Academic Staff

Ed Wilding studies the psychological and neural processes that support human long-term memory. His current research interests are in how we exert control over what we remember and what we forget. A newer and rather different line of research concerns how best to implement and evaluate initiatives that promote diversity and inclusion.

Ian Apperly is an experimental psychologist, and his main research interest is in “mindreading” – the ability to take other people’s perspectives for communication, co-operation, competition or deception. He is the author of over 80 journal articles, and the 2010 book, entitled “Mindreaders: The cognitive basis of theory of mind”.

Sarah's research examines how we think imaginatively about the real world. She is especially interested in how children become able to speculate about what might have been (counterfactual thinking) and how they think creatively to solve novel problems, particularly those involving tools. She takes a developmental approach, focusing on how children’s imaginative thinking changes and what ...

Professor Bowman applies the methods of Cognitive Neuroscience, especially EEG and Neural Modelling, to understanding a spectrum of Cognitive phenomena, including conscious perception, temporal attention and subliminal search. Much of his work focuses on verifying the simultaneous Type/ Serial Token theory of temporal attention and working memory encoding, which he developed with Brad Wyble.

Prof ...

Matthew is an academic psychiatrist and Director of the Institute for Mental Health at the University.  He is a leader in the field of early psychosis and in the philosophy and ethics of mental health.

Professor Dr. Higgs is a researcher interested in the psychology of eating. In particular, she is interested in the role that learning and memory processes play in decisions we make about what and how much to eat.

Prof.  Ole Jensen is a word leading expert on applying magnetoencephalograpghy to study the human brain. In particular his work has focused on uncovering the mechanism role of neuronal oscillations for cognition. 

• Research group website

• Orcid ID: 0000-0001-8193-8348

Steven Marwaha is an academic Psychiatrist whose main interest is in early intervention and mood disorders, such as bipolar disorder and depression. His work focusses on pathways to illness and care, and ways of improving the clinical outcomes of this group using both pharmacological and psychological interventions. As a Consultant Psychiatrist he runs the Mood Disorders Clinic in Birmingham ...

Rachel is Professor of Psychiatry and Youth Mental Health at the University of Birmingham, and Consultant Psychiatrist in the Birmingham Early Intervention Services. Her research Interest is within the field of major mental illness; particularly schizophrenia and co-morbid depression in early phases of illness. Recent projects have developed the investigation of inflammatory models of psychosis ...

Jessica is a chartered psychologist and an HCPC registered forensic psychologist. Her primary areas of research are policing and sexual offending. She is the Director of the Centre for Applied Psychology, founder of the international academic-practitioner C-LINK network (Crime Linkage International NetworK), and Co-Director of the Centre for Crime, Justice and Policing at the ...

Dr Bagshaw's main interest is in developing and applying non-invasive neuroimaging methods to questions in clinical and behavioural neuroscience. Current work in the Multimodal Integration Group (MIG)focuses on using EEG-fMRI to understand the influence of ongoing brain activity on evoked and behavioural responses, and to examine the localisation and functional significance of ...

Dr Andy Bremner is a developmental psychologist with expertise in multisensory perceptual development and the development of touch perception. He has particularly focused on examining how infants come to perceive their own bodies and their relation to the external world around them.

Heather’s research is centered on understanding episodic memory, particularly memory for criminal events, using both experimental and applied approaches. This includes interdisciplinary investigations of memory retrieval in police interviews and lineup parades. She develops memory enhancing, broad reach, low-cost procedures that are being integrated into legal systems around the world.

Heat ...

Dr Galea is broadly interested in motor control. This ranges from the neural correlates of motor learning to stroke rehabilitation. At present, he is particularly interested in how reward/punishment influences our actions and can be used to alter the speed at which our motor system learns or retains new movements.

Personal website: www.josephgalea.weebly.com

Andrea Krott studies the psychology of human language. Her early research investigated how we store and represent language rules and words in our minds and how children acquire those rules and words. More recently, she has investigated language as an ability that interacts with other cognitive abilities. She is interested in how general cognitive abilities such as attention and cognitive ...

