Jack Brett
Research Fellow
BPsych (Hons)
jack.brett@thekids.org.au
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-brett-967215193/Jack Brett completed a combined Master/PhD in Clinical Neuropsychology at the University of Western Australia in 2024. Jack’s research aims to understand and support the emotional functioning associated with neurodevelopmental challenges, like autism and ADHD. In addition to conducting research at The Kids, he works as a clinical neuropsychology registrar at Perth Children’s Hospital, assessing kids who struggle with intense emotions to work out what support they need. Jack wants to improve how we support children and families by creating practical tools to identify when children need additional support and how best to address these challenges. By developing holistic, flexible, and tailored approaches, Jack believes his research will help guide, children, families, clinicians, and schools to better manage big emotions so that children, regardless of their diagnosis, can reach their potential.
Projects
SMS4Dads
SMS4RRdads is a digital prevention and early intervention service that will engage, screen and support expectant and new fathers experiencing or at risk of perinatal mental illness.
September 2022
Published research
Predicting Problem Gambling in Young Men: The Impact of Sports Gambling Frequency and Internalizing Symptoms
Young men aged 18-25 years are at disproportionately increased risk for gambling problems compared to their older or female counterparts. The unique mechanisms that precipitate these problems in this group remain unclear. Data from the largest longitudinal cohort study on Australian men's health (the Ten to Men Study) were used to identify the psychosocial, health-related, and gambling-related behavioral predictors of problem gambling severity in 265 young men aged 18-25 years. Hierarchical multiple ordinal logistic regression analyses found these predictors to explain a moderate proportion of variance in problem gambling severity.
Measuring cognitive and affective empathy across positive and negative emotions: psychometric properties and measurement invariance of the Perth Empathy Scale
Empathy, a complex and multidimensional construct essential for social functioning and mental health, has been extensively studied in both research and clinical settings. The Perth Empathy Scale (PES), a recently developed self-report measure, assesses cognitive and affective empathy across both positive and negative emotions and is based on the self-other model of empathy. This study aimed to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Persian version of the PES in large Iranian sample.
Fathers’ Self-Compassion and Child Attachment Quality: Testing a Sequential Indirect Effect via Emotion Regulation Difficulties, Loneliness and psychological distress in two paternal samples
Self-compassion has emerged as a promising treatment target to promote healthy parent–child relationships, though mostly in maternal samples. The mechanisms through which self-compassion may optimise the father-child relationships are not yet well-established.
Education and Qualifications
- Bachelor of Science (Psychology) Honours – The University of Western Australia
- Registered Provisional Psychologist – The Psychology Board of Australia