m particularly drawn to topics that are difficult to talk about because of their technical or scientific complexity and social sensitivity. I’ve always seen my role as an academic as serving as bridge or medium between disciplines, as well as between the university and advocacy communities.

What has been your career highlight to date? 

Either being quoted by AOC (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) in a bill to the US congress on the harms of tear gas or being interviewed by Queer Eye’s Jonathan Van Ness for his podcast ‘Getting Curious’.

What are you working on at the moment? 

I’m writing up findings from my AHRC project about “covid comics” and public health messaging over social media. I’m also finally starting work on my book about the cultural and political economy of infertility that got delayed because of the pandemic.

If you weren’t an academic, what would you be doing?

I still regret turning down an internship at DC comics when I was 19. So in my alternative life I’d like to be writing queer feminist superhero comics.

What do you do to unwind? 

Lots of things! Yoga, forest walks with our fur baby, bingeing fantasy or sci-fi series, and I’m currently teaching myself gothic calligraphy.

What’s the best thing about Bournemouth? 

Dog surfing. And that people don’t take themselves too seriously.

If you could pick any superpower, what would it be and why? 

Teleportation, so it would be easier to visit friends and family around the world – and more sustainable.

If you were stranded on a desert island, what one luxury item would you take with you?

If I’ve also got electricity on this island, my iPad.

What advice would you give to your younger self?

It’s ok that, in 2009, when those senior people asked what you worked on at an academic wine reception you said, “I do weird sh**.” One day you’ll get promoted to full professor for doing weird sh** well.

If you’re a recently appointed Professor or Associate Professor and you’d like to be featured in the series, please contact research@bournemouth.ac.uk to find out more and get involved.