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Phone:: (023) 8059 9020
Email:: F.L.Bishop@soton.ac.uk

Dr Felicity Bishop MSc, PhD

Associate Professor, Programme Director, MSc Health Psychology

Dr Felicity Bishop is a health psychologist leading an interdisciplinary programme of mixed methods research around complementary therapies and placebo effects in health care within Psychology at the University of Southampton.

Placebo effects are real and powerful. Can we harness them ethically to improve healthcare?

I am a Chartered Psychologist and Health Psychologist. I have an MA in Experimental Psychology from the University of Oxford (The Queen’s College) and an MSc in Health Psychology from the University of Southampton. In 2006 I obtained my PhD in Psychology from the University of Southampton. Following some postdoctoral work I moved to Primary Care and Population Sciences within the Faculty of Medicine to take up an Arthritis Research UK Career Development Fellowship. From 2008 to 2011 I undertook a programme of research, funded under the Fellowship, using mixed methods to investigate psychosocial aspects of acupuncture for low back pain. During this period I was also a visiting researcher at Harvard University, developing a programme of work around lay perspectives on placebo effects. In 2012 I returned to Psychology at the University of Southampton to take up a Lectureship in Health Psychology. In 2015 I was promoted to Associate Professor.

Research

Responsibilities

Publications

Teaching

Contact

Research interests

I have an interdisciplinary programme of mixed methods research around contextual effects in health care, encompassing topics including: ethical, scientific and lay perspectives on use of placebos in clinical practice and research; uptake and adherence to treatments for back pain; applications and elaborations of the common-sense model of illness perception; utilisation of complementary and alternative medicines and psychosocial mediators of their effectiveness; mixing qualitative and quantitative methods.

My work on complementary and alternative medicines led to my selection through international open competition as 1 of 12 international complementary medicine research fellows at the Australian Research Centre for Complementary and Integrative Medicine, University of Technology Sydney. I continue as an Honorary Visiting Research Fellow, at the University of Technology Sydney.

Grants

Current PhD Research Students

Contextual Factors in Low Back Pain Consultations. Dima Ivanova. (Funding: ESRC SCDTP 1+3 studentship)

Expanding models of health behaviour change: A critical evaluation of health promotion in traditional acupuncture. Jonquil Pinto. (Funding: Vice-Chancellor’s Scholarship, British Acupuncture Council)

Reconceptualising Patient-Reported Outcome Measures as Active Components of Complex Interventions. Michelle Holmes. (Funding: Vice-Chancellor’s Scholarship, Royal College of Chiropractors, Anglo-European College of Chiropractic, and Southampton Complementary Medicine Research Trust)

Healthy Sexual Aging: A mixed-method Study of Sexual Function and Sexual Well-being in Older European Adults. Lauren Towler. (Funding: Norwegian Research Council)

Patient and health professionals’ attitudes, behaviours, and intentions towards long-term depression management in primary care. Rachel Dewar-Haggart. (Funding: NIHR National School for Primary Care Research)

Completed PhD Research Students

2016-2019. From inert pills to subjunctive medicine: an exploration of the placebo effect in general practice. Doug Hardman. (Funding: NIHR National School for Primary Care Research)

2014-2018. Peer support and homelessness. Stephanie Barker.

2009-2013. Exploring illness representations and management of multimorbidity in people with diabetes and depression. Jenny McSharry.

2008-2013. How do experiences of physiotherapy and osteopathy vary between the NHS and private practice? Katherine Bradbury.

Research group

Centre for Clinical and Community Applications of Health Psychology (CCCAHP)

Affiliate research group

Primary Care, Population Sciences and Medical Education

Assessing Cognitive behavioural Therapy in Irritable Bowel Syndrome (ACTIB)

University of Southampton - Current Responsibilities

Director of Programmes, Psychology (2020 – present)
Director MSc Health Psychology (2015 – present);
Admissions Tutor: MSc Health Psychology

External – Current and Recent Education Roles

External examiner for BSc Psychology, Aston University
External examiner for MSc Research Methods, University of Nottingham
External examiner for PhDs at Monash, Plymouth, Sydney, RMIT, KCL.
External examiner for MScs at University of Oxford, Private Universität Witten.
Opponent for PhD student at Karolinska Institutet
Guest lecturer on mixed methods research at University of Oxford and Catholic University of Louvain.

