Dr Dan Shepperd

Key Roles and Teaching: 1st Year Tutor; Social Psychology; Qualitative Research Methods

Profile

I'm a social psychologist with interests in gender, sexual identity, friendship, and group prejudice. My background is in discourse analysis and I specialise in qualitative research methods to analyse interviews, focus groups and sets of media data. At Aston I  convene undergraduate modules in Social Psychology and Human Aggression. I also teach and convene various postgraduate Qualitative Research Methods modules. As 1st Year Tutor I help coordinate and oversee the first year of the Psychology BSc at Aston.

Background

I gained my Human Psychology BSc from Aston (2002) before heading off to the University of Surrey where I studied for a Social Psychology PhD with Adrian Coyle, Peter Hegarty and Evanthia Lyons. In 2008 I won a place at the LGBT Summer Institute at the University of Michigan (USA). I taught qualitative research methods, critical psychology and social psychology at the University of Surrey. The University of Winchester offered me a position as an associate lecturer where I also taught qualitative research methods until returning to Aston in 2011.

Teaching

• Level 1: PY1128 - Studying Psychology in Higher Education; PY1125 Psychology Practicals - Attitudes Questionnaire Design; PY1118 Social Psychology (Module Convenor)

• Level 2: PY2238 - Lectures on Qualitative Methods

• Level 3: PY3003 - Human Aggression (Module Convenor)

• Postgraduate (Health Psychology MSc, Health & Illness MSc, Rehabilitation, MRes) PYM701 Qualitative Methodology (Module Convenor); PYM707a & PYM707b; PYM708; PY4010; PY4020; PY4100; PY4053 Qualitative Research Methods for Health Services (Module Convenor).

Supervision / Examination

I supervise and examine qualitative psychological research at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. As a qualitative psychologist I don't normally supervise or examine quantitative projects (especially if they involve multivariate analysis). If you are considering me as your potential supervisor, here is a paper typical of my research (see below for more). These are examples of the type of things I've supervised in the last couple of years:

Recent Supervision (2011-12 at Aston): 

Previous Supervision (2010-11 at the University of Surrey):  

Doctoral examination:

Examined by viva voce two Practitioner Doctorates in Psychotherapeutic & Counselling Psychology (PsychD) at the University of Surrey, September 2011. Co-examiners: Prof Simon Du Plock and John Waite.

Research Interests

Social psychology: sexual and gender identities, friendship, liberalism, consumerism and commodification, social media, intergroup conflict and prejudice.

Methods: Discourse analysis, thematic analysis, interpretative phenomenological analysis.

Selected Output

Shepperd, D., Coyle, A., & Hegarty, P. (2010). Discourses of friendship between heterosexual women and gay men: Mythical norms and an absence of desire. Feminism & Psychology, 20 (2), 205-224. Download free version

Cited in... Massey, S.G. (2010). Valued differences or benevolent stereotypes, Psychology & Sexuality, 2, 115 - 130. DOI 10.1080/19419899.2010.484593 | Rumens, N. (2011) Queer Company: The Role and Meaning of Friendship in Gay Men's Work Lives, Burlinton, VT: Ashgate. | Holt, A. (2011). Discourse Analysis Approaches. In Frost, N. (Ed.), Qualitative Research Methods in Psychology: Combining Core Approaches (pp. 66-91). Maidenhead: OUP/McGraw-Hill. | Hegarty, P. & Buechel, C. (2011). 'What blokes want lesbians to be' On FHM and soocialization of pro-lesbian attitudes, Feminism & Psychology, 21 (2), 240-247. DOI 10.1177/0959353510370184 | Muraco, A. (2012). Odd Couples: Friendship at the Intersection of Gender and Sexual Orientation. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. | Rumens, N. (2012). Queering Cross Sex Friendships, Human Relations, OnlineFirst. DOI 10.1177/0018726712442427 | Peel, E. (2012). Moving beyond heterosexism? The good, the bad and the indifferent in accounts of others' reactions to important life events, Psychology of Sexualities Review, 3 (1), 34-46. Chasin, C. (in press). "Friend moments": A discursive study of friendship, Qualitative Research in Psychology. Kahn, J.S., Goddard, L., & Coy, J.M. (2013). Gay men and drag: Dialogical resistance to hegemonic masculinity, Culture & Psychology, 19 (1), 139-162.

Adams, J., Blair, K.L., Borrero-Bracero, N.I., Espín, O.M., Hayfield, N.J., Hegarty, P., Hermann-Green, L.K., Hsu, D.M.H., Maurer, O., Manalastas, E.J., McDermott, D.T., Shepperd, D. (2010). Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Psychology: An international conversation between researchers. Psychology and Sexualities, 1 (1), 75-90.

Shepperd, D. (2009). Juxtaposing different perspectives. [Review of the book 'An introduction to masculinities']. The Psychologist, 22 (12), 1039.

Shepperd, D. (2007, October). Gay men and heterosexual women: Discourses of normativity. Invited address at the meeting of the Sexualities and Identities Research Group, London South Bank University.

Shepperd, D., Coyle, A., & Hegarty, P. (2006, September). Accounts of difference and similarity in friendships between heterosexual women and gay men: A discourse analytic approach. Paper presented at the meeting of the British Psychological Society Social Section, Birmingham, UK).

Shepperd, D., Hegarty, P., Coyle, A., & Lyons, E. (2004, August). Friendships between heterosexual women and gay men: Resistance to heteronormativity. Paper presented at the International Conference of Critical Psychology, Bath.

Shepperd, D. & Hegarty, P. (2004). Building partnerships between lesbian, gay and bisexual psychologists and the lesbian, gay and bisexual voluntary sector. Lesbian & Gay Psychology Review, 5 (3), 127.

Shepperd, D., & Percy, C. (2002, July). Fag hags and feminism: Gender political tensions in relations between gay men and straight women. Paper presented at the meeting of the British Psychological Society Psychology of Women Section, Birkbeck College, University of London.