Social Sciences

Name and Contact Details Research Interests
Dr Nicolas Argenti
Role: Senior Lecturer

Phone: + 44 (0) 1895 265457
Email: nicolas.argenti@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 138
Childhood, youth, performance, political violence, collective memory
Dr Andrew Beatty
Role: Senior Lecturer

Phone: + 44 (0) 1895 265943
Email: andrew.beatty@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 144
Psychological anthropology, emotion; religion and ritual; approaches to ethnographic writing; Indonesia, Mexico
Dr Dominique Behague
Role: Senior Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 267309
Email: dominique.behague@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 154a
Medical Anthropology, Medicalisation of the life-span, Psychiatry, Mental health, Adolescence, Anthropology of Biomedicine and Statistical sciences, Evidence-based Policy-making, Global Health, Inequities and class conflict, Brazil.
Dr Caragh Brosnan
Role: Research Fellow

Phone: +44 (0)7952 723216
Email: caragh.brosnan@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB152

I am a sociologist whose main areas of interest include medicine, science, the professions and higher education.

Professor David Bunce
Role: Professor in Psychology

Phone: +44 (0)1895 267242
Email: david.bunce@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB230
  • Early detection of cognitive decline and dementia.
  • Biomarkers of cognitive ageing.
  • Executive function and memory in old age.
  • Depression, anxiety and cognitive performance in older adults.
Dr Survjit Cheeta
Role: Senior Lecturer in Psychology

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 266530
Email: survjit.cheeta@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB 268
Psychopharmacology and epidemiology of depression and anxiety disorders.

My research interests are within the field of psychiatric illness, with a particular focus on the disease states of depression and anxiety. My research has aimed to understand these conditions from a multi-disciplinary perspective (molecular to clinical and social policy) Within the pre-clinical sciences i have used models of these disease states to understand their neurobiological underpinnings. Currently I am using epidemiological data and psychological paradigms of emotion and cognition to identify markers for normal and abnormal brain function.

I have also been involved in policy development for the treatment of drug and alcohol addiction at a local and national level. I have worked on a number of projects including investigating issues concerning access of women and black and ethnic minority groups to drug services, alcohol use and presentations to Accident & Emergency departments and substance misuse in individuals with learning disabilities. Most recently, I was involved in the National Alcohol Needs Assessment project. This project was funded by the Department of Health, with the aim of supporting the National Alcohol Harm Reduction Strategy for England, which was published by the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit, 2004. This work has resulted in the publication of a national policy document which will be used by the government to fund alcohol treatment services in England.

Dr Liana Chua
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265429
Email: liana.chua@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 138
Religion and ritual, conversion, anthropology of Christianity, ethnic citizenship, materiality, museology, landscape, migration, environmentalism, human-animal relations, Sarawak, Southeast Asia.
Dr Andrew Clark
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265127
Email: andrew.clark@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB159
I am broadly interested in the process of sexual selection and in a variety of topics that typically fall within its purview, including mating systems, sexual conflict, direct and indirect sexual competition, mating strategies, mating effort allocation and mechanisms of mate preference and choice.

I am also interested in social consequences of human mate choice, with the prediction that such consequences may prove to be important in regulating the strength and nature of choice, and in developing predictive models of human mate preference and mating tactics.
Dr Rachel Crockett
Role: Lecturer

Phone: 01895 267584
Email: rachel.crockett@brunel.ac.uk
Office: MJ141

My main research interests concern why we find it difficult to change our behaviour in ways that promote our health, even when we are want to be more healthy. I am therefore interested in both individual and environmental influences on our behaviour and the use of population level interventions to promote better health. Currently my work focuses on healthy eating behaviour and the impact of nutritional labelling on food purchasing and consumption. Additionally, as we frequently fail to behave in the ways that logic would predict, I am also interested in the possible unintended effects of population level interventions paradoxically resulting in less, rather than more, healthy behaviour.