Dr. Jonathan Lee is a behavioural neuroscientist primarily interested in the mechanisms and functions of memory processes. In particular, he currently studies the phenomenon of memory reconsolidation, which may have applications in the understanding of and treatment of conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder and drug addiction.

Find out more about Jonathans role at Memory Birmingham.

Dr Brittain studies the human motor system in health and disease. He is particularly interested in the way that brain stimulation can be used to understand the functioning of brain networks, and to alleviate disease symptoms.

Cognitive Motor Neuroscience group website

Dr Anke Büttner is a psycholinguist and cognitive psychologist interested in the way people make sense of language. She also has an interest in learning and teaching, in particular in the effects of encouraging students to take ownership of the work and in the processes that take place during mentoring relationships.

Dr Jonathan Catling is a Senior Lecturer in Cognitive Psychology, and is an expert in research design and analysis.  His research interests cover the fields of language acquisition, especially the impact of the ‘Age of Acquisition’ of language on cognitive functions in later life, and of resilience and the impact of general mental health and state anxiety on cognitive ...

The aim of Dr Cruse’s research is to improve clinical practice following severe brain injury through the application of methods from cognitive electrophysiology. By identifying residual neural and cognitive mechanisms, it is possible to improve the accuracy of diagnoses and prognoses, and gain a more accurate understanding of how the brain supports consciousness and cognition.

Dr De Brito is a psychologist and director of the Social, Cognitive, Affective, and Neuroscience (SCAN) lab. Research in the SCAN lab focuses on understanding the mechanistic interplay between the social, cognitive, affective, and neurocognitive factors implicated in the development and persistence of antisocial and aggressive behaviour. A second strand of research examines those aspects among ...

Dr Di Luca investigates the mechanisms of human perception using psychophysical methods and computational modeling. The goal of his research is to understand how the brain progressively builds the perception of the environment by picking up information through actions and by integrating sensations over time.

Personal website: http://massimilianodiluca.info/

Davinia Fernández-Espejo’s main goal is to understand how the brain supports consciousness and what goes wrong for patients to become entirely unaware after severe brain injury. She uses techniques such as MRI (structural and functional), tDCS, and behavioural approaches in both healthy volunteers and patients with a disorder of consciousness to test hypotheses about ...

Dr. Dietmar Heinke teaches statistics at the School of Psychology. His research focuses on interdisciplinary brain research integrating experimental work in psychology with theoretical/computational modeling work. for more information see his personal webpages.

He also is a member of the Centre for Computational Neuroscience and Cognitive Robotics (CNCR).

Dr Hickey uses tools from cognitive neuroscience – fMRI, EEG, MEG, TES, eye-tracking, and drug challenge – to study how our prior experience of the world dictates the manner in which we sense and perceive it.

Dr Fay Julal Cnossen is a psychologist interested in attachment and caregiving experiences in emerging adulthood and support-seeking (within relationships and in academic settings). In 2018 Fay was awarded the HEFi Award for Educational Enhancement and Innovation for her use of infant simulators in teaching undergraduate developmental psychology students.

Monica Lloyd is a chartered and HCPC registered forensic psychologist who joined the University on retirement from Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service. She set up and continues to teach on the combined forensic clinical psychology doctorate training course, which started in 2013 and now has 15 alumni. Her specialism is the Psychology of Terrorism, which developed from working with ...

Dr Steve Mayhew conducts a lot of simultaneous EEG-fMRI experiments in an effort to better understand the coupling between single-trial variability in electrophysiological and haemodynamic measurements of brain responses, and how interactions between ongoing brain processes and external events are intrinsic to the function of the brain.

Dr Mazaheri is an expert on the role of oscillations in cognition and behaviour. His research focuses on the neural interactions underlying different facets of  cognitive control in both the healthy and clinical populations.

