🔆 The Summer edition of Let's Connect, my newsletter bringing together up-to-date knowledge and information about effective smartphone use, positive device habits, and digital wellness for parents with babies, is now published and ready to read here: lets-connect.beehiiv.com/p/june-newsl...

June Newsletter:

Resources for Promoting Effective Smartphone Use and Digital Wellness

lets-connect.beehiiv.com

Our latest paper found a number of risk factors for mother-infant responsiveness. Mitigating these cumulative risks and preventing reduced mother-infant responsiveness through adequate resources, education, and tailored support is crucial in the First 1001 days. #Technoference #First1001Days

International Congress of Infant Studies@infantstudies.bsky.social · last yr.

- @lisagolds.bsky.social @karri-g-smith.bsky.social et al. (2025) studied 📱use on mum-infant r/s: infant social-emo'l devt, birth parity, appraisal support for mums & maternal 📱use during critical parenting periods predicted mother-infant responsiveness #infancypapers doi.org/10.1111/infa...

🔍 We are looking for parents to join us at the University of Edinburgh for an exciting new research project! Can you help us design resources to support parents with effective smartphone use habits? To find out more, and to join us for this hands-on and innovative project: tinyurl.com/yy2mvd45

New fathers' mental health is often overlooked, but recent research shows what helps: 💬 Check in with dads too 👋 Actively involve them 📄 Share dad-focused info 🗣️ Offer one-to-one space to talk 💡 Treat families as a unit Read full study:

Paternal perinatal mental health support: fathers’ perspectives on barriers, facilitators, and preferences - Discover Mental Health

The perinatal period is a time of increased vulnerability to psychological distress. Paternal mental wellbeing is linked to both maternal and child wellbeing. Paternal mental health problems are…

link.springer.com

📣 We are recruiting for a new study! 📣 We want to talk to first time parents in the UK with babies aged under 12 months old about their experiences of using their phones while parenting. The good, the bad - we want to hear it all! Join us for an online focus group: tinyurl.com/483vnewu

Let's Connect is my (relatively infrequent) newsletter, bringing together up-to-date knowledge and information about effective smartphone use, positive device habits, and digital wellness for parents with babies. Read the latest newsletter and subscribe for future posts here: tinyurl.com/4m63kd8x

March Newsletter:

Resources for Promoting Effective Smartphone Use and Digital Wellness

lets-connect.beehiiv.com

Our paper focusing on the voices of pregnant women experiencing perinatal distress was cited in Forbes: "3 Harsh Truths About Pregnancy That No One Tells You—By A Psychologist" Read the study: tinyurl.com/mvbu3cu6 Read the Forbes article: tinyurl.com/mr43x8nh

www.bbc.com/news/article... 58 of those children were babies under the age of one. If you're not thinking about poverty, you're not thinking about infant mental health.

Temporary housing linked to deaths of at least 74 children

Official data show that 58 of those children were babies under the age of one.

bbc.com

What does it feel like for pregnant women who experience psychological distress? Our study published in PPTRP explores the voices of women for whom pregnancy was "not all glowing and kale smoothies" bpspsychub.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... #PerinatalMentalHealth #MaternalMentalHealth

<em>Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice</em> | BPS Journal | Wiley Online Library

Objectives This study aimed to explore the experiences of women with moderate-to-severe mental health difficulties during pregnancy, with a focus on establishing their psychological needs. Psycholog.....

bpspsychub.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

450 mothers across the UK took part in my cross-sectional survey to explore the associations between mental health, infant development, #smartphone use habits, and #mother-infant responsiveness. A summary of the results in plain English can be found here: blogs.ed.ac.uk/wellbeing-sm...

Scottish Charity Starter pack: go.bsky.app/VDuTxi3 Now including @sharedparentsco.bsky.social @peekscot.bsky.social 👍

Technology isn’t inherently bad. We just need to be reflective about how we use it. @peteetchells.bsky.social summarises perfectly why panic fuelled research can lead us nowhere! www.bps.org.uk/psychologist...

Happy to share the first empirical paper from my PhD thesis in collab with Angus MacBeth and @karri-g-smith.bsky.social - a cluster analysis of risk and protective factors for maternal smartphone use and mother-infant responsiveness onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/... #PerinatalMentalHealth

Associations between maternal smartphone use and mother‐infant responsiveness: A cluster analysis of potential risk and protective factors

Contradictory results in the extant literature suggests that additional risk factors should be considered when exploring the impacts of maternal smartphone use on mother-infant relationships. This st...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

2025 might be the year that I start triple writing! www.timeshighereducation.com/campus/stret...

Stretch your work further by ‘triple writing’

Rewriting your research to serve different purposes and to reach different audiences can lead to new opportunities. And it’s fun, says Matthew Flinders

timeshighereducation.com

I loved using a dynamic systems approach throughout my PhD to understand the developing relationship between mother and infant. This blog post from @researchbow.bsky.social introduces state space grids - a methodology for observing dynamic interactions: 👀 👉 blogs.ed.ac.uk/research-bow...

How effective are different psychological interventions for anxiety in the perinatal period? We conducted a meta-analysis to find out bpspsychub.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... Results suggest both CBT and mindfulness based (MBI) interventions are effective throughout the perinatal period.

<em>Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice</em> | BPS Journal | Wiley Online Library

Purpose Anxiety disorders are relatively common during pregnancy and the postnatal period. Despite their potential acceptability to users, psychological interventions research for this population is...

bpspsychub.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

A number of factors can influence dyadic synchrony between mother and infant in the first year of life. Our systematic review identified a number of social determinants of health as well as biological factors. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/... #Parent-InfantRelationships #InfantMentalHealth

After using an online survey to collect data, I realised I had been infiltrated by bots! Read this blog and find out my tips and tricks to spot them and stop them from ruining your data!

Research Bow@researchbow.bsky.social · 3y ago

👏Using an online survey for data collection? 🤖Read about @lisagolds.bsky.social experience of identifying bots in her survey and gain some helpful tips on how to spot them and prevent them from responding in your own research! 👉 blogs.ed.ac.uk/research-bow...