Developing Conceptual and Experimental Analyses of Key Concepts in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Based on Relational Frame Theory

These scholarships will cover full-time PhD tuition fees for three years (subject to satisfactory academic performance) and will provide a £900 per annum research training support grant (RTSG) to help support the PhD researcher.

Applicants who already hold a doctoral degree or who have been registered on a programme of research leading to the award of a doctoral degree on a full-time basis for more than one year (or part-time equivalent) are NOT eligible to apply for an award.

Please note: you will automatically be entered into the competition for the Full Award, unless you state otherwise in your application.

The scholarship will cover tuition fees at the Home rate and a maintenance allowance of £19,000 (tbc) per annum for three years (subject to satisfactory academic performance).

This scholarship also comes with £900 per annum for three years as a research training support grant (RTSG) allocation to help support the PhD researcher.

Arch, J.J., Fishbein, J. N., Finkelstein, L.B., & Luoma, J.B. (2023). Acceptance and commitment therapy mediation and processes: Problems and how to address them. Behavior Therapy,54, 971-988. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.beth.2022.07.005

Barnes-Holmes, D., Barnes-Holmes, Y., & McEnteggart, C. (2020). Updating RFT (more field than frame) and its implications for process-based therapy. The Psychological Record, 70, 605-624. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40732-019-00372-3

Barnes-Holmes, D., Finn, M., McEnteggart, C., & Barnes-Holmes, Y. (2018). Derived stimulus relations and their role in a behavior-analytic account of human language and cognition. Perspectives on Behavior Science, 41, 155-173. https://doi.org/10.1037/bar0000129

Barnes-Holmes, D., & Harte, C. (2022). Relational frame theory 20 years on: The Odysseus voyage and beyond. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 117, 240-266. https://doi.org/10.1002/jeab.733

Barnes-Holmes, Y., Hussey, I., McEnteggart, C., Barnes-Holmes, D., & Foody, M. (2016). Scientific ambition: The relationship between relational frame theory and middle-level terms in acceptance commitment therapy. In R.D. Zettle, S.C. Hayes, D. Barnes-Holmes, & A. Biglan (Eds), They Wiley Handbook of Contextual Behavioral Science (pp 365-382), West Sussex, UK: Wiley-Blackwell.

Blackledge, J. T. (2007). Disrupting verbal processes: Cognitive defusion in acceptance and commitment therapy and other mindfulness-based psychotherapies. The Psychological Record, 57(4), 555-576. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03395595

Harte, C. & Barnes-Holmes, D. (2021). A primer on Relational Frame Theory (RFT). In M.P. Twohig, M.E. Levin, & J.M. Peterson (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (pp. 77-108), Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780197550076.013.4

Harte, C., Barnes-Holmes, D., de Rose, J. C., Perez, W. F., de Almeida, J. H. (2022). Grappling with the complexity of behavioral processes in human psychological suffering: Some potential insights from relational frame theory. Perspectives on Behavior Science, 46, 237-259. https://doi.org/0.1007/s40614-022-00363-w

Hayes, S. C., Barnes-Holmes, D, & Roche, B. (2001). Relational frame theory: A post-Skinnerian account of human language and cognition. New York: Plenum.

Hayes, S. C., Barnes-Holmes, D., & Wilson, K. G. (2012). Contextual behavioral science: Creating a science more adequate to the challenge of the human condition. Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science, 1(1-2), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcbs.2012.09.004

Hayes, S. C., Ciarrochi, J., Hofmann, S. G., Chin, F., & Sahdra, B. (2022). Evolving an idionomic approach to processes of change: Towards a unified personalized science of human improvement. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 156. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.brat.2022.104155

Hayes, S. C., Strosahl, K., & Wilson, K.G. (1999). Acceptance and Commitment Therapy: An experiential approach to behavior change. New York: Guilford Press.

Hayes, S. C., Strosahl, K., & Wilson, K.G. (2003). Acceptance and Commitment Therapy: An experiential approach to behavior change (2nd Ed.). New York: Guilford Press.

Hofmann, S. G., & Hayes, S. C. (2019). The future of intervention science: Process-based therapy. Clinical Psychological Science, 7, 37-50. https://doi/10.1177/2167702618772296

Vahey, N. A., Nicholson, E., & Barnes-Holmes, D. (2015). A meta-analysis of criterion effects for the Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure (IRAP) in the clinical domain. Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry, 48, 59–65. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbtep.2015.01.004