Dr Nicki O'Brien

Associate Professor

Department: Psychology

Nicki is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology. She is a Chartered Health Psychologist, an Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society and is registered with the Health and Care Professions Council. Nicki’s research focuses on developing and evaluating complex interventions that are designed to make a demonstrable contribution to the promotion of individual, population and global health. Her work includes lifestyle-based interventions for primary and secondary prevention of chronic conditions, animated health behaviour change messages, and community pharmacy supported interventions. Nicki leads the Health Behaviour and Behaviour Change Research group at Northumbria.

Nicki is a Visiting Researcher at the Heidelberg Institute of Global Health, Heidelberg University in Germany.

Nicki uses quantitative and qualitative research methods, and has particular experience in intervention co-design; n-of-1 methods; systematic reviewing and meta-analysis; and randomised and pragmatic trials. Her work has been funded by NIHR, MRC, ESRC, Versus Arthritis, Lewy Body Society, Department of Health and the Cabinet Office.

Nicki is an experienced postgraduate supervisor and is registered as an Applied Psychology Practice Supervisor. If you are would like to discuss potential supervision of a PhD or Stage 2 Health Psychology training, please get in touch.

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Research Themes and Scholarly Interests

Global health and behaviour change
'Languageless' animated health communication
N-of-1 (single case) methodology
Digital and blended (digital + human) health behaviour change interventions
Community pharmacy supported interventions for chronic health conditions
Physical activity behaviour change
Arthritis and musculoskeletal health
Intervention co-design with stakeholders

Key Publications

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
Animations to communicate public health prevention messages: a realist review protocol, McCorry, K., Maniatopoulos, G., Errington, L., Land, E., Craig, M., Vijaykumar, S., Bärnighausen, T., O'Brien, N. 9 Aug 2024, In: BMJ Open
Co-development and testing of an extended community pharmacy model of service delivery for managing osteoarthritis: protocol for a sequential, multi-methods study (PharmOA), Babatunde, O., Cottrell, E., White, S., Chudyk, A., Healey, E., Edwards, J., Nicholls, E., O’Brien, N., Todd, A., Walker, C., Stanford, C., Cork, T., Long, A., Simkins, J., Mallen, C., Dziedzic, K., Holden, M. 12 Jan 2024, In: BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders
Defining the Traditional Mediterranean Lifestyle: Joint International Consensus Statement, Sidossis, L., Lawson, R., Aprilakis, E., Barata, B., Baska, A., Beneka, A., Bird, R., Birrell, F., Chatzinikola, C., Chondronikola, M., Chrousos, G., Conduit, R., Constantinou, C., de Courten, B., Cvejic, J., Davis, A., Demetriou, C., Errington, L., Feehan, J., Figueroa, C., Flynn, M., Frates, B., Kabthymer, R., Karagounis, L., Karimi, L., Kennedy, G., Kolokotroni, O., Korovljev, D., Kouris‐Blazos, A., Kushkestani, M., Kyriakides, T., Hutanu, E., Mosquera, M., Nikiphorou, E., O'Brien, N., Philippou, E., Piątek, K., Poole, S., Popescu‐Spineni, D., Radd‐Vagenas, S., Sidossis, A., Simonis, M., Soultanakis, H., Telinga, A., Tierney, A., Tkacz, A., Vlachopoulos, D., Yaman‐Dent, G., Yap, Y., Zervides, Z., Itsiopoulos, C. 1 Oct 2024, In: Lifestyle Medicine
Exploring the potential extended role of community pharmacy in the management of osteoarthritis: A multi‐methods study with pharmacy staff and other healthcare professionals, Simkins, J., Holden, M., Babatunde, O., White, S., Nicholls, E., Long, A., Dziedzic, K., Chudyk, A., Todd, A., Walker, C., Stanford, C., Cottrell, E., Edwards, J., Healey, E., Cork, T., Mallen, C., O’Brien, N. 7 Mar 2024, In: Musculoskeletal Care
Facilitators and barriers to engaging in expressive writing among health and social care professionals, Smith, M., Hoult, L., Rippon, D., O'Brien, N., Branley-Bell, D., Byrne-Davis, L., Collins, C., Gallagher, S., Kinman, G., Mark, A., O'Connor, D., Vedhara, K., Wetherell, M. 28 Oct 2024
Filling in the Gaps. Making Sense of Living with Temporomandibular Disorders: A Reflexive Thematic Analysis, Penlington, C., Durham, J., O'Brien, N., Green, R. 1 Oct 2024, In: JDR Clinical and Translational Research
Health and lifestyle advice in community pharmacy for musculoskeletal conditions: a focused ethnography, Long, A., O'Brien, N., Rapley, T., Dziedzic, K. 29 Apr 2024, In: International Journal of Pharmacy Practice
Impact of a social prescribing intervention in North East England on adults with type 2 diabetes: the SPRING_NE multimethod study, Moffatt, S., Wildman, J., Pollard, T., Gibson, K., Wildman, J., O'Brien, N., Griffith, B., Morris, S., Moloney, E., Jeffries, J., Pearce, M., Mohammed, W. 30 Mar 2023, In: Public Health Research
Uptake of diabetes follow-up checks by minority community groups: a rapid review of the evidence for the CYMELL study, Spencer, L., Albustami, M., Porter, A., Naha, G., Thomas, R., Rees, S., Stewart, R., Hettiarachchi, T., O'Brien, N., Edwards, R., Khanom, A. Nov 2023, In: The Lancet
A pre- and post-intervention study testing the effect of exposure to languageless animated images communicating COVID-19 preventive behaviours on behavioural intentions and beliefs of Guatemalan adults, O'Brien, N., Vijaykumar, S., Craig, M., Land, E., Aguilar Jocol, S., Bedoya Mendoza, X., dela Cruz Estrada, R., Najera Gonzalez, E., Nicolau Ozaeta, L. 22 Jul 2022, In: Journal of Global Health

