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Animations & Interaction

The Leeds Beckett University website occasionally uses animations to page elements and animated gifs to add impact to pages. If you wish to stop them from playing for accessibility purposes or for personal preference then please see the guidance below. Please note that browsers sometimes change how they operate, so please refer to your browser help files to find their latest information.
How do I turn off animations?

Chrome

Chrome users will need to use browser extensions. Animation Policy from Google will help you set your own preferences.

Microsoft Edge

There is currently no way to disable animations within Microsoft Edge. Users of Edge (Chromium) browser can install the Chrome extensions above and use them.

Internet Explorer

To stop animations on a single page you can just press the 'Esc' key. This will stop the animation on that page. If you wish to restart the animations you need to refresh the page. To permanently disable the playing of animated GIF images, open Internet Options > Advanced tab. Under the Multimedia section, uncheck the Play animations in webpage check-box, click Apply and Exit and then restart your computer.

Firefox

Type about:config in Firefox address bar and hit Enter to open Settings. Search for the image.animation_mode flag and change its value from Normal to None. Once you restart Firefox this will disable animations.

Dr Nova Deighton-Smith

Senior Lecturer

As LREC Chair, Nova is responsible for ensuring that both staff and student applications comply with the British Psychology Society Code of Ethics and University policies. She delivers ethics lectures across all Psychology courses, teaching students about BPS principles and the ethical implications surrounding their research.

Nova is currently an Academic Adviser for Level 4 and 5 students and has previously worked as Admissions Tutor for the BSc (hons) Psychology course.

Current Teaching

Nova teaches across both BSc (hons) and MSc courses in Psychology and supervises undergraduate and postgraduate students (MRes and PhD) in areas consistent with her research interests.

Current teaching:

Module tutor for Psychology of Appearance (level 5)
Person and the Social World (level 5)
Foundation and Intermediate Research Methods (level 4)
Health Psychology (level 6)

Research Interests

Since 2014, Nova has been working on a collaborative research programme with colleagues from York St. John University and Sussex University to increase awareness of body image issues and eating disorders across Universities and schools in the local area. This project has involved data collection across numerous sites, three consecutive years’ worth of activism, research seminars and more recently, BPS-funded public events and conference presentations.

Nova's current research focuses on the role of social media. More specifically, she has conducted research examining influential appearance-related messages attached to social media hashtags and the implications they have for body image, self-perception, physical activity participation and health behaviours.

She is also currently working with colleagues at Leeds Beckett to understand how women with a breast cancer diagnosis manage appearance-related changes and cope with symptoms during treatment.

Her doctoral research involved a composite analysis of body image, health behaviours and physical activity in first-time pregnant women; the aim of which was to build an understanding of factors that have an influence on body image, exercise behaviours and coping strategies in pregnant women. The findings from Nova's PhD studies have been presented at the prestigious international Appearance Matters Conference in Bristol.