Dr Carmel Mevorach is a cognitive neuroscientist focusing on mechanisms of top-down attention control, which lie at the heart of various cognitive functions. His research also aims to unravel how individual factors (such as autistic traits or normal aging) mediate mechanisms of attention, including on the neural level.

Website: https://mevorach-lab.weebly.com/

Andrew Olson is a neuropsychologist who is interested in cognition and its various forms of breakdown and especially in the organization of language in the brain. He works with patient volunteers with aphasia, children, healthy adults and members of the deaf community.

The aim of Dr Richards’ research is to reduce negative clinical outcomes for individuals with neurodevelopmental disorders. Her work with children with autism and children with rare genetic syndromes has thus far focused on reducing self-injury, improving sleep disorders and understanding the impact of premature birth. Her research uses experimental, epidemiological, single case and ...

I have been a member of staff in the School of Psychology since 1988 and have combined my academic post with clinical psychology practice and managerial responsibilities in the NHS.

Robin Thompson is a cognitive psychologist interested in the underlying nature of human language (both signed and spoken) and, in particular, how language is related to other aspects of cognition.

Research group website

Dr Kate Woodcock’s research interests can be summarised as aiming to investigate and explain human behaviour by considering multiple potential influences at different levels of explanation. For example, people’s genes, their brain structure, their brain functioning, cognitive, physiological and emotional functioning can all affect people’s behaviour both individually and in an ...

Matthew Brett has worked in neurology, cognitive psychology, and methods of brain imaging analysis. His recent interests have been in new methods of teaching data analysis, drawing on his experience in open source scientific computing and current developments in the data science movement.

Visit Matthew's personal website

Dr Chechlacz is broadly interested in understanding how variability in the neurochemical, structural and functional organisation of the brain affect cognitive functions and relates to individual differences in human behaviour and in susceptibility to cognitive ageing and mental health problems. Her work combines cognitive assessment of attentional functions with spherical deconvolution ...

Dr Melissa Colloff conducts research on applied memory and cognition. Melissa mainly uses research and statistical modelling techniques from basic psychology to investigate memory and decision-making in the legal system. Melissa is interested in both theoretical and applied aspects.

Dr Rory T. Devine is a developmental psychologist with expertise in children’s social and cognitive development, longitudinal research methods and psychometrics. His research focuses on individual differences in ‘higher-order’ cognitive skills from infancy to adulthood. His work seeks to understand: (1) why children differ from one another in their ability to reason about ...

Dr Andy Fox is a clinical psychologist specialising in complex and enduring mental health needs, particularly psychosis. Much of his work involves developing an understanding of the social-psychological factors important in complex mental health difficulties and trying to work out what to do about them to improve people's well-being.

Dr Mullinger is an expert in simultaneous EEG-fMRI. She focuses on understanding the sources of the EEG artefacts and how to reduce them at source. Using the best EEG-fMRI techniques available she investigates neurovascular coupling to better understand brain function.

See Dr Mullinger's Nottingham profile

Dr Rogers is a Lecturer in Psychology and Youth Mental Health based within the Institute for Mental Health, School of Psychology, University of Birmingham. His work uses different scientific methods such as clinical assessment, neuropsychological testing and neuroimaging techniques to better understand how brain maturation promotes normal cognitive development, and what causes this development to ...

Dr Pia Rotshtein is an experimental researcher and works on the field of cognitive neuroscience, combining work on the healthy and the diseased brain. She is actively involved in promoting transparency and open science initiative.

Dr. Katrien Segaert's research focuses on the neurobiology of language processing, with a special focus on how sentence-level processes and interactive communication are supported by the brain. She also studies how the neurobiological infrastructure of language processing changes throughout the lifespan and researches lifestyle factors (such as regular physical exercise) that can ...

Dr Stephenson is a lecturer in Forensic Psychology for the Forensic Psychology Practice Doctorate (ForenPsyD) and the Continued Professional Development (CPD) programmes. Her research projects have focused on female offending, the rehabilitation of violent and sex offenders in the UK, youth offending, alternatives to accredited treatment programmes (e.g. applied theatre), and alternatives to ...

