News

Early Career Researcher News

EPS Plymouth (2023) President’s Poster Commendation Prize Winner.

We are pleased to announce the winner of the President’s Poster Commendation Prize for the EPS Plymouth 2023 meeting is Anita Twele (Brock University, Canada), supervised by Professor Catherine Mondloch.

Anita’s Research Study Poster is entitled ‘What happens to competence? The second dimension underlying first impressions of older adult faces changes with use of naturalistic vs. controlled images’.

Congratulations Anita!

Early Career Researcher News

2023 EPS / BSA Undergraduate Prize Winner 

Lottie Shipp (University of Oxford, supervised by Polly Waite and Emma Černis) has been selected as the winner of the 2023 Experimental Psychology Society / British Science Association Undergraduate Project Prize for best undergraduate research project in experimental psychology!

There were many outstanding submissions brought to the attention of BSA and EPS, congratulations to all nominated projects. Further details of Lottie’s presentation to the EPS will be provided in the near future. 

Society News

EPS Award Nominations for approval at the Annual General Meeting in January 2023.

Following the autumn EPS committee meeting, we are delighted to announce the Committee’s award nominations for approval at the Annual General Meeting in January 2023.

The Committee seeks approval for the following nominations:

Election of the Fifty-Second Bartlett Lecturer
Prof Marlene Behrmann (Carnegie Mellon University) 

Election of the Twenty-Second EPS Mid-Career Award Lecturer
Prof Geoffrey Bird (University of Oxford) 

Election of the Thirty-First EPS Prize Lecturer
Dr Nadine Lavan (Queen Mary, University of London) 

Election of the Twelfth Frith Prize Lecturer
Dr Tom Arthur (University of Exeter) 

Forthcoming Workshop

New lab-leader opportunity at the University of Leipzig, Germany.

Please see below information regarding the search for a new Lab-leader in the EEG-lab of Prof. Matthias Müller at the University of Leipzig, Germany.

The successful candidate has either an educational background as a Technical Assistant or in Psychology. He/she will have experience in working in an EEG-lab, has profound Matlab programming skills and experience in managing a scientific lab and given the international orientation of the lab, he/she speaks fluently English.

The position is a permanent full-time position at the University of Leipzig, with all the amenities thereof. Annual salary will be around 35.000 Euros.

For more information of the scientific work in the lab see:

https://www.lw.uni-leipzig.de/en/wilhelm-wundt-institute-for-psychology/working-groups-1/experimental-psychology-and-methods/research

or contact Prof. Müller at m.mueller@uni-leipzig.de.

Leipzig is one of the most aspiring town in Germany offering a vivid cultural life and is titled the “better Berlin” in the meantime.

Given that the position is a university position, applications with the identification number 212/2022 need to be sent to the Dean of the Faculty of Life Sciences not later than July 26th 2022.

Prof. Dr. Marc Schönwiesner
Fakultät für Lebenswissenschaften
Talstraße 33
04103 Leipzig

or by e-mail: dekanat.lw@uni-leipzig.de.

Related (non-EPS) activities

Michael Posner – Developing a Brain: A Life in Psychology.

EPS Member Michael Posner has written a memoir, Developing a Brain: A Life in Psychology, that includes many interactions with UK psychology including the EPS and QJEP, as well as his time at Cambridge University with the then Applied Psychology Unit.

The memoir is now available on Amazon kindle for $2.99, which you can find by going to the kindle store and typing in ‘Michael I Posner’. If you don’t use a kindle you can get a free app to read on any computer.

A print version will also be available in the future.

Early Career Researcher News

President’s Commendation for Student Posters – EPS Online – January 2022

We are pleased to announce the winner of the President’s Poster Commendation Prize for the EPS Online (January 2022) meeting is Rebecca Crowley (Royal Holloway, University of London, supervised by Jakke Tamminen)!

Rebecca’s Research Study Poster is entitled ‘Forgetting of newly learned words: Fragmented or holistic depending on retrieval practice’.

Congratulations Rebecca!

Forthcoming Workshop

EPS / BSA Undergraduate Project Prize Winner for 2022.

Congratulations to Caitlin Naylor from the University of Bath (and Caitlin’s supervisor, Dr Michael Proulx) who has been selected as the winner of the EPS / BSA prize for best undergraduate research project in experimental psychology!

There were many outstanding submissions brought to the attention of BSA and EPS, congratulations to all nominated projects. More details of Caitlin’s presentation to the EPS will be provided in the near future.

Forthcoming Workshop

EPS Award Nominations for approval at the Annual General Meeting in January 2022.

Following the autumn EPS committee meeting, we are delighted to announce the Committee’s award nominations for approval at the Annual General Meeting in January 2022.

