Perspectives and challenges for the study of brain responses to coaching: Enhancing the dialogue between the fields of neuroscience and coaching psychology

Article: The interest in coaching psychology and neuroscience have been steadily increasing over the past 15 years. However, the two fields have not yet established consistent dialogues underpinned by experimental research. This paper highlights the importance of such dialogue for the growth of evidence-based coaching and how coaching psychology could benefit from previous neuroimaging and electroencephalographic studies in the field of psychotherapy and task-specific brain functioning to design research protocols that could significantly contribute to our understanding of how coaching works at the brain level and how coachees could best achieve results.

Launched in August, 2020, The International Journal of Coaching Psychology is a peer reviewed journal that publishes theory, research and practice articles on all aspects of coaching psychology.

The International Journal of Coaching Psychology editorial team invite papers on the theory, research and practice of coaching psychology. Editorials are written by the editors on topics of general interest or journal policy. Perspectives, leading articles, invited papers and keynote speeches maybe commissioned from experts in the coaching psychology and applied fields.

The journal team welcome research and discussion papers, brief reports, short papers on techniques, book reviews and conference reports.

The journal is sponsored by the International Society for Coaching Psychology, a professional membership body.

The Editor is Dr Siobhain O’Riordan PhD.

Credibility in Neuroscience webinar on reporting

This webinar was broadcast on 19 August 2020 as part of the British Neuroscience Association’s (BNA) work to ensure that neuroscience research is as robust, reliable, replicable, and reproducible as possible – increasing credibility in neuroscience.

Find out how we can take steps to improve the credibility of how neuroscience research is reported by using some of the new innovative ways to do this.

Federation of European Neuroscience Societies

Founded in 1998 at the first Forum of European Neuroscience, the Federation of European Neuroscience Societies (FENS) is the main organisation for neuroscience in Europe. FENS currently represents 43 European national and single discipline neuroscience societies with close to 23,000 member scientists from 33 European countries.
FENS promotes neuroscience research to policy-makers, funding bodies and the general public, both regionally and internationally.

The British Neuroscience Association (BNA) is the largest UK organisation representing all aspects of neuroscience.

The Aims of the BNA are to:

• promote neuroscience research
• organise lectures, symposia, meetings, events and reports
• advise on issues in neuroscience
• engage with the public and the media
• train neuroscientists and other neuroscience-related professionals
• represent UK neuroscience to Government, funding agencies, and science administration, regulation and standards organisations.

The BNA is a growing learned society with around 1700 members. There are many benefits of membership, including free or discounted registration for events, discounted journals and books, the BNA Journal and many other offers.

New Journal, The European Journal of Applied Positive Psychology is launched on 29 April, 2017.

The European Journal of of Applied Positive Psychology (EJAPP) was launched on 29 April, 2017 . The EJAPP is a peer reviewed journal focusing on all aspects of the theory, research and practice of positive psychology.

The Co-editors are: Dr Ilona Boniwell PhD (France), Prof Stephen Palmer PhD (England), Dr Siobhain O’Riordan PhD (England). The Associate Editors are Dr Anthony Grant PhD (Australia), Pascale Haag (France) and Dr Rebecca Shankland PhD (France).

The editors look forward to receiving contributions reflecting the counselling and psychotherapy field in Europe and beyond. Visit the website for further information about submissions.

Further Information from the EJAPP website.

Another article by the team at the Coaching Psychology Unit, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), Brazil and the Centre for Neuroscience, International Academy for Professional Development. The group undertook a systematic review of electroencephalographic findings in patients with major depressive disorder during cognitive or emotional tasks. The studies identified reveal the frontal cortex as an important brain structure involved in the
complex neural processes associated with MDD. Findings point to disorganization of right-hemisphere
activity and deficient cognitive processing in MDD. Depressed individuals tend to ruminate on negative
information and respond with a pattern of relatively higher right frontal activity to emotional stimuli
associated with withdrawal and isolation.

Take a look at the article, in press.

de Freitas, S.B., Marques, A.A., Bevilaqua, M. C., de Carvalho, M. R., Ribeiro, P., Palmer, S., Nardi, A. E. & Dias, G. P. (in press). Electroencephalographic findings in patients with major depressive disorder during cognitive or emotional tasks: a systematic review. Revista Brasileira de Psiquiatria. DOI: 10.1590/1516-4446-2015-1834.

Moving forward neuroscience research

Research Fellows at the Centre for Neuroscience, Dr Nollaig Heffernan and Prof Stephen Palmer have just had an article published titled: Moving forward neuroscience research in the fields of coaching psychology and sport psychology: Would Imagery Based Coaching be a useful area to research? 

In this discussion paper they briefly consider the problems that both coaching psychology and sport psychology researchers can encounter when undertaking neuroscience research. They propose that Imagery Based Coaching is an easier area to undertake neuroscience research, in contrast to conversational coaching.

The article can be read on the Centre website or downloaded from ResearchGate.

We welcome Dr Nollaig Heffernan who joins the Centre for Neuroscience faculty. She is a Sport and Exercise Psychologist (BPS) and a member of the Psychological Society of Ireland. She is an independent Management Consultant and works with businesses from sole traders to multinationals specialising in Leadership and Management, Organisational Psychology, Workplace Performance and Stress Management. In her role as a Sport Psychologist she works with all abilities from beginner to elite in a wide range of sports. She is a successful rowing coach with wins at national and international level. She regularly speaks at conferences and universities as a specialist lecturer or guest speaker and is a contributing author to a number of business books including the Association for Coaching’s Psychometrics in Coaching and Leadership Coaching.

Her interests include the neuroscientific make-up of high performing individuals, the cross-discipline transfer of effective coping strategies, resilient leadership and enhancing wellbeing in the workplace. She has co-authored (with Stephen Palmer) a paper, Moving forward neuroscience research in the fields of coaching psychology and sport psychology: Would Imagery Based Coaching be a useful area to research?  which will be published in Coaching Psychology International this summer.