Oct 2022 – Oct 2023
Happiest Health
~5 articles. Audience: scientifically literate health readers. Two or more expert sources per article — psychiatrists, clinicians, researchers. Weekly turnaround through structured editorial review.
← All work
Research
Published research, evidence synthesis, and applied research work outside product case studies.
01 — Peer-reviewed publication
Which parts of negative affect actually drive social anxiety?
The question
Existing literature established that social anxiety and negative affect are related. It treated negative affect as a single construct. I wanted to know which specific affective states carried that relationship — because “anxiety and negative feelings are correlated” is not something you can act on, while “nervousness is the dominant component” is.
Method
- Design
- Correlational survey
- Sample
- n=101, ages 18–25 (26 male, 75 female)
- Sampling
- Purposive, via online platform
- Instruments
- Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale – Self Report (LSAS-SR); Positive and Negative Affect Schedule – Short Form (PANAS-SF)
- Analysis
- Pearson correlation, SPSS — conducted independently
Findings
r = .467Aggregate correlation between social anxiety and negative affect, p < .01.
Correlation by affective state
Pearson correlation with social anxiety. Labels show the correlation coefficient and significance value.
Nervous
r = .508p < .01
Afraid
r = .419p < .01
Guilty
r = .349p < .01
Distressed
r = .325p < .01
Ashamed
r = .303p < .01
Hostile
r = .222p < .05
Every individual affective state correlated significantly, but not equally. Nervousness exceeded the aggregate; hostility was less than half its strength.
What this contributes
Disaggregating the construct changes what the finding is useful for. A treatment model targeting nervousness specifically is a different intervention from one targeting negative affect generally.
Limitations
Purposive sampling from a single age band limits generalisability. The gender split (75 female, 26 male) was uneven. The design is correlational, so no causal direction can be inferred. The paper identifies anger, disgust, sadness, and loneliness as affective states worth examining next.
02 — Evidence synthesis & expert interviewing
25 published articles built on expert interviews and literature
Between 2022 and 2023 I wrote evidence-based health and psychology articles for two publications. Each piece required sourcing and interviewing subject matter experts, reviewing published literature, and translating findings for a specific audience without losing accuracy. This is the same skill set as research synthesis, applied to a publishing context.
May 2022 – Oct 2023
Bonobology
20 articles. Audience: general readers. Translating psychological evidence into accessible writing while maintaining citation discipline. One to two expert sources per piece.
03 — Applied research in industry
Market research and competitive analysis — Lyftly Minds, 2020–21
At Lyftly Minds I conducted market research and competitive analysis, and synthesised findings into reports used to inform decisions. Alongside this I built internal courses and delivered workshops for a student community. It's the earliest instance of the research-to-recommendation cycle in my work — four years before the product studies on this site.
04 — Research training
Academic training and counselling practice
- PhD Coursework
- School of Liberal Arts and Sciences, RV University · Mar 2024 – Mar 202512 credits: Quantitative Research Methods (76), Qualitative Research Methods (82), Academic Writing & Publication Ethics (70), plus five Coursera courses in psychology and behavioural science. Withdrew from the programme.
- MSc Counselling Psychology
- Sampurna Montfort College, Martin Luther Christian University · 2018–2020
- BA Political Science, Economics & Journalism
- Mount Carmel College, Bangalore University · 2015–2018
- Counselling practice
- Four years counselling individuals and couples and providing mental health support (approx. 2,000 sessions). The work included intake assessment, risk assessment, and consistent documentation.