Dr Stewart is an experimental Social Psychologist with research interests in social cognition, intergroup relations, and ageing. Much of his research focuses on how goals and environments influence automatic and controlled thinking to produce prejudice and influence intergroup relations and decision making.

Dr Andrew Surtees is an expert in social cognition, autism and mental health.  He combines cutting-edge research on social understanding in typical and atypical populations with practice as a Clinical Psychologist.

Wieske van Zoest uses eye movements and manual responses (and occasionally EEG/ MEG)  to investigate how observers process and respond to the plethora of visual information in the world.

For more information: https://sites.google.com/site/wieskevanzoest

Dr. Apps is a leading expert in the computational, cognitive and neural basis of motivation and social behaviour. More info about the labs work can be found here: www.MSN-lab.com

Dr Cook’s work investigates action and social cognition in typically developed adults and those with autism spectrum conditions.

With respect to action Dr Cook and her colleagues have shown that autistic adults move with subtly different kinematics compared to typical controls (Cook, Blakemore and Press, 2013, Brain). Such atypical kinematics can impact on the perception, ...

Dr. Patricia Lockwood is a cognitive and social neuroscientist. She is head of the Social Decision Neuroscience Lab. Her work focuses on the neurocognitive foundations of social learning and decision-making across the lifespan and in psychiatric and neurological disorders.

Dr Maria Michail leads the Suicide and self-harm research group at the Institute for Mental Health. Her work focuses on understanding the processes that underlie self-harm and suicidal behavior in young people with multiple vulnerabilities; and, using this knowledge to develop and evaluate evidence-based intervention to reduce suicide risk among young people and improve their care and ...

Dr Hyojin Park is an expert on neural oscillatory mechanisms associated with human speech and memory. Her PhD work focused on the functional role of brain oscillations and how they support network interactions (cross-frequency coupling) in attention and memory. Her current research is focused on the topic of audiovisual speech processing, integration, and communication.

View Hyojin Park’s ...

Dr. Apps is a leading expert in the computational, cognitive and neural basis of motivation and social behaviour. More info about the labs work can be found here: www.MSN-lab.com

Dr Berger joined the group of Professor Ole Jensen as a Marie Curie Research Fellow in 2017. She is using MEG and EEG-TMS to investigate how flexible allocation of attention and inhibition can be mapped looking at brain oscillatory activity.

The research focus of Marion Brickwedde is the application of brain computer interfaces to modulate and understand neural oscillations and their role for information processing und neural plasticity.

Dr Geoff Brookshire’s research focuses on the role of cortical oscillations in perception and cognition. In this work, he uses electroencephalography (EEG) and magnetoencephalography (MEG), along with computational simulations.

Ben is a qualitative researcher with a background in mental health, social policy, applied health research, and philosophy. He has worked across the University on research projects in mental health crisis care, female genital mutilation, twin pregnancy, advocacy, and applied ethics. His research is now primarily focused on the sexual exploitation and abuse of children via Internet technologies.

Dr Jo Cutler is a Postdoc in the Social Decision Neuroscience Lab with Dr Patricia Lockwood. Her research uses techniques from neuroscience and psychology to understand prosocial behaviours.

Dr. Davies has recently completed a PhD entitled ‘The practice of crime linkage’. She is now working as a research fellow in the School of Psychology, and as the research coordinator for the Centre for Crime, Justice and Policing.

Dr Griffiths is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow working with Professor Rachel Upthegrove on the Psychosis Immune Mechanism Stratified Medicine Study (PIMS) and the NIHR ADePP trial. She has extensive experience of working on clinical trials and observational studies within the area of psychosis and youth mental health. 

Dr Griffiths is interested in heterogeneity in treatment outcomes and ...