Current and Recent Projects

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
Development and implementation of support for pharmacists to delier integrated primary care for osteoarthritis, O'Brien, N. (Principal Investigator), National Institute for Health Research, 01/11/21 - 31/10/23, £10,480.00
The influene of culture, religion and identity for patients from BAME background in accessing medicines review services, O'Brien, N. (Principal Investigator), National Institute for Health Research, 01/03/21 - 31/08/21, £1,091.00
Evaluation of TILL Phase 2 (transfer in), O'Brien, N. (Principal Investigator), Swansea University, 01/06/20 - 31/07/20, £5,198.00
Interventions in community organisations to improve health and wellbeing and reduce health inequalities, O'Brien, N. (Principal Investigator), National Institute for Health Research, 23/04/19 - 31/10/20, £8,944.00

Professional Activity

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
Membership of committee: National Institute of Health and Care Research Doctoral Clinical Academic Fellowship Selection Committee (External organisation) 2024
Membership of committee: The British Psychological Society (External organisation) 2022
Editorial work: Frontiers in Health Services (Journal) 2021
Editorial work: Lifestyle Medicine (Journal) 2021
Membership of committee: National Institute of Health and Care Research Pre-doctoral Local Authority Fellowship (External organisation) 2021
Membership of committee: HEE-NIHR Integrated Clinical and Practitioner Academic Programme Selection Committee (External organisation) 2020
Editorial work: British Journal of Health Psychology (Journal) 2012

PGR Supervision

Colin Stephenson Group Consultations: exploring the role of Community Pharmacy in supporting the self-management of Long Term Health Conditions (LTCs) Start Date: 01/01/2023
Angela Long “They’re pushing people towards pharmacy”: An exploration of community pharmacy’s role in the management of musculoskeletal conditions Start Date: 01/04/2021

Further Information

Current PhD supervision:

David Bourne. Chronic pancreatitis: towards a comprehensive, patient-centred, evidence-based model of nutritional care. NIHR Clinical Doctoral Fellowship

Beckie Gibson. Understanding persuasive effects of message framing for vaccination uptake in university students. Northumbria Doctoral Studentship

Angela Long. The role of commuinty pharmacy in the management of age-related musculoskeletal conditions. ESRC Doctoral Studentship

Chris Penlington. Psychological therapy for orofacial pain: series of N-of-1 studies

Colin Stephenson. Ensuring the future sustainability of NHS primary care: applying a Group Consultation model in community pharmacy settings to help address population health inequalities. Northumbria Doctoral Studentship