Senior Research Associate

at  University of Portsmouth

DISCOVER THE ADVANTAGES OF JOINING OUR UNIVERSITY. WE OFFER A RANGE OF ATTRACTIVE BENEFITS AND OPPORTUNITIES TO ENHANCE YOUR WORK EXPERIENCE:

• Competitive salary, including incremental progression within your scale.
• Contributory defined benefits pension schemes – Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) for support and research staff and Teachers Pensions for our academic staff.
• Generous leave entitlement of 32–35 days a year, plus bank holidays, and an additional Christmas closure.
• Family-friendly policies supporting flexible working.
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This post-doctoral role is based in the Technology Acceptance Research Group for Energy Technologies (TARG:ET) in the School of Psychology, Sport and Health Sciences at the University of Portsmouth. The successful candidate will take up the post of Senior Research Associate to work on a targeted 6-month project examining the social acceptance of proposed innovations in residential sector heating.
The research forms part of the GasNetNew Project. GasNetNew is a 3-year EPSRC-funded research project, led by engineers at the University of Nottingham, with the support of researchers at the Universities of Birmingham, Loughborough and Portsmouth. It aims to look at how the existing mains gas network can be used differently in order to provide innovative, low-carbon heating and cooling solutions to UK households.
Alongside engineering and technological research and innovation, GasNetNew is focused on the social scientific study of the factors that shape the relative social acceptance of different heating and cooling options among key actor groups, including practitioners (e.g., business, industry) and publics. This aspect of the project will be led from the University of Portsmouth.
We seek a motivated and collegial individual, with good research and interpersonal skills to join the team. The successful candidate will take responsibility for the design, delivery, analysis and reporting of a quantitative questionnaire-based survey. This survey will be distributed online to a representative sample of the UK public and will provided insight into public attitudes towards the technologies being investigated and developed by the GasNetNew team.
The ideal candidate will have knowledge of the social acceptance of science and technological innovation. They will hold a PhD in Psychology (or cognate discipline) and will be familiar with the design, delivery, quantitative analysis and academic reporting of questionnaire-based surveys. The successful candidate will have experience of writing for different audiences, including for academic journals.
This appointment is a fixed term contract for 7 months.
For internal candidates it may be possible to apply for this role under the Secondment Policy . If you wish to apply as a secondee, you must have approval of your line manager in advance of submitting your application form. Please confirm in your application that your line manager has approved this.
Some fractional appointments/flexible working would be considered and can be discussed at interview.
Whilst there is a need to be in Portsmouth a few days a week, hybrid working is available for this role.
Informal enquiries are strongly encouraged and should be made to Dr Chris Jones by email: chris.jones1@port.ac.uk
Interviews are expected to be held 29 November 2024.