ECR Fire Talks (University of Sydney Psychology)

Samuel Warren

Staging frontotemporal dementia using multimodal features and event-based modelling

INTRODUCTION: Frontotemporal dementia (FTD) comprises several clinical phenotypes with overlapping features that can impact diagnostic timelines and confidence. Here, we applied event-based models (EBM) to characterise the relative ordering of shared clinical and neurodegenerative features in behavioural-variant FTD (bvFTD) and semantic dementia (SD).

METHODS: Cross-sectional EBMs were applied to bvFTD (n=86) and SD (n=32) groups relative to controls (n=57) using retrospective data from FRONTIER (N=175). Measures included general cognition, grey matter regions-of-interest, and behavioural abnormalities common in FTD.

RESULTS: Behavioural and cognitive features were ordered first in bvFTD, followed by abnormalities in frontostriatal, insular, and then medial temporal regions. In contrast, SD was characterised by probabilistic orderings of medial-temporal lobe, cognitive, insular, behavioural, and frontostriatal abnormalities, respectively.

DISCUSSION: EBMs applied to cross-sectional data enables identification of syndrome-specific patterns in the relative ordering of clinical and neuroanatomical abnormalities in FTD syndromes. This framework could assist with syndromic differentiation and clinical decision-making.

Bio:

Sam is a Postdoctoral Researcher in Computational Neuroscience at the University of Sydney. His research focuses on applying novel machine learning, deep learning, and statistical models to the characterisation and detection of dementia—with a specific focus on younger-onset dementia. He works on a vast array of data modalities, such as neuroimaging, clinical tests, omics, and digital health data. This work spans big-data research across large clinical populations, as well as fine-grained characterisations of rare disorders. 

Yue Li

Not Always Nice: Cultural Differences in Strategies and Motives for Making Others Feel Worse

People at times try to make others feel bad (i.e., affect worsening). Yet this form of interpersonal emotion regulation is understudied and drawn mainly from Western samples. Little is known about how it might differ across cultures, or between the perspectives of the regulator (who worsens others’ emotions) and the target (whose emotions are worsened). We examined cultural differences in affect worsening motives and strategies among Anglo-Celtic, East Asian, and South Asian participants in two studies framed from the regulator (Study 1, N = 607) or target (Study 2, N = 606) perspective. Two key findings emerged. First, after controlling for age, cultural differences in strategies emerged only from the regulator (but not target) perspective, with East Asians reporting greater use of show-off and cautioning strategies than the other groups. Second, cultural differences in motives varied by perspective: East Asians reported stronger self-focused motives (to win, to help me) as regulators, and South Asians perceived stronger counter-hedonic motives as targets. These findings suggest that culture shapes affect worsening differently for regulators and targets, with implications for cross-cultural communication.

Bio:

Yue Li is a post-doc at the School of Psychology working with Prof Carolyn MacCann. She obtained her PhD from the University of Texas at Dallas in August 2025. Her research focuses on culture, emotion, and interpersonal relationships. Her current work examines cultural differences in motives, strategies, and consequences of making others feel worse. During her PhD, she investigated how cultural context shapes the perception of emotional facial expressions and the regulation of one’s own and romantic partner’s emotions, and their implications for health and well-being.

Kyra Webb

Understanding carer experiences of fear and worry about their loved one’s cancer coming back

Partners, family members and friends play a vital role supporting people living with and beyond a cancer diagnosis. Fear of cancer recurrence (FCR), defined as the fear or worry that cancer may come back or progress is a key concern for cancer carers. Almost half of carers report levels that would be considered clinically significant among cancer survivors. At high levels, FCR is associated with poorer psychological outcomes such as increased levels of depression and anxiety. Despite identified need, few interventions addressing carer FCR are available. This talk will describe how foundational work to understand carer-specific FCR experiences has been applied to develop a theoretically informed online intervention tailored to the needs of cancer carers.

Bio:

Dr Kyra Webb is a Research Fellow with the Psycho-Oncology Co-operative Research Group (PoCoG), based in the School of Psychology at The University of Sydney. Her research focuses on understanding and improving psychosocial support for people living with and beyond cancer, as well as the partners, family members, and friends who provide care.

Kyra completed her PhD at the University of Sydney in 2024, where she examined carers’ experiences of fear and worry about a loved one’s cancer recurring or progressing. This work resulted in the development of a conceptual model that captures the unique features of carer fear of cancer recurrence, alongside the development and psychometric validation of a new measurement tool. Her postdoctoral research builds on this work and focuses on the adaptation and pilot testing of a psychosocial intervention to address carer fear of cancer recurrence.

Kyra is passionate about developing evidence-based, accessible psychosocial support that is informed by, and meets the needs of people living with cancer and their family carers.

Iana Wong

Interpersonal Emotion Regulation in Couples: A Window into Coercive Control

Coercive control is a subtle form of intimate partner violence, making it difficult to identify before serious harm occurs. My research examines the psychosocial mechanisms underlying intimate partner violence, with a current focus on interpersonal emotion regulation. Specifically, I examine how partners’ deliberate worsening of each other’s emotional states predicts coercive control. A next step in this research is to examine whether it is not worsening alone, but the combination of improving and worsening a partner’s emotions, that may serve as an early warning sign of coercive control dynamics. Together, this program of research aims to better understand the mechanisms underlying intimate partner violence. Together with A/Prof Helen Paterson, I co organize a university-wide research network for domestic, sexual, and family violence researchers, and invite colleagues working in this space to connect.

Bio:

Dr Iana Wong is a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the School of Psychology at the University of Sydney, where she works with Prof Carolyn MacCann in the Regulation of Emotion and Affect Lab. She completed her PhD at UNSW in 2025, where she examined the psychosocial mechanisms linking insecure attachment to intimate partner violence.

Renèll Rodrigues

Virtual Reality as an Alternative for Attentional Bias Research and Assessment in Addiction

Attentional bias is a well-established factor in addiction research. However, traditional assessment tools face significant limitations. The widely used dot-probe task requires a large number of trials and participants to achieve statistical significance, while self-report questionnaires (such as the AUDIT) are prone to social desirability bias.

Alternative methods, such as 4×4 image arrays measuring participant eye movements (specifically dwell time), yield improved results; however, further analysis reveals an interaction between stimulus characteristics and spatial area, as many participants demonstrate spatial preferences independent of the stimulus shown. 

To address these challenges, a novel approach using VR technology presents stimuli on two moving conveyor belts, allowing participants to view them freely without explicit instructions. Initial findings are promising: total viewing time correlates significantly with AUDIT scores, suggesting that this VR-based free-viewing paradigm could serve as an effective tool for individual clinical assessment.

Bio:
Dr. Renèll Rodrigues earned her PhD from the University of Sydney in 2025. Her doctoral research investigated psychophysical methods and virtual reality (VR) technologies to develop novel paradigms for measuring attentional bias, with a focus on refining individual-level assessments for behavioural health challenges like alcohol addiction. Expanding on another area of interest, her current research explores the social and educational environments impacting neurodivergent children and adults.