Dr Laura Nicholson

Profile

Biography

Whilst working towards my PhD in Psychology, I taught for five years as a Sessional Lecturer at Liverpool John Moores University and also worked as a Research Assistant in Psychology at Edge Hill University for 18 months. I completed my PhD in 2010. I then worked as an Associate Tutor in Psychology at Edge Hill University, before joining the research team in the Faculty of Education, also at Edge Hill University, in 2013. After seven years, I left my role of Senior Research Fellow to return to the Department of Psychology as Senior Lecturer in 2020. I have since achieved Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy.

Alongside my employed position, I became a Chartered Psychologist in 2014 and Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society in 2017. I am Associate Editor of the British Journal of Educational Psychology and serve on the editorial boards of Educational Psychology: An International Journal of Experimental Educational Psychology and Social Psychology of Education: An International Journal. I regularly examine PhDs and peer review for several international journals. 

I am Programme Leader for the Specialist Pathways in Psychology (Educational Psychology, Sport and Exercise Psychology, and Psychology and Criminology).

Research Interests

My research interests focus on the psychology of education, particularly student motivation and achievement and the variables that affect and are affected by these, such as test anxiety, achievement emotions, perceptions of control and value, student perceptions of teacher messages, academic self-concept, wellbeing at school and in general, and student-teacher relationships.

Teaching

The modules I teach on are:

EDP3106: Student Motivation and Engagement (Module Leader)

EDP1001: Introduction to Educational Psychology (Module Leader)

EDP2004: The Psychology of Teaching, Learning and Instruction

PSY1117: Real World Psychology

PSY3135: Psychology Undergraduate Dissertation

Supervision: MRes and PhD Psychology

• Warning Students of the Consequences of Examination Failure: An Effective Strategy for Promoting Student Engagement?
• A Cross-Lagged Panel Analysis of Fear Appeal Appraisal and Student Engagement
• A Person-Centered Approach to Students’ Evaluations of Perceived Fear Appeals and their Association with Engagement
• Teacher motivational messages used prior to examinations
• Factors Influencing Chinese Undergraduate Students’ Emotions in an Online Language Learning Context During the COVID Pandemic

View full research outputs

• Higher Education Academy (External organisation)
• British Journal of Educational Psychology (Journal)
• University of Manchester MEd Psychology of Education
• Using the ABC model to change how you approach exams
• A longitudinal study investigating how students’ perceptions of teacher fear appeals relate to academic outcomes