I am also interested in the communication of health-related information to patients, specifically how complex information about the likelihood of the possible outcomes of medical interventions can be communicated in ways to promote understanding and informed choices.

Dr Matthew David
Role: Lecturer in Sociology of Culture and Research Methods

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 266029
Email: matthew.david@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Gaskell Building 175
On-line Sharing, Moral Panics about ‘Piracy’, Sociology of Science and Technology.
Dr Monica Montserrat Degen
Role: Senior Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0)1895 265940
Email: monica.degen@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 149
  • cities and space (urban cultures, urban regeneration & social change, public space and life)
  • the senses and embodiment (the relation between material environment and experience, the politics of the senses, senses and the organization of urban life)
  • everyday life (aesthetization of everyday life, everyday practices, the body and performativity)
  • material cultures (design & architecture, entanglements of human non-human relations)
Dr Bridget Dibb
Role: Lecturer, School Senior Tutor, Touch Point Leader

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 266564
Email: bridget.dibb@brunel.ac.uk
Office: MJ148

As a Health Psychologist my research interests cover many aspects of health and illness, my main areas of interest include posttraumatic growth after illness; the influence of social comparison on perceptions, adjustment and rehabilitation; illness beliefs; quality of life and adjustment to chronic illness; fear-avoidance beliefs.

Current studies include:

  • Factors influencing decisions to disclose a positive HIV diagnosis
  • Posttraumatic growth after a positive HIV diagnosis and disclosure
  • The experience of stigma in people who experience memory loss and epilepsy
  • Understanding expectations and social comparison in the context of spinal cord rehabilitation
  • Doctor and patient communication and satisfaction
  • Understanding obesity


Dr Liory Fern-Pollak
Role: Associate Research Fellow

Phone:
Email: liory.fern-pollak@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB262

Neural mechanisms of language processing, Multilingualism, Reading, Dyslexia

Dr Peggy Froerer
Role: Senior Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265456
Email: peggy.froerer@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 145
Anthropology of South Asia, anthropology of education, schooling and learning, anthropology of childhood and youth, anthropology of development, inequality and social mobility, anthropology of illness and healing.
Dr Stanley Gaines
Role: Senior Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0)1895 265485
Email: stanley.gaines@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB269
Personality influences (eg attachment styles, cultural values) and demographic influences (eg gender, ethnic group membership) on personal relationship processes (eg accommodation, interpersonal resource exchange)
Professor Fernand Gobet
Role: Professor in Cognitive Psychology

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265484
Email: fernand.gobet@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB263
My research is centred around the development of the CHREST (Chunks Hierarchies and REtrieval STructures) architecture. In particular, I'm trying to understand the mechanisms underlying the acquisition of expertise, with a special focus on learning, memory, perception and attention processes in skilled individuals. CHREST is also applied to concept formation, the acquisition of multiple diagrammatic representations, and the acquisition of syntax and of vocabulary. My research uses experimental investigations, computer simulations, and theoretical investigations.
Professor Robin Goodwin
Role: Professor of Social Psychology

Phone: +44 (0)1895 265470
Email: robin.goodwin@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB203
Social change and its impact on personal relationships, relationships and culture, values and value change, sexual disease, perceptions of terrorism.
Dr Lesley Henderson
Role: Senior Lecturer in Sociology & Communications

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265459
Email: lesley.henderson@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Gaskell Building 164
Lesley’s research spans the production, transmission and reception of media messages concerning health, science; social problems and political ‘disconnection’. Substantive topics include new genetics, breast cancer, infant feeding, MMR, mental distress, social care, inequalities. She has a longstanding interest in public engagement; ‘public’ issues in television soap & drama and has specific expertise in research with younger audiences.
Dr Eric Hirsch
Role: Head of Department

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265953
Email: eric.hirsch@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 147
historicity, landscape, myth, personhood, power, property relations, ritual, technology; Melanesia, Papua New Guinea, Britain
Dr Jason Hughes
Role: Senior Lecturer, Graduate Tutor, Deputy Head of School

