Psychology & Neuroscience in Education

Student members: 2008-09

Student	Topic	Supervisor
Anna Abramowski	A study of academic procrastination and self-worth in postgraduate university students Most of the literature has explored this construct using a quantitative methodology and survey protocols, but this approach limits insight, elaboration and understanding of other aspects that might influence procrastination, such as socio-cultural and environmental factors. This study will build on the existing quantitative literature by adding student's personal narratives/ voices from their own personal perspectives and individual context.	Roland Chaplain
Hei Jean Ahn	'Able underachievement': an exploratory study into the causal factors, academic motivation, and suggested strategies for improvement	Mike Younger & Ruth Kershner
Daniella Aschettino	The identification of social-cognitive deficits in autism to inform teaching strategies The study aims to reveal the social-cognitive deficits involved in autistic disorder. I propose that measuring teacher's knowledge of autism, and how they believe the disorder influences their teaching could be used to further inform teachers of the emotional/social/ cognitive barriers that autistic children experience at school which may go on to impair their learning.	Linda Hargreaves
Sue Bingham	The expression and regulation of emotion by young children in classrooms	David Whitebread
Pamela M Black	14-19-year-old school students' everyday and school science understanding of genetics and inheritance, in the context of health and disease. Understandings gained (from Phase I research) will support the development of a teaching intervention designed to enable students to achieve integration between their everyday and school science understandings. Collaborative group work will be used to support the development of students' understandings in the planned teaching intervention.	Christine Howe
Margo Bristow	Working memory ability, classroom experience and educational attainment: a mixed-methods approach to the understanding and assessment of working memory in pupils at 14 years of age. This two-stage study compared the relationship between working memory skills and education attainment at KS3. Stage 1: 25 Year 10 pupils were tested using the Automated Working Memory Assessment. Stage 2: a case study comprising a series of classroom observations and interviews looking at the experiences of pupils in relation to the demands of working memory during routine classroom activities.
Donna Bryce	Metacognitive skills and executive functions: an examination of relationships and development in young children.	David Whitebread & Denes Szucs
Emma Callow	An exploratory study of teacher and pupil perceptions of the effects of a school-based exercise programme on personal qualities associated with resilience. A case study of a UK primary school which has a whole-school 10-minute daily exercise session. Interviews with children and teachers have been analysed thematically to identify whether participants perceive the exercise programme to have increased any personal qualities associated with resilience, such as self-esteen, postive outlook, and social skills.	Ruth Kershner
Ruby Jane Carmen	Emotional Literacy and the implementation of social and emotional aspects of learning at primary level: a case study with 9-year-olds. This study examines the psychological construct of Emotional Literacy, and of Emotional Intelligence (EI), with particular focus on the Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning (SEAL) within a classroom setting.	Linda Hargreaves
Victoria Cheah	The role of cross-modal correspondences in children's analogical reasoning	Usha Goswami
Angela Chiu	The professional development of teachers of English in Hong Kong primary schools	Linda Hargreaves
Demetra Demetriou	Interrelationships in children's cognitive development: theory of mind, executive functioning, verbal ability, representational processes and source memory	David Whitebread
Priyanka Dinesh	Creativity: are there cultural differences? This research focuses on comparing the creativity of individuals from collectivistic and individualistic cultural affiliations and to examine differences and why these differences arise	Ruth Kershner
C.L. Fung	Group work and the learning of critical thinking skills in Hong Kong secondary schools	Christine Howe
Deniz Seher Gozunke	How do Turkish minority children's attitudes towards Britain affect their school performance? This study aims to investigate whether there is any contingency between the degree Turkish immigrant children view Britain positively and their levels of academic achievement	Ros McLellan
Jennifer Green	Synaesthesia and number cognition: behavioural and electrophysiologial investigations	Usha Goswami
Paula Guardia	The relations between phonological awareness, rapid naming and reading development from kindergarten to first grade in Spanish speakers.	Usha Goswami
Michael Hast	Young children's explicit and tacit knowledge of object speed and acceleration. Alternative knowledge of naive physics in primary school children is being explored, with the intention of possible exploitation within early science education to facilitate conceptual change.	Christine Howe
Yi-Fang Hsu	The numerical representation in adults with/without developmental dyscalculia	Denes Szucs
Erëblir Kadriu	What it takes to be a good teacher: attributes of effective teachers according to secondary school students in Kosova. The research will investigate which attributes are perceived by Kosovar high school students to make a good/effective teacher.
