Professor Hilary Moss, Irish World Academy of Music and Dance, and Associate Professor Daragh Bradshaw, Department of Psychology, were the winners of the Early Career Research Consolidator Award and Starting Award respectively for 2024.
Professor Hilary Moss
Hilary is Professor at the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance and a member of UL鈥檚 Health Research Institute.
Her interdisciplinary research integrates humanities, health sciences and other areas including computer science and is an important scholarly contribution to the growing evidence that engaging with the arts positively impacts health.
Innovative solutions are being piloted at UL, for example trialling telehealth music therapy with computer science colleagues for people with dementia, an international innovation.
Hilary's field of research investigates how music supports the health and wellbeing of people living with dementia (PLWD) and their family carers.
Since completing her PhD in 2015, Hilary have developed a programme of work in this area and built a team of music and dementia researchers at UL across humanities and STEM.
Significant contributions include developing the first European telehealth music therapy service for PLWD and developing two practical guides for healthcare staff and family members, to guide them to provide high quality appropriate individualised music interventions for PLWD.
The beneficiaries of Hilary's research are people living with dementia in Ireland, family carers, students and clinicians, music therapy professionals and public education about dementia.
As part of the winner's prize, a Research Impact podcast is recorded.
Music Therapy hitting the right note in improving health and wellbeing discusses the need for the inclusion of Music Therapy in health care and she highlights examples of how music therapy specifically focused on dementia care has changed patients and their carers' lives.
Find out more about Hilary's research
Associate Professor Daragh Bradshaw
Daragh is Associate Professor at the Department of Psychology and a member UL鈥檚 Centre for Social Issues Research.
He specialises in the application of theory and method to address real-world issues. A strength of his work is the creation of ambitious applied projects increasing our theoretical understanding and achieving maximum impact for those most in need.
Applying the Social Identity Model of Identity and Organisational Change in an applied setting addressing social and psychological outcomes, this research is conducted across a variety of community settings with demonstrable theoretical and applied impact such as stakeholder engagement, peer-reviewed publications, international awards, competitive funding, and through the application of his work in developing community supports
As part of the winner's prize, a Research Impact podcast is recorded.
In Nothing as practical as a good theory: A Social Identity approach to applied psychology Daragh talks about his research, the real-world impacts, informing national policy, the importance of collaboration and the support that UL provides to early career researchers.
Find out more about Daragh's research
