Clara Humpston
Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Mental Health

Profile

Biography

With a background in both psychopharmacology and psychiatric research methods, I was awarded my PhD on the cognitive neuropsychiatry of schizotypy and first episode psychosis in Professor David Linden’s lab from Cardiff University in February 2018, focusing on predictive processing and source monitoring frameworks. I began my first postdoctoral position in 2017 at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London working on chronotherapeutics for the rapid treatment of depression, before taking up a post of Research Fellow at the Institute of Mental Health, University of Birmingham in 2019. I joined the Department of Psychology as a Lecturer in Mental Health at the University of York in April 2022.

Career

Apr 2022 – Present Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Mental Health, University of York
Jun 2019 – Apr 2022 Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Institute for Mental Health, University of Birmingham
Dec 2017 – Apr 2019 Postdoctoral Research Associate, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London
Nov 2012 – Sept 2014 Research Assistant, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London
PhD in Cognitive Neuropsychiatry, Cardiff University (2018)
MSc (Distinction) in Psychiatric Research, King’s College London (2012)
BSc (2:1 Hons) in Pharmacology, University of Bristol (2011)

Research

Overview

Towards an interdisciplinary understanding of schizophrenia

Projects

My research interests mainly focus on schizophrenia-spectrum psychoses. My research experiences span from psychopharmacology to cognitive neuropsychiatry to phenomenology, and I am heavily involved with the International Consortium for Hallucination Research. I am a strong proponent of inter- and multidisciplinary approaches and values the importance of multiple lines of scientific inquiry in mental health research.

Research group(s)

Hallucination, Thought and Self in Schizophrenia (HATSS) Lab
York HATSS Lab website

Grants

2023 University of York Impact Fund (£1,447)
2023 NIHR Research Design Service Yorkshire and Humber Public Involvement Funding Award (£600)
2023 University of York Small Award for Research Priming (£1,500)
2021 Co-applicant, EPSRC Towards Turing 2.0 Core Funding (£29,760.80)
2019 University of Birmingham School of Psychology Pump-priming Fund (£1,300)
2019 University of Birmingham Internationalisation Grant (£932)
2014 Medical Research Council Doctoral Training Grant and Cardiff School of Psychology Studentship Award
2014 Experimental Psychology Society Grindley Grant (£500) / Psychiatry Research Trust Conference Grant (£500)
2013 Guarantors of Brain Full Travel Grant (£800)

Awards and Prizes:

2020 Fellowship of the UK Higher Education Academy
2018 Cognitive Neuropsychiatry Best Young Researcher Paper Award: 3rd Prize
2016 Cardiff University First Year PhD Prize for Early Promise
2015 Medical Research Council Max Perutz Science Writing Prize: Commendation (3rd Prize)
2011 University of Bristol R. B. Barlow Final Year Pharmacology Research Project Prize

Collaborators

National collaborators:

Professor Beth Jefferies, University of York
Professor Robert Dudley, University of York
Dr Aidan Horner, University of York
Professor Matthew Ratcliffe, University of York
Professor Matthew Broome, University of Birmingham
Professor Steven Marwaha, University of Birmingham
Professor Rachel Upthegrove, University of Birmingham
Dr Jack Rogers, University of Birmingham
Dr Maria Michail, University of Birmingham
Professor Anthony David, University College London
Dr Vaughan Bell, University College London
Professor Quinton Deeley, King’s College London
Professor David Veale, King’s College London
Professor Allan Young, King’s College London
Professor Emma Robinson, University of Bristol
Professor Derek Jones, Cardiff University
Dr Lisa Evans, Cardiff University

International collaborators:

Professor David Linden, Maastricht University
Dr Cherise Rosen, University of Illinois at Chicago
Professor Sohee Park, Vanderbilt University
Dr Katharine Thakkar, Michigan State University
Dr Anne Giersch, French Institute of Health and Medical Research
Professor Henry Jackson, University of Melbourne
Professor Flavie Waters, University of Western Australia
Professor Barnaby Nelson, University of Melbourne
Professor Frank Larøi, University of Oslo
Dr Elisabeth Haug, Norwegian University of Science and Technology
Professor Todd Woodward, University of British Columbia

Available PhD research projects

Available for PhD supervision – please feel free to email

Teaching

Undergraduate

Advanced module, Schizophrenia and Related Psychoses
BSc and MSci final year project supervision