Dr Tjerk Gutteling investigates visual perception and the aspects that influence it. Currently, the focus is on neuronal oscillations using MEG.

Dr. Patricia Lockwood is a cognitive and social neuroscientist. She is head of the Social Decision Neuroscience Lab. Her work focuses on the neurocognitive foundations of social learning and decision-making across the lifespan and in psychiatric and neurological disorders.

Dr Yali Pan is a postdoctoral researcher in neuronal oscillations group. She is interested into the neural mechanism underlying brain cognitions. Her research fields focus on visual working memory, reading and spatial attention, using the technique of MEG and iEEG (intracranial EEG).

Jasper van den Bosch is a Research Fellow working with Ian Charest on conscious access to visual object perception.

Jasper is also the School of Psychology representative at PERCAT. Find out more about Jasper's role.

Lab website: iancharest.com 

Dr Alexander Zhigalov is currently research fellow at the Neuronal Oscillations research group, led by Prof Ole Jensen. Dr Zhigalov has extensive training in the field of cognitive neuroscience and medical imaging, and his main expertise lies within the field of MEG data analysis and methods development.

Dr Michelle Fisher is the Clinical Director for the Clinical Psychology Doctorate Course.  She has worked as Clinical Director since 2012 and prior to this she was a Clinical Tutor since 2004.  She qualified in 2000 from the Birmingham Clinical Psychology Doctorate Course and has a background in working in adult mental health.

I am a Senior Lecturer in Clinical Psychology and within that role I am Admissions Tutor for the ClinPsyD Programme.  My areas of interest in research and teaching fall within the broad area of health psychology, focusing specifically on coeliac disease, cancer and end of life care.   

Elizabeth has worked as a Clinical Tutor on the Clinical Psychology course since 2009, which includes liaison with placement providers within the NHS and third sector, organizing placements, training supervisors and working to resolve any difficulties if they occur. In addition Elizabeth is involved in coordinating the Systemic and Learning Disabilities sub-courses and has lead the admissions ...

Teresa is a Clinical Psychologist specialising in working with children, young people and their families. She has a special interest in autism spectrum, pathological demand avoidance and chronic health conditions. As a clinical tutor on the Clinical Psychology Doctorate Programme she oversees the personal and professional issues curriculum model and is involved in the child module teaching and ...

Dr Oliver is a BPS Chartered Psychologist and HCPC Registered Forensic Psychologist, and is Director of the Forensic Psychology Postgraduate Programmes at the University of Birmingham. Dr Oliver is also a part-time practitioner.

Theresa joined the Clinical Psychology Doctorate in May 2000.  Her main research interests are in the area of brain injury rehabilitation and include: factors affecting engagement in rehabilitation, compensatory memory strategies, outcome measurement and navigation/route learning in people with acquired brain injury.  Her clinical work is based at West Midlands Rehabilitation Service, ...

I am a Clinical Psychologist.  I work in neuropsychological rehabilitation, both in clinical practice and in research.  Research interests include family relationships in acquired brain injury and dementia, errorless learning, and the coping responses of those with an acquired brain injury (particularly self-identity).

Dr Melanie Snape has been teaching and supervising on the CBT Programme since its inception at the University of Birmingham in 2004. She currently contributes to CBT training and supervision across the school of Psychology.

Professor Anthony Beech is an Emeritus Professor in the Centre for Applied Psychologyat the University of Birmingham, UK. He has authored over 180 peer-reviewed articles, 50 book chapters and six books in the area of forensic science/criminal justice. In 2009 he received the Significant Achievement Award from the Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers in Dallas, and the Senior Award ...

Dr Richard Bennett works as a Lecturer on the CBT programmes, where he leads the Postgraduate Diploma in High Intensity CBT.  He is qualified as a Clinical Psychologist and Occupational Therapist and regularly contributes to a range of professional training courses across the University.

Jackie is an applied developmental psychologist whose specific interest is in parenting and childhood eating behaviour and obesity.

