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Dr Sharon Xuereb

Profile summary

  • Regional Academic Staff
  • Staff Tutor in Psychology & Counselling
  • Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences
  • School of Psychology & Counselling
  • Psychology
  • sharon.xuereb

Professional biography

Dr Sharon Xuereb has a background in clinical and forensic psychology, having worked with offenders in the community and in prisons, and worked in secure settings. She has experience in risk assessment, individual therapy, and group therapy. Sharon's PhD was about shame, guilt and denial in offenders. More recently her intereststs have moved away from forensic psychology, and towards the experience of refugees and minority ethnic groups.

Sharon has been working in higher education, both brick and online universities, since 2010. She has been a programme leader and ethics co-ordinator, and mentored numerous postgraduate studies using qualitative or quantitative methodologies. Sharon is currently Lead Academic Conduct Officer for Psychology & Counselling.. 

Research interests

The following are Sharon's current research projects:
- The experience of Black and Minority Ethnic students on an undergraduate research project module (thematic analysis with 11 participants)
- Emotions, prejudice, perceived threat, and attitudes to help Ukrainian, Syrian, and Somali asylum seekers (quantitatve between-subjects design)
- Perception of African asylum seekers on a Mediterranean island

Teaching interests

Member of the DE300 module team.

Publications

The association of distress and denial of responsibility with maladaptive personality traits and self-esteem in offenders (2015-02)
Xuereb, Sharon; Ireland, Jane L.; Archer, John and Davies, Michelle
Legal and Criminological Psychology, 20(1) (pp. 176-189)

Academic resourcefulness, coping strategies and doubting in university undergraduates (2015)
Xuereb, Sharon
Journal of Further and Higher Education, 39(2) (pp. 205-222)

Why students consider terminating their studies and what convinces them to stay (2014-07)
Xuereb, Sharon
Active Learning in Higher Education, 15(2) (pp. 145-156)

Chronic and offence-related factors and coping styles in offenders (2009-03)
Xuereb, Sharon; Ireland, Jane L. and Davies, Michelle
Personality and Individual Differences, 46(4) (pp. 465-471)

Development and preliminary assessment of a measure of shame, guilt, and denial of offenders (2009)
Xuereb, Sharon; Ireland, Jane L. and Davies, Michelle
Journal of Forensic Psychiatry & Psychology, 20(5) (pp. 640-660)