Lab members
Find out more about our lab members.
Meet the team
Lab directors
Lab Director
Professor Emily Farran
Professor in Developmental Psychology
Biography
I completed my PhD at the University of Bristol in 2001. I then took on a lectureship position at the University of Reading. I then moved to the UCL Institute of Education in 2008, before joining the University of Surrey in 2018. My research has been funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, the British Academy, the Leverhulme Trust, the Nuffield Foundation, the Wellcome Trust, the Education Endowment Fund, the Waterloo Foundation, Autour des Williams, the Williams Syndrome Foundation, and Fondation Jerome Lejeune.
Lab Co-director
Dr Katie Gilligan-Lee
Lecturer in Developmental Psychology
Biography
Katie completed an undergraduate degree in Neuroscience at Trinity College Dublin (2012) followed by a MPhil in Psychology and Education at the University of Cambridge (2013). She obtained her PhD in Developmental Psychology from University College London (UCL) before joining the University of Surrey as a Lecturer in October 2018.
Current lab members
Emma Campbell
Postgraduate Researcher
Biography
I am in the final year of PhD studies at UCL Institute of Education, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council. My studies are supervised by Professor Emily Farran and Dr Emma Sumner (formerly Professor Liz Pellicano) of the Department of Psychology and Human Development, UCL Institute of Education.
I am interested in the proposed link between vision and motor control, and my current research investigates whether visual tracking abilities and the predictive control of eye movements are impaired in children with Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD), and whether this relates to their motor difficulties. Working with children aged 5-15, I am in the process of profiling typical and atypical development of oculomotor control as well as assessing motor skills across a range of domains (fine and gross motor, balance etc.). I am interested in how we can encourage children’s development of visuomotor skills for use in everyday life (at school, in the home). In particular, those with DCD struggle with skills that most children find easy (such as throwing and catching). Therefore, based on the findings of my first study, the next step in my PhD is to think about the root of these difficulties and how they can be overcome in everyday life.
My previous work in the lab has included a cross-sectional study looking at the development of mathematical ability in children with cerebral palsy.
Publications
(Critten, V., Campbell, E., Farran, E., & Messer, D. (2018). Visual perception, visual-spatial cognition and mathematics: Associations and predictions in children with cerebral palsy. Research in developmental disabilities, 80, 180-191).
Marija Zivkovic
Postdoctoral Researcher
Biography
In 2010 I finished MSc in Psychology at the University of Nis. From 2012 to 2016 I worked as a Psychologist at the Day care for children and young adults with intellectual disabilities in Belgrade (Serbia). In 2017 I finished Master 2 in Developmental Psychopathologies at the University of Padova (Italy). From 2017 to 2021 I worked at the University of Trieste (Italy) on the PhD project that investigated influence of cognitive, emotional and motivational factors on math performance in primary and middle school students. In 2021 I get the PhD in Neural and Cognitive Science - section Developmental and Educational Psychology. I joint University of Surrey as Postdoctoral Researcher on the SPACE project (https://www.surrey.ac.uk/spatial-cognition-enhance-mathematical-learning-space).
Sarah McCarthy
Postgraduate Researcher
Biography
Sarah is a Postgraduate Researcher at the University of Surrey. Sarah is currently researching how spatial reasoning training can be used with children from low-income backgrounds to support their mathematics understanding. Prior to starting her PhD Sarah was a Research Assistant at Surrey, investigating the use and impact of the Spatial Reasoning Toolkit – a set of resources designed to support practitioners and families in developing children’s spatial reasoning. Sarah also works for the University of Roehampton, as the Co-Investigator for Applied Musicology projects. She is leading a project investigating the development of children's patterning skills in the auditory and visuo-spatial domains. Prior to working in the CoGDEV Lab, Sarah completed her MSc in Psychology (Conversion) at the University of Surrey. Sarah has over 20 years’ experience in marketing and communications gained in the Financial Services sector.
Laura Cristescu
Postdoctoral researcher
Biography
I completed my PhD at the University of Birmingham in 2022, which focused on the development of teaching practice to support the self-determination of autistic students through a collaborative approach. My research experience includes conducting intervention studies, systematic reviews, action research, and developing a data collection system. I have extensive practitioner experience working in education settings, out of school provision, and in the assistive technology industry. I am particularly interested in research focusing on collaboration with stakeholders, research priority setting, and bridging the gap between research and practice.
Jovana Durica
Postgraduate Researcher
Biography
Jovana is a Postgraduate Researcher at the University of Surrey. Her research is centred around exploring the relationship between anxiety and reading disorders in adolescents, as well investigating the risk and protective factors for developing anxiety for adolescents with reading difficulties. By gaining valuable insights into the aforementioned topics, Jovana hopes to in the future be able develop an anxiety intervention to help adolescents with reading disorders.
Jovana has been practicing as an educational psychologist for 5+ years and has had extensive experience with children and young people with special educational needs. As such, she is extremely passionate about her thesis topic as she has seen the effects of anxiety in adolescents with reading difficulties first hand, in practice.
Felicity Smith
Placement Student
Biography
I am a BSc psychology student at the University of Surrey, currently completing my placement year as a research assistant in the CoGDeV lab. I will be working on a number of projects, the Baily Thomas project being my primary focus. This placement is a really exciting opportunity to see the behind the scenes of psychological research. It will help me to prepare for my final year at university and to discover where my interests lie within the exciting world of psychology.
