Biography

I am Professor in Experimental Psychology and Fellow of St. John's College (visit my St John's page here).  My interests in children's language and literacy development began with my DPhil research at the University of York (1991-1994) which explored factors influencing spelling development.  Following my DPhil, I stayed in York working as a Research Fellow for 5 years before being appointed Lecturer in Psychology at York in 1999.  I moved to Oxford in 2002 and was promoted to Professor of Experimental Psychology in 2006.

Research Summary

Broadly, my research is concerned with the language processing, especially reading development.  I am interested in how children learn to read words and comprehend text. Key aims at present are to specify some of the mechanisms involved in the transition from novice to expert, and to better understand how experience with written language emerges and serves to drive development through childhood and into adolescence. We also study language processing in skilled adults, addressing the issue of how skilled behaviour emerges via language learning experience. 

For more information, visit our research hub at ReadOxford and our academic research group home page.

Find my Google Scholar research profile and citations here .

Follow me on twitter @ReadOxford.