Professor Tim O'Brien
Research interests
Tim’s research interests reflect the varied professional spaces in which he works:
Special Educational Needs and Disabilities [SEND], particularly Social, Emotional and Mental Health needs [SEMH].
The impact of distributed cognition and emotion on team and individual performance
Domains and dimensions of human wellbeing
The psychological construction of culture
The ontology and practice of inclusion
More information
Tim is a Professor [part-time] in the Department of Educational Psychology, Inclusive and Special Education.
He is also:
Honorary Professor in Psychology and Human Development at UCL Institute of Education, UK.
A Chartered Psychologist [British Psychological Society]
A Fellow of The Royal Society of Medicine [UK]
Chair of the Advisory Board for the UCL Centre for Inclusive Education
A peer reviewer for The International Journal of Wellbeing
A peer reviewer for Support for Learning
Tim's works in applied psychology in a range of contexts:
He has worked in English Premier League Football, with three clubs, for over twenty years. This has mostly been at Arsenal Football Club as psychologist for the men's team (appointed by Arsene Wenger) and Head of Psychology and Wellbeing for the club (appointed by Mikel Arteta).
He is involved in knowledge-exchange research programmes with primary and post-primary schools, working alongside teachers.
He wrote and co-led the Teacher Wellbeing programme for The Chartered College of Teaching, working with teachers in deprived areas of the UK.
He is a member of the UK Government Expert Advisory Group on Teacher and Leader Wellbeing.
He works with executive teams in global businesses.
He has also worked with executive teams across the UK National Health Service.
Academic Awards
Tim was the first person in the UK to be awarded The Fulton Fellowship.
He was awarded The Hines Page Scholarship (UK/USA)
Publications
Tim has authored, co-authored, edited and contributed to many books..
His first book, Promoting Positive Behaviour, was published in 1998.
His most recently published book is, Inner Story: Understand your mind. Change your world.
Recent publications/articles include:
- O'Brien, T. and Guiney, D. (2019) Staff Wellbeing in Higher Education: a research study.
- O'Brien, T. and Roberts, A. (2019) A domains-based approach to Social, Emotional and Mental Health needs.
- O'Brien, T. (2020) Has inclusion become a barrier to inclusion?
- O'Brien, T. and Guiney, D. (2021) Wellbeing: how we make sense of it and what this means for teachers.
His work has been published in Spanish and Chinese
