Aja Murray
Reader

- Psychology
- School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences
Contact details
- Tel: 0131 650 3455
- Email: Aja.Murray@ed.ac.uk
Address
- Street
-
Room F16, Psychology Building
- City
- 7 George Square, Edinburgh
- Post code
- EH8 9JZ
Background
I joined the Department of Psychology, University of Edinburgh as a Lecturer in Psychology with Quantitative Focus in 2018. My research focuses on developmental aspects of mental health, especially ADHD, internalising problems, externalising problems, and their co-occurrence. A second area of focus is on quantitative methodology, especially longitudinal methodology and psychometrics. I currently lead projects on student mental health, domestic violence during pregnancy, and survey methodology and am the deputy director of the Evidence for Better Lives Study.
Prior to joining the department, I was a Research Fellow at Emmanuel College, University of Cambridge where I researched developmental trajectories of mental health issues and their co-occurrence. I also previously worked as a Research Associate in the Violence Research Centre at the University of Cambridge. There I worked on developmental trajectories of ADHD symptoms and conduct problems in the Zurich Project on Social Development from Childhood to Adulthood (z-proso) and later on the Evidence for Better Lives Study.
Qualifications
B.Sc. Psychology - University of Edinburgh (2011)
M.Sc. Psychology - University of Edinburgh (2012)
Ph.D. Psychology - University of Edinburgh (2016)
Postgraduate teaching
I am the course organiser and teach the latent variable modeling section of Multivariate Statistics and Methodology with R
Open to PhD supervision enquiries?
No
Areas of interest for supervision
I am interested in supervising PhD projects in any of my above-mentioned primary research areas, as well as in developmental psychology, mental health, and violence topics more broadly. Please feel free to get in touch to discuss.
Current PhD students supervised
Sumeiyah Koya (primary)
Xinxin Zhu (primary)
Yi Yang (primary)
Tong Xie (visiting)
Yongtian Cheng (co-supervisor)
Christina Thurston (co-supervisor)
Menchie Leung (co-supervisor)
Xuefei Li (co-supervisor)
Abby Pooley (co-supervisor)
Zhuoni Xiao (primary)
Janell Kwok (co-supervisor)
Past PhD students supervised
Lydia Speyer (co-supervisor)
Anna Hall (co-supervisor)
Chad Lance Hemady (co-supervisor)
Aimee Neaverson (University of Cambridge; co-supervisor)
Yulia Shenderovich (University of Cambridge; PhD advisor)
Research summary
My primary research interests relate to mental health phenotypes and their co-occurrence from a developmental perspective. I have a particular interest in attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and in the developmental period of adolescence. I use a range of research methods, including longitudinal and ecological momentary assessment designs.
Current project grants
- Addressing the adverse impacts of domestic violence during pregnancy (PI; Wolfson British Academy Fellowship)
- Wellcome Trust Mental Health Data Prize (PI; Wellcome Trust)
- Loneliness in the digital age (co-I; MRC)
- Decades-to-Minutes -D2M (PI; Levehulme Trust)
- Mental health in the Moment - MHIM (PI; Wellcome Trust)
- MHIM-ADHD (PI; Medical Research Foundation)
- The Scottish Student Mental Health Research Network (ScotSMART) (co-I; RSE)
- CHILDs study (co-I; ESRC)
- Effects of prenatal maternal infections on developmental outcomes in children with typical development, autism spectrum disorders and
learning disability (co-I; Bailey Thomas Grant)
Past project grants
- Dynamic predictors of and corrections for attrition in Understanding Society (PI; Understanding Society Survey Fellowship)
- Identifying risk and protective factors to help support student mental health (PI; SMaRteN Research Grant)
- A Delphi survey to define research priorities for a birth cohort study in eight low- and middle- income countries (PI; SFA ODA Global Challenges)
- Evidence for Better Lives- Impact (co-I; ESRC Impact Acceleration Grant)
- Violence against pregnant women: A dataset review (PI; Cambridge Humanities Research Grant)
- Identifying reliable change using cognitive tests in ageing and dementias research (co-I; Dementias Platform UK Discovery Award)
- Enhancing early child development in low- and middle- income countries (PI; British Academy Small Research Grant)
- Evidence for Better Lives- Data Innovation (co-I; Botnar Foundation Grant)
-
Development of the item pool for the ‘WHO-ageism scale’: Conceptualisation, item generation, and content validity assessment
In:
Age and Ageing
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Accepted/In press) -
Co-developmental trajectories of parental psychological distress and child internalizing and externalizing problems in childhood and adolescence: Associations with self-harm and suicide attempts
In:
Research on Child and Adolescent Psychopathology, vol. 51, pp. 847-858
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-023-01034-3
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Respondent characteristics associated with adherence in a general population ecological momentary assessment study