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265633
Email: jason.hughes@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Gaskell Building 177
Sociology of emotions; historical sociology; sociological theory; organisational sociology; sociology of health and illness; sociology of addiction.
Dr Stephen Johnston
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 267878
Email: stephen.johnston@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB 167
Object recognition, attention, emotion processing and the processes involved in affective stimulus evaluation.
Dr Barbara Knorpp
Role: Visiting Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0)1895 267301
Email: barbara.knorpp@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 153
The role of ethnographic museums in anthropology, the roles of photographs and films in anthropological knowledge, the senses of belonging, and production of history.   
Dr Gustav Kuhn
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 267759
Email: gustav.kuhn@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB162
Visual Cognition, Attention, Awareness and the Science of Magic.  
For more information go to http://www.gustavkuhn.com

Dr Sharon Lockyer
Role: Lecturer in Sociology and Communications

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 267373
Email: sharon.lockyer@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 142
  • Sociology of mediated culture
  • Critical comedy studies
  • Media controversies
  • Gender, class and disability
Dr Sarita Malik
Role: Lecturer in Media and Communications

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 266874
Email: sarita.malik@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 154
Media communication, race and representation, media genres, cultural diversity and public service broadcasting, Diasporic media practice.
Dr Tara Marshall
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 267096
Email: tara.marshall@brunel.ac.uk
Office: 161 Gaskell Building

My research examines the influence of culture, gender, and attachment style on romantic relationships. Recently, my studies have investigated topics such as the acculturation of migrant couples to the United Kingdom; coping with relationship break-ups; reactions to romantic rejection threats; and the role of social networking websites in relationship satisfaction. More information is available on my website.

 

Dr Clare Melhuish
Role: Visiting Research Fellow

Phone:
Email: clare.melhuish@brunel.ac.uk
Office:

Anthropology of architecture and built environment; urban anthropology; Modern Movement architectural heritage and social identity; domestic space and cultures; ethnographic research and urban design/regeneration; ethnography of architectural design practice.

Dr Timothy Milewa
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265450
Email: timothy.milewa@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Gaskell Building 071
Citizenship and governance in health policy/ health management; sociology and politics of evidence in health and science; health policy
Professor Lynn Myers
Role: Professor of Health Psychology

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265879
Email: lynn.myers@brunel.ac.uk
Office: MJ143
All aspects of the repressive coping style. Many areas of health psychology including:  adherence/compliance to treatment, inhibition of emotion and disease, risk perception, stress and dentists, social cognition models and health-related behaviours. Culture and health. Romantic adult attachment styles. Inhibitory processes in memory. 
Dr Isak Niehaus
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 267413
Email: isak.niehaus@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 150
Cosmology, witchcraft, politics, violence, gender and sexuality, the HIV/AIDS pandemic, violence, crime, in southern Africa  
Professor Dany Nobus
Role: Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Strategy, Development and External Relations

Phone: + 44 (0)1895 265944
Email: dany.nobus@brunel.ac.uk
Office: A117, Wilfred Brown Building

Psychoanalysis, history of psychiatry, epistemology, philosophy of science

Judith Okely
Role: Visiting Research Fellow

Phone:
Email: sss-enquiries@brunel.ac.uk
Office:
Her research interests include: Fieldwork Practice, Gypsies, Feminism, Autobiography, Visualism, Landscape Representations and the Aged, mainly within Europe.
Dr Alexandra Ouroussoff
Role: Visiting Research Fellow

Phone: +44(0)7947198269
Email: Alexandra.Ouroussoff@brunel.ac.uk
Office:

Anthropology of political economies, methodology, psychoanalytic theory

Dr Justin O’Brien
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265475
Email: justin.obrien@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB207
Developmental Disorders – I study visual deficits in autism, dyslexia and dyspraxia. This includes visual form and motion coherence processing as well as higher level processes in biological motion and object recognition.

