Research Associate in Speech and Multimodal Data Analysis for Mental Health

About us:

The post will be based in the Department of Biostatistics & Health Informatics at KCL, within the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience (IoPPN). The centre offers a diverse research environment that is open, welcoming and supportive to all. The faculty-wide initiatives are supported by an active Diversity & Inclusion Team.

The Department has been a major force in the development of quantitative methodology as applied to mental health research. We have significant national and international collaborations, and our research has growing impact into all areas of medicine particularly through expertise in trials and software development.

About the role:

We are seeking a highly skilled and motivated Postdoctoral Research Associate to join a pioneering project at the intersection of speech analytics, mHealth, and precision psychiatry. This is an exciting opportunity to contribute to an internationally unique study that integrates speech analysis with qualitative and quantitative methodologies at scale, aiming to transform our understanding of Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) and advance patient-centred mental health care.

The postholder will play a central role in collecting and analysing large-scale speech and wearable data from participants in the GLAD Study cohort (). Using large language models (LLMs) and acoustic analytics, they will uncover patterns in content, lexical choice, prosody, and acoustic features. These speech-derived measures will be integrated with insights derived from wearable data, structured assessments, medical records, and multi-omics datasets to enable innovative genetic and biomarker association studies, supporting the development of stratified and personalized approaches to mental health treatment.

In addition to conducting cutting-edge analyses, the postholder will prepare research findings for dissemination in high-impact, REF-returnable journals and actively engage with Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement (PPI-E) efforts to ensure authentic, patient-centred interpretations of the data.

To be considered for this role, you should have:

• A PhD (or equivalent) in a relevant discipline (e.g., biostatistics, machine learning, computer science, clinical informatics, natural language processing).
• Strong skills in data analysis and programming (e.g., Python or R).
• A track record of publications in high -quality scientific journals.
• Experience or interest in large language and foundational models is an advantage.

This is a full-time post (35 hours per week), and you will be offered a fixed term contract from 1st April 2026 - 30th September 2028.

Research staff at King's are entitled to at least 10 days per year (pro-rata) for professional development. This entitlement, from the Concordat to Support the Career Development of Researchers, applies to Postdocs, Research Assistants, Research and Teaching Technicians, Teaching Fellows and AEP equivalent up to and including grade 7. Visit the Centre for Research Staff Development for more information.

Please note that we reserve the right to close this advert early if we receive a high volume of applications.

About you:

To be successful in this role, we are looking for candidates to have the following skills and experience:

Essential criteria

• PhD or equivalent in a relevant discipline (e.g., biostatistics, computer science, clinical informatics, natural language processing).
• Proven experience in speech and language analysis, including acoustic feature extraction and/or natural language processing (NLP) techniques.
• Proficiency in data analysis and programming with languages such as Python or R.
• Experience handling and integrating large, complex datasets, including multimodal data
• Proven track record of writing and publishing scientific papers in high-impact journals.

Desirable criteria

• Experience with Large Language Models (LLMs) or other foundational models applied to speech or text data
• Experience applying speech and language technology in mental health research, particularly in depression
• Familiarity with wearable technologies, including data cleaning and feature extraction
• Experience in grant writing and securing research funding.

*Please note that for applicants currently undertaking a PhD and awaiting their results (thesis submitted), the appointment will be made at Grade 5, spine point 30 with the title of Research Assistant. Upon confirmation of the award of the PhD, the job title will become Research Associate and the salary will increase to Grade 6.

Downloading a copy of our Job Description

Full details of the role and the skills, knowledge and experience required can be found in the Job Description document, provided at the bottom of the page. This document will provide information of what criteria will be assessed at each stage of the recruitment process.

Further information:

We ask all candidates to submit a copy of their CV, and a supporting statement, detailing how they meet the essential criteria listed in the advert. If we receive a strong field of candidates, we may use the desirable criteria to choose our final shortlist, so please include your evidence against these where possible.

To find out how our managers will review your application, please take a look at our 'How we Recruit' pages.