External – Research and Scholarship Roles

Associate Editor British Journal of Health Psychology
Elected member of the Board of Directors, International Society of Traditional, Complementary & Integrative Medicine Researchers.

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Articles

Book Chapters

Lavorgna, A., & Bishop, F. (Accepted/In press). Framing of CAM-adjacent health scams in the UK media: an interdisciplinary perspective. In A. Lavorgna, & A. Di Ronco (Eds.), Medical Misinformation and Social Harm in Non-Science-Based Health Practices: Routledge.
Yardley, L., & Bishop, F. (2007). Mixing qualitative and quantitative methods: a pragmatic approach. In C. Willig, & W. Stainton-Rogers (Eds.), The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research in Psychology (pp. 352-370). SAGE Publications.
Bishop, F., & Yardley, L. (2007). Qualitative Assessment. In S. Ayers, A. Baum, C. McManus, S. Newman, K. Wallston, J. Weinman, & R. West (Eds.), Cambridge Handbook of Psychology, Health and Medicine (pp. 314-318). Cambridge University Press.

Conferences

Letters/Editorials

Webster, R. K., Bishop, F., Collins, G. S., Evers, A. W. M., Hoffmann, T., Knottnerus, J. A., Lamb, S. E., Macdonald, H., Madigan, C., Napadow, V., Price, A., Rees, J. L., & Howick, J. (2021). Measuring the success of blinding in placebo-controlled trials: should we be so quick to dismiss it? Journal of Clinical Epidemiology. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclinepi.2021.02.022
Shaw, R. L., Bishop, F. L., Horwood, J., Chilcot, J., & Arden, M. A. (2019). Enhancing the quality and transparency of qualitative research methods in health psychology. British Journal of Health Psychology, 24(4), 739-745. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjhp.12393
Steel, A., Sundberg, T., Reid, R., Ward, L., Bishop, F., Leach, M., Cramer, H., Wardle, J., & Adams, J. (2017). Reply to the letter to the editor: ‘Systematic review of comparative effectiveness and health economics research relating to osteopathic manipulative treatment’. Musculoskeletal Science and Practice. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.msksp.2017.02.001

Report

Hardman, D., & Bishop, F. (2018). The importance of logic when choosing how to approach a systematic review: lessons from a meta-ethnography of how healthcare professionals and patients understand placebos and their effects in primary care. (SAGE Research Methods Cases Part 2). SAGE Publications. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781526445353

Reviews

Beard, D. J., Campbell, M. K., Blazeby, J. M., Carr, A. J., Weijer, C., Cuthbertson, B. H., Buchbinder, R., Pinkney, T., Bishop, F. L., Pugh, J., Cousins, S., Harris, I. A., Lohmander, L. S., Blencowe, N., Gillies, K., Probst, P., Brennan, C., Cook, A., Farrar-Hockley, D., ... Cook, J. A. (2020). Considerations and methods for placebo controls in surgical trials (ASPIRE guidelines). Lancet (London, England), 395(10226), 828-838. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(19)33137-X
Holmes, M. M., Stanescu, S-C., & Bishop, F. (2019). The use of measurement systems to support patient self-management of long-term conditions: an overview of opportunities and challenges. Patient Related Outcome Measures, 2019(10), 385-394. https://doi.org/10.2147/PROM.S178488

I lead these modules:

PSYC6002 Psychology and the Delivery of Health Care
RESM6012 Applied Research Methods (ARM): Qualitative Methods
PSYC6128 Apprenticeship in Health Psychology

I also teach on these modules:

PSYC2026: Introduction to Health Psychology
PSYC6001 Biopsychosocial aspects of health
PSYC6003 Psychosocial Aspects of Illness & Disability
RESM6012 Applied Research Methods (ARM): Planning and Designing

And I supervise and act as personal academic tutor for undergraduate, MSc, professional doctorate, and PhD students.

Dr Felicity Bishop
Building 44 Highfield Campus University of Southampton SO17 1BJ

Room Number: 44/3067

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