The Committee seeks approval for the following nominations:

Election of Fifty-First Bartlett Lecturer
Professor Robert Logie (University of Edinburgh)

Election of Twenty-First EPS Mid-Career Award Lecturer
Professor Gareth Gaskell (University of York)

Election of Thirtieth EPS Prize Lecture
Dr Clare Sutherland (University of Aberdeen)

Election of Joint Eleventh Frith Prize Winners
Moataz Assem (University of Cambridge) and Matthew Mak (University of York)

Early Career Researcher News

President’s Commendation for Student Posters – EPS Online – July 2021

We are pleased to announce the winner of the President’s Poster Commendation Prize for the EPS Online (July 2021) meeting is Hellen Jing Yuan (Cardiff University, supervised by Christoph Teufel and Krishna Singh)!

Hellen’s Research Study Poster is entitled ‘Early sensory processing of a feature is modulated by the feature’s relevance to high-level object perception’.

Congratulations Hellen!

Society News

President’s Commendation for Student Posters – EPS Online – April 2021

We are pleased to announce the joint winners of the President’s Poster Commendation Prize for the EPS Online (April 2021) meeting are Tom Arthur (University of Exeter, supervised by Samuel Vine, Gavin Buckingham and Mark Brosnan) and Cátia Ferreira De Oliveira (University of York, supervised by Lisa Henderson and Emma Hayiou-Thomas)!

Tom’s Research Study Poster is entitled ‘Expecting the unexpected: An examination of active inference in autistic adults using immersive virtual reality’ whilst Cátia’s Research Study Poster is entitled ‘Procedural learning in the SRT task: A long road to stability’.

Congratulations to both Tom and Cátia!

Society News

Helen Pattison

It with great sadness that I write to tell you that Professor Helen Pattison has passed away.

Helen joined Aston from the University of Birmingham 17 years ago, and before that, she was at Loughborough. She brought with her expansive knowledge and experience of clinical trials, interdisciplinary working, and a desire to set up a centre of excellence in health psychology. As a result Aston can claim to be the UK’s biggest provider of BPS-accredited health psychology training at MSc level with the largest cohorts of campus and online students.

Helen’s close collaborations with the Birmingham Women’s and Children’s Hospital, with her clinical colleagues and those working in the areas of biomedical ethics and parental health behaviour brought with her a strong profile of applied health research, informed by psychology. Helen contributed psychological and methodological expertise to a number of clinical trials focusing on women’s reproductive health and paediatric health. She was also interested in women’s experience of pregnancy, and debunking urban myths such as ‘eating for two’ and the ‘pregnancy brain’ or ‘baby brain’.

Later in her career, and as technology progressed, Helen became interested in self-testing kits and the potential impact of those on illness perceptions, symptom perceptions, and ultimately the ways in which people managed their own diagnosis and health behaviours. This and other projects brought with them interdisciplinary collaborations within Aston, notably with pharmacy.

As well as her contributions to this highly impactful research, Helen has been a significant figure across the university. Most recently, she worked closely with others on the foundation of a new Medical School, bringing her many years’ experience to bear on the challenge. She held the position of Associate Dean for Research, and, for a number of years, and took up the position of Head of the Psychology Department. Helen’s commitment to rigorous research and to making a difference was evident throughout each of these roles.

As Head of Psychology, it was clear that Helen was always working towards creating a happy and supportive working environment. As we all know, this can be a particularly challenging task at times! Nevertheless, Helen has always been supportive to her colleagues, helping them to be the best that they can be.

This depth of commitment and mentorship was also extended to her students, at all levels. But this was not limited to her own students, Helen was always in favour of active research groups and providing researchers across their career trajectories with safe spaces to discuss their ideas, present their research, and to practise answering those tricky questions that Helen was always ready to ask.

Helen received her first degree in Psychology in 1977 from Cardiff, an MSc in Mathematical Psychology from Stirling in 1978, and a PhD from Reading in 1983. She was a member of the Experimental Psychology Society from 1985 until her death. Helen will be remembered with great fondness.

Society News

President’s Commendation for Student Posters – EPS Online – January 2021

We are pleased to announce the winner of the President’s Poster Commendation Prize for the EPS Online (January 2021) meeting is Jamie Cockcroft (University of York, supervised by Aidan Horner and Gareth Gaskell and thanks to co-author on this work Sam Berens)!

Jamie’s Research Study Poster is entitled ‘Schema influence on behaviour for both schema-relevant and -irrelevant information’.

Congratulations Jamie!

