Research themes
Research activity in the School of Experimental Psychology is organised into three research themes:
- Cognitive Processes reflects the school’s long-standing tradition of excellence in experimental cognitive psychology.
- Brain, Behaviour, and Health is a more recent but well established research strength.
- Decision-making and Rationality represents a new research direction.
The school takes a multidisciplinary approach to research, with staff working in collaboration with colleagues from all other faculties in order to address fundamental questions of psychology through an experimental lens. Strong links exist in particular with the School of Social and Community Medicine, the School of Clinical Sciences, Computer Science and CRIC Bristol. Our research aims to advance thinking in the context of industry, healthcare, education and society. Researchers have access to a wide range of state of the art facilities, including structural and functional imaging, psychopharmacology laboratories, eye movement and motion capture equipment, and electroencephalography (EEG).
Cognitive Processes
Areas of current focus:
- Language production, perception, and comprehension
- Typical and atypical cognitive development
- Memory encoding, storage and retrieval
- Social cognition and evolutionary social psychology
- Vision: from basic perceptual processes to social perception
Brain, Behaviour, and Health
Areas of current focus:
- Eating behaviour, dietary learning and obesity
- Emotional processing and mood regulation
- Neuropsychology, brain injury and ageing
- Tobacco, alcohol and caffeine use
Decision-making and Rationality
Areas of current focus:
- Selecting the appropriate movement response
- How properties of the environment shape decisions
- Structuring the world to facilitate good decisions
- Food choice and dietary decisions
- The origins of supernatural beliefs