Postgraduate

MSc Psychology of Mental Health, Module Lead on Serious Mental Illness
Programme Co-director, MSc Psychology of Mental Health

Publications

Selected publications

Humpston, C.S., and Woodward, T.S. (2024). Soundless voices, silenced selves: Are auditory-verbal hallucinations in schizophrenia truly perceptual? The Lancet Psychiatry, https://doi.org/10.1016/S2215-0366(24)00061-0.
Thakkar, K.N., McCleery, A., Minor, K.S., Lee, J., Humpston, C.S., Chopik, W.J., Burt, S.A., Pearson, A.L., Ungar, M., and Park, S. (2023). Moving from risk to resilience in psychosis research. Nature Reviews Psychology, 2, 537–555.
Humpston, C.S. (2023). Paradoxes in a prism: Reflections on the omnipotent passivity and omniscient oblivion of schizophrenia. Philosophical Psychology, 36(8), 1507-1520.
Ritunnano, R., Kleinman, J.J., Oshodi, D.W., Michail, M., Nelson, B., Humpston, C.S., and Broome, M.R. (2022). Subjective experience and meaning of delusions in psychosis: systematic review and qualitative evidence synthesis. The Lancet Psychiatry, 9(6), 458-476
Humpston, C.S. (2022). Isolated by Oneself: Ontologically Impossible Experiences in Schizophrenia. Philosophy, Psychiatry & Psychology, 29(1), 5-15.
Burgin, S., Reniers, R., and Humpston, C. (2022). Prevalence and assessment of self-disorders in the schizophrenia spectrum: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Scientific Reports, 12:1165.
Thomas, L., Torregrossa, L., Reniers, R., and Humpston, C. (2021). Exploring multimodal hallucinations and disturbances in the basic and bodily self: A cross-sectional study in a non-clinical sample. Journal of Psychiatric Research, 143, 144-154.
Humpston, C., Harrow, M., and Rosen, C. (2020). Behind the opaque curtain: A 20-year longitudinal study of dissociative and first-rank symptoms in schizophrenia-spectrum psychoses, other psychoses and non-psychotic disorders. Schizophrenia Research, 223, 327-334.
Humpston, C.S., and Broome, M.R. (2020). Thinking, Believing, and Hallucinating Self in Schizophrenia. The Lancet Psychiatry, 7(7), 638-646.

Full publications list

See Google Scholar or ResearchGate for a full list of publications.

External activities

Memberships

Member, Schizophrenia International Research Society (SIRS)
Member of Editorial Board, Cognitive Neuropsychiatry, Philosophical Psychology, BMC Psychology
Member of Executive Board, Royal College of Psychiatrists Philosophy Special Interest Group
Grant Reviewer, Medical Research Council, King's Health Partners Challenge Fund, Research Foundation Flanders
Invited Peer Reviewer for more than 30 scientific journals

Invited talks and conferences

Selected Invited Talks:

Plenary presentation on Predictive Self-Modelling and the Phenomenology of Psychosis, Universidad de Valparaíso, Valparaíso, Chile (May 2024)
Keynote presentation on interdisciplinary mental health research, INSPIRE Yorkshire Interdisciplinary Clinical Research Conference, York, UK (October 2023)
Presentation on paradoxes and ontologically impossible experiences in schizophrenia, PhenoLab, Universidad de Sevilla, Spain (December 2022)
Keynote presentation on the phenomenology of schizophrenia, International Conference on the Philosophy of Madness and the Madness of Philosophy, Ghent, Belgium (September 2021)
Presentation on delusion formation, Deluded by Experience Workshop, Birmingham, UK (July 2021)
Presentation on the phenomenology of psychosis and self-disorders, Gaustad Hospital, Oslo, Norway (October 2019)
Presentation on multimodal hallucinations and bodily self, International Consortium on Hallucination Research Working Group Meeting, Durham, UK (September 2019, as working group chair)
Presentation on the relationships between auditory-verbal hallucinations and delusional thoughts, International Consortium on Hallucination Research Working Group Meeting, Lille, France (November 2017, as working group chair)
Presentation on the phenomenology of auditory-verbal hallucinations, International Consortium on Hallucination Research Satellite Meeting, Chicago, USA (September 2016)

Clara Humpston Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Mental Health