Society News

EPS / BSA Undergraduate Project Prize Winner for 2021

Congratulations to Jessica Teed from the University of Leeds (and Jessica’s supervisor, Dr Richard Harris) who has been selected as the winner of the EPS / BSA prize for best undergraduate research project in experimental psychology!

There were many outstanding submissions brought to the attention of BSA and EPS, congratulations to all nominated projects. More details of Jessica’s presentation to the EPS will be provided in the near future.

Society News

EPS award nominations for approval at the Annual General Meeting in January 2021.

Following the autumn EPS committee meeting, we are delighted to announce the Committee’s award nominations for approval at the Annual General Meeting in January.

The Committee seeks approval for the following nominations:

Election of Fiftieth Bartlett lecturer

Professor Melvyn Goodale (University of Western Ontario, Canada)

Election of Twentieth EPS Mid-Career Award lecturer

Professor Kate Nation (University of Oxford)

Election of Twenty Ninth EPS Prize lecture

Dr Catherine Manning (University of Oxford)

Election of Tenth Frith Prize lecturer

Dr Jennifer Murphy (Royal Holloway, University of London)

Election of Officers and Committee Members

President Elect:

Professor Kathy Rastle (Royal Holloway)

Ordinary Committee Members:

Dr Brianna Beck (University of Kent; Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Representative)

Dr Joseph Brooks (Keele University; Data Protection Representative)

Dr Gavin Buckingham (University of Exeter)

Dr Joni Holmes (Cambridge University)

Dr David Sanderson (Durham University)

Early Career Researcher News

Looking back on an EPS Study Visit – Dr Paul Forbes

As a PhD candidate under the supervision of Prof. Antonia Hamilton at UCL, Paul Forbes successfully applied for an EPS Study Visit in April 2017.

This award allowed Paul to visit the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Munich, Germany for three months under the supervision of Dr Leonhard Schilbach, investigating the validation of a non-invasive motion tracking system for use in autism diagnostic interviews.

Paul has told us that he enjoyed his stay in Munich and ‘learned a lot during the placement. It also cemented my decision to go abroad for my postdoc.’

The experience has also led to the publication (on August 12th 2020) of a paper entitled ‘Unobtrusive tracking of interpersonal orienting and distance predicts the subjective quality of social interactions‘, in collaboration with Juha Lahnakoski (a colleague Paul met whilst in Munich), Cade McCall and Leonhard Schilbach.

https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.191815

Paul is now a postdoctoral researcher in the Social, Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Unit of the University of Vienna.

Society News

Bob Audley

It is with great sadness that we have learnt that Bob Audley, who was EPS Hon. Secretary between 1962 – 1964 and President between 1975 – 1976, died last Friday (31st July 2020).
 
Along with AR Jonckheere and Tim Shallice, he was one of the primary figures in the brief flowering of mathematical psychology in the United Kingdom during the 1960s. It included work on mathematical learning theory and decision making – Audley’s (1960, Psyc Rev) Theory of Choice remains an important landmark paper. Later he worked on reaction times, map cognition, and, perhaps most importantly, he triggered the development of research into the psychology of medical accidents in the 1990s (Medical Accidents by C Vincent, M. Ennis & RJ Audley OUP, 1993).
 
Audley steered the UCL department of psychology through the years of the Thatcher cuts so that the department emerged from the 1980s bigger and stronger than at the beginning of the decade. At a national level, he was a major figure in UK psychology and he successfully argued in parliament that our discipline should be classified and funded as a laboratory-based biological science rather than as a social science.
 
As such, Bob Audley had a significant impact on EPS members and the direction of our discipline. We are most grateful to his contribution to the Society.

Related (non-EPS) activities

ESRC Review of the PhD in the Social Sciences: Open Consultation

The ESRC has launched an open consultation to inform their Review of the PhD in the Social Sciences. Through the consultation they want to capture views on the strengths and limitations of current doctoral study from within and outside of the social sciences. They are particularly interested in examples from existing experience, the learning from trials of new or innovative approaches, and views of areas where change would be beneficial to enhance skills and ensure doctoral graduates are fully prepared for a range of future careers with their health and well-being safeguarded. They would like to hear from a diverse range of stakeholders and are seeking the views from all members of the research community, learned societies, government, business, third-sector organisations and others who have an interest in the future skills needed by social science PhD students. The findings of this review will directly inform the ESRC’s strategy for doctoral training and for recommissioning our Doctoral Training Partnerships in 2022/23.

Alongside the launch of this consultation, the ESRC are also publishing a comprehensive assessment of existing research evidence on the structure, funding and assessment of social science doctoral training. Please engage directly with the consultation and promote amongst your contacts and networks. The consultation is open until 16 September 2020.

The consultation page can be found here.