Infant Vision – At the Centre for Research in Infant Behaviour, we have looked at the development of motion processing in infancy and are currently investigating perception of the Hollow Mask Illusion, as featured on a recent BBC Horizon documentary.

Neuroimaging – fMRI projects include form and motion processing in developmental disorders.

Emotion in Facial Expressions – How the dynamics of facial expression influence perception of emotion and personality.

Eye Witness Testimony – I have supervised a number of student projects on eye-witness testimony, including investigation of sex differences in recall and implanting false memories.
Dr Melissa Parker
Role: Senior Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 266049
Email: melissa.parker@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 152
The Anthropology of Global Health; Neglected Tropical Diseases; Maternal Health; Mental Health, Well-being and healing in the aftermath of war; HIV/AIDS; Geographical areas of interest include: UK, Sudan, Uganda and Tanzania.
Dr Andrew Parton
Role: Lecturer/Deputy Head of Psychology

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 267326
Email: andrew.parton@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB256

In order to survive we have to rapidly identify and select relevant the information from the world to guide our behaviour.  This requires the encoding of relevant sensory information into memory and its use to control motor responses. 

My research attempts to understand the cognitive and neurological bases of these processes using behavioural experiments, neuroimaging and examination of the effects of neurological disease (esp. Parkinsons Disease and Stroke).  Current projects include examinations of motor sequence learning, the role of neural oscillations in coding cognition, and early cognitive deficits in Parkinsons.

Dr James Porter
Role: Wellcome Trust Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Phone:
Email: james.porter@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB152

STS and Knowledge Controversies (Interspecies animal/human mixtures)

Sociology of Neuroscience and Research Collaboration

Flood Risk and Climate Change Knowledge/Science

Institutional Politics of Environmental Management/Knowledge/Policy

Research Centre memberships

Royal Geographical Society

Association of American Geographers

British Hydrological Society (Institution of Civil Engineers)

Visiting Research Fellow, Department of Geography, KCL

King’s Risk Management Centre, KCL

Dr Nicholas Pound
Role: Senior Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 266311
Email: nicholas.pound@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB 103
  • Facial morphology, health and endocrine status;
  • Perception of personality in faces;
  • Male competitiveness, risk-sensitivity, impulsiveness and violence;
  • Social and psychological influences on male reproductive physiology and sexual behaviour.
Professor Barbara Prainsack
Role: Professor of Sociology and Politics of Bioscience, Deputy Director CBAS

Phone: +44 (0) 791 2622901
Email: Barbara.Prainsack@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Gaskell Building 151

I joined Brunel University London in September 2011 as Professor of Sociology and Politics of Bioscience. Previously I was Reader in Medicine, Science & Society at King’s College London, where I continue to hold an honorary Senior Research Fellowship at the Department of Twin Research & Genetic Epidemiology, St Thomas’ Hospital.

My main research interest lies at the interface of science, politics, and society.  In particular I look at the ways in which science, religion and politics mutually constitute each other, and what effect this process has on how we understand ourselves as human beings, persons, and citizens, as well as on the emergence of regulatory approaches.

The main field where I explore these questions is DNA testing, both in medical and forensic contexts. I have carried out research on genetic carrier testing, and on identical twinship, and – in a related field – on embryonic stem cell research and human reproductive cloning. In the realm of forensics I have worked on the impact of forensic DNA technologies on attitudes and strategies of prisoners; the societal and regulatory dimensions of forensic bioinformation exchange (eg Prüm Treaty) in Europe, and – together with Richard Hindmarsh at Griffith University, Nathan, Australia – edited a book on the governance of forensic DNA databases (Genetic Suspects, Cambridge University Press, 2010). A new book, co-authored with Helena Machado (at the University of Minho, Portugal) on prisoners’ views on crime scene technologies in the era of CSI will be published in 2012 (Ashgate).