Danielle F Kaye	A cross-cultural exploration of pre-university students' perceptions of parental influence and of its relation to their self-efficacy, autonomy and learning orientation. A mixed-methods investigation of 'A' level Psychology students from various cultures, employing validated instruments (questionnaires, interviews and possible action research).	Ros McLellan
Clare Killikelly	The development of control over action. The study is investigating the neural timing of the motor initiation of action in young children. The goal of the project is to understand how motor difficulties can impede the demonstration of conceptual knowledge by young children.	Denes Szucs
Sarah Killing	Reading, language and auditory processing in low IQ readers. A longitudinal project profiling low IQ good and poor readers in terms of their reading, language and auditory processing capabilities	Usha Goswami
Tamar Levi	A pilot study: classroom diaglogue and the development of reading comprehension. This intervention aims to investigate whether regular dialogic literacy sessions influence performance on Year 2 SATs reading comprehension assessments in the Primary classroom.
Rachael Levy	Becoming a reader; girls' and boys' self-perceptions as they start school.	Linda Hargreaves & Eve Bearne
Mona Nemer	The significance of role play for verbal self-regulation. The main research questions are: to what extent do 3-4-year olds in a nursery setting use private speech to regulate their behaviour? And, what is the influence of role play on self-regulatory private speech?	David Whitebread
Aileen O'Connor	An examination of the private speech of high functioning children with autism. This research focuses on whether high functioning children with autism use private speech and whether it serves a self-regulatory purpose.	David Whitebread
Hannah Pincham	The perceptual load model of selective attention description. This study researches the impact of task-relevant and task-irrelevant distractor interference using behavioural and eye-tracking measures.	Julia Flutter & Denes Szucs
Esther Robinson	Maintaining high academic self-efficacy: a qualitative study of the academic self-efficacy beliefs of high-achieving postgraduate students.	Linda Hargreaves
Benson Soong	Using ICT to improve students' revision of physics concepts through co-construction and perscriptive tutoring. This one-year longitudinal study examines the design, implementation and evaluation of an ICT-infused learning intervention for in-school secondary physics revision.	Neil Mercer
Elena Speciani	Using established trait and ability based Emotional Intelligence assessments and neuroimaging tools to investigate the neurological functioning of emotional intelligence
Jenny E Symonds	Stage-Environment Fit: early adolescents' psychological development and attitudes towards school in English middle and secondary school environments. Why do many children gradually lose interest in school and begin to view it negatively after transition to secondary education? One theory is that their developing psychology and behaviour mismatches with specific features of the new school environment. The theory of 'stage-environment fit' (Eccles & Midgley, 1989) is investigated in a longitudinal multiple methods ethnography of twenty 11- to 12-year-olds and 270 of their peers.	Linda Hargreaves
John P Verney	Bongo Phonics. A music-based test protocol to help identify children who are at risk of falling behind in a classroom-based literacy programme because they have difficulties processing simple phonological tasks involving syllable manipulation and rhyme.	Usha Goswami
Hsiao-Lan Wang	Developmental dyslexia, phonological skills and auditory processing in Chinese. The study aims to examine the specific relationship between linguistic phonological skills, auditory perception and reading abilities through the investigation of dyslexia in Mandarin-speaking children.	Usha Goswami
Sonia White	The development of number processing in Years 1, 2 and 3: relationships between education and cognitive neuroscience measures and academic performance. This research utilises a multidisciplinary approach to obtain fine grained understanding of arithmetic development, in order to inform mathematics education during the first years of formal schooling.	Denes Szucs