David Booth investigates the ways in which an individual's life works. His research and teaching centre on the processes in the mind that situate actions and reactions by people, members of other species and, indeed, socially intelligent engineered systems.

Professor Copello's research has led to major impacts on addiction treatment in the UK in recent years. He was Principal Investigator in the MRC funded UK Alcohol Treatment Trial, the largest trial of alcohol treatments conducted in the UK that informs effective and cost effective delivery of psychosocial interventions for alcohol problems. He led the development of a social and family ...

Professor Leam A. Craig is a Consultant Forensic and Clinical Psychologist and Partner at Forensic Psychology Practice Ltd. He is Professor (Hon) of Forensic Psychology at the Centre for Forensic and Criminological Psychology, University of Birmingham.

He has been appointed Fellow of the British Psychological Society.

He has authored over 70 research articles and chapters in a range of research ...

Geraldine is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist and currently works part-time in the NHS, where she leads a Skills Development Service, and part-time at the University of Birmingham, where she directs CBT Programmes. She is an accredited therapist, trainer and supervisor with the BABCP, and a Chartered Clinical Psychologist with the BPS.

Dr Gillian Harris has worked, throughout her career, on food acceptance and refusal in childhood and infancy. She is seen as a foremost expert in this field. Her clinical work has concentrated on interventions with children who refuse food; primarily because of ongoing medical conditions or developmental difference or delay.

Related links:

• Birmingham Food Refusal Services
• Infant and Toddler ...

Professor Miall has been studying sensorimotor control for about 35 years, from his PhD in locusts, to crayfish, primates and for about 20 years he has been working exclusively on human sensory and motor systems. He is particularly interested in the role of the cerebellum, in sensory motor learning and in predictive control, and the impact of somatosensory loss on movement and cognition.

His ...

Dr Isabel Morales-Muñoz is an Honorary Research Fellow at the Institute for Mental Health (IMH). Dr Morales-Muñoz holds the position of Academy of Finland postdoctoral research fellow, at the National Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), in Helsinki, Finland. Her main research interests lie within the field of sleep, neuropsychology and mental health.

Chris Oliver is Professor of Neurodevelopmental Disorders and Director of the Cerebra Centre for Neurodevelopmental Disorders. His main research interests are behavioural, cognitive and emotional disorders in people with severe intellectual disability, genetic syndromes and autism spectrum conditions.

Now semi-retired, I have a long career behind me and have achieved a national and international reputation in the fields of addiction and community psychology.

Dr Camillo Porcaro is a computational neuroscientist with a core interest in the development of analytical methods for extracting information from non-invasive measures of brain activity. His research focuses on identifying functional brain sources from data obtained through neuroimaging techniques.

View Dr Porcaro's Google Scholar page

Professor Raymond is a visual perception/cognition specialist with a wide range of interests in how humans use and respond to complex visual information. She conducted the seminal work on the “Attention Blink”, a finding that launched intensive interest in labs around the world on how selective attention operates over time. Her work has included studies on visual attention across time ...

John Rose is a clinical psychologist with a particular interest in working with people who have Intellectual Disabilities. He is currently working on a research project examining the effectiveness of Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing with people with Intellectual Disabilities.

Professor Shapiro in collaboration with other colleagues published the first paper on the ‘attentional blink’ phenomenon. His current research interests continue in attention, particularly as it interacts with short- and long- term memory. He maintains an active lab that includes postdocs, doctoral and masters students, and undergraduate research assistants. In addition to basic ...

My research aims to understand the health paradox of adolescence - the years between 12 and 25 are a time of great physical fitness, yet this is the period during which 75% of all mental disorders have their onset. Why should this be the case? Clearly changes in the brain are likely culprits, but how they interact with genetic and environmental factors to produce illness is unclear.

The disorder ...

Dr Wilson has over 10 years’ experience in the field of Magnetic Resonance, with a particular interest in MR spectroscopy. He currently provides MR Physics support for research at Birmingham University Imaging Centre (BUIC).