Dr Michael Price
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 266974
Email: michael.price@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB158
Evolutionary social psychology. Cooperation and moral systems. The effects of physical condition (e.g. muscularity, attractiveness) on personality and social cognition. Collective action, punishment, and the free rider problem. The evolutionary psychology of business and organisational behaviour. Long-term mating preferences.
Dr Martina Reynolds
Role: Senior Lecturer in Psychology

Phone: +44 (0)1895 265482
Email: martina.reynolds@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Gaskell Building 160
Dr John Roberts
Role: Senior Lecturer/ Work Placement Convenor for Sociology and Communications

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 266377
Email: john.roberts@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 155
Free speech, the public sphere, public space, new media, imperialism, global political economy and the workplace, regulation of everyday life, Marxist theory, and the use of social theory for qualitative research methods.
Dr Toby Robertson
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265945
Email: toby.robertson@brunel.ac.uk
Office: MJ139
Group Processes, Intergroup Relations, Social Influence, Identity.
Professor Ian Robinson
Role: Professor Emeritus in Sociology

Phone:
Email: ian.robinson@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Gaskell Building 175
Professor Chris Rojek
Role: Head of Department and Professor

Phone: +44 (0)1895 266599
Email: chris.rojek@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Gaskell Building 176

Celebrity, Event Management, Leisure and Tourism, Popular Culture

Dr William Rollason
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265041
Email: william.rollason@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 158
Papua New Guinea, Rwanda, race, ethnicity, development and the post-colony, the future, post-structural and post-colonial theory
methodology.
Dr Charlotte Russell
Role: Lecturer in Psychology

Phone: +44 (0)1895 266366
Email: charlotte.russell@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB102

Visual attention, awareness and integration across saccades in the healthy brain. Neuropsychology of these processes and associated disorders eg, visuo-spatial neglect and constructional apraxia.

Current projects

  • Role of spatial remapping impairments in Constructional Apraxia
  • Attentional capacity deficits after stroke
  • Changes in motivational aspects of faces and emotion across the life span and after brain injury
Dr Noam Sagiv
Role: Lecturer in Psychology

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265341
Email: noam.sagiv@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB168
Synaesthesia and cross-modal interactions; Face Perception; Neural Correlates of Consciousness.g
Ana Santos
Role: Leach/RAI Research Fellow

Phone:
Email: ana.santos@brunel.ac.uk
Office:

Research interests include: anthropological perspectives on ethnicity, violence and history, understanding the structure and processes of political and ethnic violence.

Dr Marvin Schiller
Role: Research Fellow

Phone: +44 (0)1895 267487
Email: marvin.schiller@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB259

Cognitive Modelling, Problem Gambling, Reasoning, Problem Solving, Artificial Intelligence, AI in Education



Dr Achim Schuetzwohl
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 266367
Email: achim.schuetzwohl@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB211
Understanding the structure and functioning of the mechanisms underlying surprise and jealousy.
Dr Isabel Scott
Role: Lecturer

Phone: 01895 265907
Email: isabel.scott@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB257
My interests include facial perception, mate choice, and moral psychology. My research applies an evolutionary, cross-cultural perspective to existing questions in the field of social cognition, such as why individuals differ in their sexual preferences, or in their norms about resource distribution. I am interested in how ancestrally relevant features of the environment, such as social inequality, hunger and disease, contribute to modern variation in these aspects of social cognition.
Dr Sanjay Sharma
Role: Senior Lecturer in Sociology and Communications

Phone: +44 (0) 18952 65835
Email: sanjay.sharma@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 156
Critical multiculturalism; Anti-racism; Race and Technology; Radical Pedagogy; New Media
Dr Lynda Shaw
Role: Part time lecturer

Phone: +44 (0)1895 267654
Email: lynda.shaw@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB230

As an undergraduate in Psychology and Social Anthropology my first dissertation investigated contrast sensitivity and copy drawing performance in patients with cortical lesions. My PhD, which was funded by Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), used fMRI and behavioural studies to explore the Neuropsychology of consciousness and emotion.

