David Pollard

School of Psychology
Doctoral Researcher

Contact details

Email: dxp592@bham.ac.uk

Address: School of Psychology
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

David Pollard is a doctoral student at the University of Birmingham whose research investigates the development of adolescent social cognition. Specifically, whether adolescents become increasingly sensitive to structural features of their social relationships and use this information when playing modified versions of classical economic games. Additionally, this project will investigate whether adolescents are particularly susceptible to social influence and whether any differential influence effects can be discerned from structures within their peer groups.

Qualifications

Psychology with Neuropsychology (Bangor University) – 1^st
Brain Imaging with Cognitive Neuroscience (University of Nottingham) - Merit

Biography

David gained a first-class degree in Psychology with Neuropsychology from Bangor University in 2013, where he worked on research projects investigating the effects of schadenfreude and action perception on learning. In 2015, David received a degree in Brain Imaging with Cognitive Neuroscience from the University of Nottingham where he conducted research on fine discrimination in the visual system and gained experience in neuronal modelling, programming and fMRI analysis.

Doctoral research

PhD title: Developing social competence and susceptibility in adolescence
Supervisors: Dr Stephanie Burnett Heyes and Professor Ian Apperly

Research

Research interests

Adolescence social cognition, Theory of Mind, social influence

Other activities

David is also engaged in several science communication projects. He delivers talks to secondary schools about the developing teenage brain and is trialing a Youtube channel dedicated to making psychology more accessible to students and the general public.

If you represent a school and would be interested in your students receiving a talk on how their brains are changing, or if you are a researcher (student or postdoctoral) and would be interested in a collaboration that seeks to make your work more available to the public and your peers then please do get in contact.