Welcome to the BPS Social Psychology Section!

The Social Psychology Section is part of the British Psychological Society (BPS), which is a non-profit-making educational and professional organisation for psychologists in the UK.

As a section of the British Psychological Society (BPS), it receives financial support from the Society and it is represented on major BPS committees and at BPS conferences.

In the current socio-political context of education and research fundings cuts, where disciplines compete for the recognition of their societal and academic value, it is more important than ever that social psychology has a strong and distinctive voice

 The Social Psychology section aims to:

• Encourage social psychological research
• Facilitate the development of social psychological knowledge
• Facilitate and promote the application of social psychological knowledge in a variety of settings
• Support and facilitate the professional development of social psychologists
• Promote social psychological responses to social problems at national and international level
• Increase public understanding of social psychology
• Safeguard a central place for social psychology in the curricula of psychology degrees.

Achieving our Aims:

The Social Psychology Section aims to meet the objectives above through the following activities:

• An Annual Social Psychology Section Conference
• Supporting seminars, workshops, and other conferences organised by members of the section
• Offering pump priming funds for such events
• Establishing awards for a recent PhD, Mid-Career, and Distinguised Contribution to Social Psychology
• Supporting policy relevant meetings with government and non-government organisations
• Responding to consultation documents and/or initiatives relevant to the development of social psychology; for example, the ESRC Psychology Bench marking Exercise and Nomination of REF Panel Members.

The Committee

The Social Psychology Section has an elected committee and chair who manage and run section activities, such as the Social Psychology Annual Conference.

Chair and Council/Research Board representative: Abigail Locke (a.locke@hud.ac.uk)

Honorary Secretary: Sharon Coen (s.coen@salford.ac.uk)

Treasurer: Dora Brown (dora.brown@surrey.ac.uk)

Social Psychological Review (SPR) editor: Claire Campbell (c.campbell2@ulster.ac.uk)

SPR Book Review Editor: Beth Richardson (bhrichardson@uclan.ac.uk) 

Conference officer Jane Montague (j.montague@derby.ac.uk)

Press Officer: Carrie Childs (c.childs@derby.ac.uk)

Website officer: Kirsty Budds (k.budds@keele.ac.uk)

Impact Workshop Co-ordinator: Caroline Howarth (C.S.Howarth@lse.ac.uk)

Postgraduate officer: Daniel Jolley (Dj93@kent.ac.uk)

Ordinary Member: Dennis Nigbur (dennis.nigbur@canterbury.ac.uk)

Ordinary Member: Chris Walton (c.walton@lancaster.ac.uk)