My research to date has focused on three main areas:

(1) Goal and implementation intentions as determinants of behaviour change

How do people achieve their goals and make changes to their behaviour? The usual answer is that people need to be motivated. However, even medium-to-large changes in people's intentions seem to have only a small-to-medium effect on their behavior. In short, motivation is not enough. As a result, much of my research to date has investigated how the effects of motivation can be boosted by forming specific plans -- known as "implementation intentions" -- that link good opportunities to act with suitable responses to those opportunities.

(2) Internet-based interventions for health behaviours

The Internet is increasingly used as a medium for the delivery of interventions designed to promote health behavior change. However, reviews of these interventions to date have not systematically identified intervention characteristics and linked these to effectiveness. We conducted a meta-analysis that attested to the importance of using theory to guide intervention development and compared the relative efficacy of a number of behaviour change techniques and modes of delivery.

(3) Emotion regulation

As part of an ESRC large grant titled "Emotion Regulation in Others and Self" (EROS) we are investigating the efficacy of a number of affect regulation strategies as well as the neurophysiology of emotion regulation.