Principal Investigators
Amanda is a Lecturer in the School of Psychology & Neuroscience and aims to address the evolutionary origins of conceptual thought and causal knowledge by combining developmental and comparative studies of physical problem-solving.
Juan is a Reader in the School of Psychology & Neuroscience who conducts research on the development of prelinguistic communication and early theories of mind in human infants and in great apes and monkeys.
Erin is a lecturer whose research interests focus on social learning, cross cultural influences and traditions. She studies the development of social learning capacities in children.
James is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Psychology & Neuroscience who studies episodic and spatial memory from both neuroscientific and developmental perspectives.
Malinda is a Professor in Developmental Psychology and studies infants’ and young children’s social behaviour and social-affiliative motivations.
Josep is a Professor in Evolutionary Origins of Mind who studies causal and inferential reasoning, tool-use, long-term memory and planning, gestural communication and mindreading in great apes and human children.
Postdoctoral Scholars
Dr Eva Reindl
Eva is a postdoctoral researcher in the School of Psychology & Neuroscience, working with Dr Seed on examining the origins and development of executive functions in young children. Other research interests include children’s problem-solving and tool use, innovation, collaboration, social and asocial learning.
Postgraduate Students
Zeynep CivelekZeynep studies causal reasoning in children and non-human primates under the supervision of Amanda Seed. She started her research with chimpanzees during her masters in St Andrews and is now planning to extend it as a comparative study.
Emmie BryantEmmie is a PhD student jointly supervised by Amanda Seed and Jamie Ainge, studying the evolution and development of episodic cognition in children and non-human primates. She is interested in developing techniques for drawing near-direct comparisons in memory function across taxa and across the lifespan.
Eleanor is a PhD student with Amanda Seed, studying the evolution and development of curiosity and exploration in children and non-human primates. Her initial work focused on causal reasoning in monkeys, and subsequent work on comparative research into how an individual’s natural curiosity can lead to self-guided exploration and learning.
Hao (Lucy) Liu
Lucy is a PhD student co-supervised by Malinda Carpenter and Juan-Carlos Gómez, studying infants’ and young children’s social cognition and communication. She is currently conducting research on the development of common ground reasoning and its relation to theory of mind.
Laras Yuniarto
Laras is a PhD student supervised by Juan-Carlos Gómez. She studies how implicit and explicit elements come together in children’s skill learning, focusing on the processes behind learning from one’s own past performance and making predictions about others’ skills.
Gideon Salter
Gideon is a PhD student supervised by Malinda Carpenter, interested in joint attention and communication. His research is looking at the ways in which the emergence of joint attention in infancy relates to early communication, and he is interested in examining how a clearer understanding of the development of these skills can inform theoretical approaches.
Francesca Fotheringham
Francesca is a PhD student, co-supervised by Barbara Dritschel and Erin Robbins, exploring how children think multiple emotions interact across time. Her main current focus is adapting the Analogue Emotions Scale (AES) measurement for children, and exploring the different patterns of interaction.
Baby and Child Lab Manager
Geraldine BrownGeraldine coordinates research carried out in the lab, nurseries, schools, and public venues and events such as the Dundee Science Centre and Fife Science Festival. Her research work focuses on the development of self-regulation and attentional control, and their role in influencing how we learn.
Associates
Dr Emily Burdett, Institute of Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Oxford, UK.
Dr Sarah Gerson – School of Psychology, Cardiff University, UK.