My interests continue in Cognitive Neuroscience studying consciousness and emotion and in particular positive emotion. I am also very keen to address the disturbing increase in depression in our society.

Dr Janine Spencer
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265474
Email: janine.spencer@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB206
Developmental Disorders – I study various visual deficits in children and adults with autism, Asperger’s syndrome, dyslexia and dyspraxia. These include the lower lever processes of visual form and motion coherence processing and higher level processes such as face perception and biological motion.

I am also interested in the psychological affect a clinical diagnosis has on self esteem.

Communication: How different types of communication aids understanding in children with autism.

Infant research – At the Centre for Research in Infant Behaviour, we study the development of biological motion perception in general and facial motion processing in particular. We are also investigating whether infants can perceive the Hollow Mask Illusion, which has been featured in a recent BBC Horizon documentary.

fMRI – Using Neuroimaging I study visual form and motion processing in autism and dyslexia.

Emotion in Facial Expressions – I study the dynamics of facial expression and how this influences perception of emotion and personality.

Dr James Staples
Role: Senior Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 267412
Email: james.staples@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Marie Jahoda 137
South Asia (especially Telugu speaking South India); medical anthropology (leprosy, disability, anthropology of the body and pain); suicide; begging; charity; anthropology of food.
Dr Nicola Start
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0)7533 164997
Email: nicola.start@brunel.ac.uk
Office: MJ156

Clinical Psychology

Dr Maria Uther
Role: Senior Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 267342
Email: maria.uther@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB258
My interests are in the area of language, speech and auditory perception and auditory perception. This includes topics such as how we learn new languages, how we learn music; how the brain processes different kinds of sounds and how we can use technology to help language learning. I use a range of techniques in my research, such as behavioural and psychophysiological (ERP, MEG) measures.
Dr Matei Vladeanu
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 267760
Email: matei.vladeanu@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB208
My primary research interest is in face processing. I am particularly interested in the processes involved in the perceptual and associative learning of unfamiliar faces, the neurobiological substrates of face processing and face learning (e.g. brain lateralisation), as well as individual differences in face processing (e.g. personality, clinical traits, hormonal exposure). 
Professor Steven Wainwright
Role: Professor of Sociology, Deputy Director CBAS

Phone: +44 (0) 7793 056589
Email: steven.wainwright@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Gaskell Building 175

I joined Brunel University London in April 2011 as Professor of Sociology, and I was previously Professor of Sociology of Medicine, Science & the Arts at King’s College London.  My current major research area focuses on new medical technologies where I blend insights from Medical Sociology and Science Studies.  However, my research interests are wide and varied. 

My research focuses on the transformation of social worlds, and explores the links between individuals and institutions and the making of professional identities.  My interdisciplinary work draws on ethnography, history and biography, spans the fields of medicine, science and the arts, and often explores the interfaces between these domains.  

Since 2000 my research has examined sociological aspects of four main areas: the arts (particularly classical ballet); the biomedical sciences (especially links between the lab and the clinic in areas like stem cell research); the philosophy and history of social science (particularly realism and the histories of sociology and geography); and the earth sciences (where I have a developing interest in climate change and in the development of geomorphology as a discipline and profession).  My research has been funded by bodies such as the Wellcome Trust and the ESRC.  

