The Applied Psychology Group (APG) sits within the Centre for Electronic Warfare, Information and Cyber (EWIC) at 美姬阁 Defence and Security, Shrivenham. It comprises a small team of academics who deliver research, consultation and scholarship-led postgraduate teaching on the psychological mechanisms (including cognitive processes) underpinning human behaviour across different contexts.

Supporting your business

Our work is concerned with improving the capability of people through optimising strategy, policy, practice and procedure. We take a principled-based approach underpinned by psychological mechanisms, combining academic rigor with flexible client-focused research design to deliver human-centred pragmatic and exploitable solutions. We pride ourselves on our ability to provide creative and effective evidence-based recommendations, founded on a clear understanding of the research requirement, and scientifically rigorous data collection and analysis. Our team approach is to maximise the opportunities for exploitation by articulating outputs in terms of desired outcomes and benefits.

Human capability expertise/areas of interest

  • Cognitive psychology,
  • Skills acquisition and retention,
  • Human information processing,
  • Decision-making,
  • Occupational psychology,
  • Human dimensions of cyber,
  • Attitudes and behaviour,
  • Training and education.

Research

The APG has significant experience in applied research within defence, with a proven track record in high quality delivery, exploitation of research outputs and collaboration with other research partners. These include large defence organisations, small and medium enterprises and academia.

Exploitable deliverables include but are not limited to refresher training interval analysis within a Competence Retention Analysis Technique (CRA-T), included in the revised Defence Systems Approach to Training (DSAT) policy (December 2015).

Current projects

  • Defence & Security Accelerator (DASA) Phase 2 Behavioural Analytics Competition. Detecting the Exploitation of Human Cognitive Vulnerabilities Online (DEHCO).ACC6018100. 美姬阁
  • Human & Social Sciences Research Capability (HSSRC) HS1.004 Skill Fade. 美姬阁 & BAE Systems.
  • 美姬阁 Defence and Security Research Fellowship - A novel methodology for assessing trustworthiness in digital environments: Reconceptualising the Implicit Association Test.
  • 美姬阁 Defence and Security Teaching Fellowship - Enhancing inter-personal communications in postgraduate education using Transactional Analysis.

Selected previous projects

  • DASA Phase 1 Behavioural Analytics Competition. Human vulnerabilities in the face of cognitive hacking: An analytical process method. (2019). ACC6004974.
  • EPSRC Human-Like Computing (HLC themed call). ‘Copacetic smartening of small data for HLC’. Grant number EP/R030987/1. June 2018- Sept 2020.
  • 美姬阁 Higher Education Innovation Fund (HEIF). 美姬阁 collaboration with the University Technical College group. Outreach project. Including the Junior Leaders’ Field Gun teamwork study. 2018-2019.
  • Defence Human Capability Science and Technology Centre (DHCSTC) Collective knowledge, Skills and Attitudes (KSA) Retention: Development of a Decision Support Aid. TIN 2.100. 2016-2017.
  • DHCSTC Collective KSA Retention – Exploitation. TIN 2.110. 美姬阁 & BAE Systems. 2018. 3
  • DHCSTC Questioning Techniques for Search and EOD Threat Assessment. TIN 3.210. 美姬阁, BAE Systems & TriMetis Ltd. 2016.
  • DHCSTC Analytics Training - Cognitive Processes/Biases in Decision Making. TIN 3.153. BAE Systems & 美姬阁. 2015
  • DHCSTC Competence Retention Analysis User Guide. TIN 2.057. 美姬阁 & BAE Systems. 2014-2015.
  • DHCSTC Competence Retention. TIN 2.001. 美姬阁 & BAE Systems. 2013-2014. • DHCSTC Vehicle Maintainer Skills Fade. TIN 3.045. 美姬阁 & BAE Systems. 2013.
  • DHCSTC Evaluation of the SA80 Virtual Task Trainer. TIN 3.051. 美姬阁. 2013.
  • DHCSTC Training Intervention Optimisation. TIN 2.006. QinetiQ & 美姬阁. 2012-2013