In:
International Journal of Methods in Psychiatric Research
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/mpr.1972
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (E-pub ahead of print) -
Early adolescent predictors of young adults’ stress experiences and coping during the COVID-19 pandemic: Findings from a longitudinal cohort study
In:
Journal of Early Adolescence
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Accepted/In press) -
Measurement invariance of the General Health Questionnaire GHQ 12 item version (GHQ-12) across students and non-students based on a large UK longitudinal study
In:
European journal of psychological assessment
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Accepted/In press) -
Trajectories of screen time across adolescents and their associations with adulthood mental health and behavioral outcomes
In:
Journal of Youth and Adolescence, vol. 52, pp. 1433–1447
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-023-01782-x
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (E-pub ahead of print) -
The worst and the best: New insights into risk and resilience in young adults from the COVID-19 pandemic
In:
Adversity and Resilience Science
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s42844-023-00096-y
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (E-pub ahead of print) -
Teacher-student relationships in childhood as a protective factor against adolescent delinquency up to age 17: A propensity score matching approach
(29 pages)
In:
Crime and Delinquency, vol. 69, pp. 727-755
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/00111287211014153
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Priorities and directions for future research on student mental health within Scottish Higher Education Institutions: A scoping review protocol
Priorities and directions for future research on student mental health within Scottish Higher Education Institutions: A scoping review protocol › Protocols (Published) -
Who participates in ecological momentary assessment (EMA)?: Predicting participation willingness in a general population health and behaviour EMA study using machine learning techniques
In:
Journal of medical Internet research
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Accepted/In press) -
Exploring the effect of ADHD traits on the moment-to-moment interplay between provocation and aggression: Evidence from dynamic structural equation modelling
In:
Aggressive Behavior
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/ab.22081
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (E-pub ahead of print) -
Latent profiles of childhood psychological maltreatment and their links to adult mental health in China and the UK
(12 pages)
In:
Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Mental Health, vol. 17, pp. 1-12
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s13034-023-00572-4
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Prompt-level predictors of compliance in an ecological momentary assessment study of young adults' mental health
(7 pages)
In:
Journal of Affective Disorders (JAD), vol. 322, pp. 125-131
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2022.11.014
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Screening for intellectual disability in autistic people: A brief report
In:
Research in autism spectrum disorders, vol. 100
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rasd.2022.102076
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Psychometric evaluation of an adapted version of the perceived stress scale for ecological momentary assessment research
In:
Stress & Health
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/smi.3229
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (E-pub ahead of print) -
Social expectations as a possible mechanism for adult personality change: Limited empirical evidence for the Social Investment Principle
In:
Journal of Personality
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/jopy.12809
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (E-pub ahead of print) -
Validation of the Violent Ideations Scale (VIS) in Spain
(19 pages)
In:
International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0306624X221148126
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (E-pub ahead of print) -
Understanding the factors at play in the sender-receiver dynamic during the telepathy ganzfeld: A meta-analysis
In:
Journal of Anomalous Experience and Cognition, vol. 3, pp. 42-77
DOI: https://doi.org/10.31156/jaex.23878
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Maternal metabolic syndrome in pregnancy and child development at age 5: Exploring mediating mechanisms using cord blood markers
In:
BMC Medicine, vol. 21
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12916-023-02835-5
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Establishing the measurement properties of the Residential Environment Impact Scale (Version 4.0)
In:
Scandinavian Journal of Occupational Therapy
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/11038128.2022.2143891
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (E-pub ahead of print)