Dr Peter Wilkin
Role: Reader in Communication

Phone: +44 (0)1895 267241
Email: peter.wilkin@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Gaskell Building 166
Peter Wilkin's research interests are guided by a general interest in world-systems analysis and focus upon the following: theories of political economy and development;  social implications of ergonomic design; tory anarchism and conservative cultural works; satire and politics; the social and political thought of Noam Chomsky; international relations theory and historical sociology; the politics of pornography; the anti-globalisation/anti-capitalist movements; the political economy of the body; issues in political culture.
Professor Clare Williams
Role: Deputy Head of School for Research; Professor of Medical Sociology, Director of Centre for Biomedicine and Society (CBAS)

Phone: +44 (0) 78500 93522
Email: clare.williams@brunel.ac.uk
Office: Gaskell Building 165

I joined Brunel University London in June 2011. Although my interests are diverse, I am essentially a qualitative medical sociologist. My research focuses on four inter-related areas: the sociology of biomedical ethics; gendered experiences of chronic illness; the sociology of medical/scientific professions; and the development of new medical technologies.

My current research explores the social, medical, scientific, and ethical aspects of innovations in biomedicine, particularly the interface between the lab and the clinic in the fields of pre-implantation genetic diagnosis, stem cell research, embryo donation, and experimental neuroscience.

I am PI and Director of the Wellcome Trust London and Brighton Translational Ethics Centre (LABTEC), funded by a five year strategic award Programme Grant (2009-14). Since 1999, I have secured ten Research Council and Wellcome Trust grants worth £2.4 million for my multidisciplinary research programme which focuses on the clinical, ethical and social issues associated with innovative medical technologies. Since 1999 I have published over seventy papers, almost all in leading international peer reviewed journals.

Dr Adrian Williams
Role: Lecturer

Phone: +44 (0) 1895 265452
Email: adrian.williams@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB105
My research interests are broadly in the area of sensory perception, but with a primary focus on vision and the organization of the visual brain. I'm interested in gaining a deeper understanding of the underlying anatomy and functional organization of the visual brain that facilitate our sense of vision, primarily through the use of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), but also utilising behavioural/psychophysical approaches.
Dr Linda Williams
Role: Part-time lecturer

Phone: +44 (0)1895 265946
Email: linda.williams@brunel.ac.uk
Office: MJ140

My interests are primarily in mental disorders, psychiatry, gender and power relations but I am also broadly interested in social psychology where it meets discursive and constructionist approaches (critical social psychology). I am an experienced discourse analyst (particularly the discursive psychology strand) and I also have experience with Grounded Theory, Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) and Thematic Analysis.



Dr Barlow Wright
Role: Senior Lecturer in Psychology

Phone: +44 (0)1895 267327
Email: barlow.wright@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB163

My research takes a broadly experimental approach within three main themes: Lifespan development, disadvantage and ethnicity. Studies tend to be underpinned by methodologies from Cognitive Psychology and are often quantitative or based on computer designs. Example specific foci are:

  • Cognitive and socio-cognitive development from birth to adolescence. This includes development of the object concept, memory, reasoning, mathematics , attention, reading and spelling, and Theory of Mind.  

  • Adult-child comparisons of cognitive abilities.  This includes the ways that the contrasts between dyslexics and non-dyslexics change from childhood to adulthood.  

  • Disadvantage in childhood, adulthood and education.  This includes general and specific learning difficulties, culture and ethnicity, and Theory of Mind deficits in disability. 


Professor Michael Wright
Role: Professor

Phone: +44 (0) 18952 65957
Email: michael.wright@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB204
Brain Imaging (fMRI, EEG), perceptual skills in sport, visual attention and change blindness, expertise and the brain, mirror neuron system, fMRI and emotions, facial expressions and ERPs, Consciousness.
Professor Taeko Wydell
Role: Professor in Psychology, Co-Director of CCNI

Phone: +44 (0)1895 265473
Email: taeko.wydell@brunel.ac.uk
Office: GB205
  • Cognitive and neural processes involved in language, in particular, reading using behavioural and brain imaging (EEG, MEG, fMRI and TMS) data.
  • Normal and impaired language/reading processes including Developmental Dyslexia, acquired dyslexia (with neurological patients), and SLI (Specific Language impairment)
  • Bilingual’s language/reading processes

Page last updated: Wednesday 31 August 2011