Fully funded ESRC PhD Studentship in referential understanding in infants

Closing date for applications:  30th May 2014

A 3 year ESRC studentship is available at Lancaster University, linked to the new ESRC International Centre for Language and Communicative Development (LuCiD), a multi-million pound collaboration between the Universities of Lancaster, Liverpool, and Manchester.

The PhD project, supervised by Eugenio Parise and Vincent Reid at Lancaster involves a series of experiments aiming at a systematic analysis of infants' referential understanding of words in relation to objects and actions. The main project will involve measuring EEG during a communicative ostensive-referential situation, involving ostensive communication between experimenter and infants, and referential, deictic, gestures toward objects and actions. There is considerable scope for the student to develop her/his own research agenda within this broad topic. Possible developments include investigation of ostensive signals, early language development, the relation between communication and language development, infants understanding of words and early conceptual development. The project offers the opportunity to be trained in EEG and related measures (ERP, time-frequency analysis) by internationally recognized leaders in the field.

The studentship benefits from the vibrant environment of the LuCiD Centre, including opportunities to travel to international laboratories, training in a range of psychological and neurophysiological techniques, frequent research and public engagement meetings, and support from a large team of researchers in language acquisition.

The department has a very strong and supportive research atmosphere with a large and active group of graduate students, excellent research facilities and a first class supervision record. Students receive their own research support budgets, which can be used to attend national and international conferences. Further details concerning postgraduate study in psychology at Lancaster can be found at:www.psych.lancs.ac.uk/postgraduate/phd/

and details of the Department’s research can be found at:  www.psych.lancs.ac.uk/research/

The studentship will cover UK/EU fees, plus the current stipend for Research Council studentships (currently £13863), for three years. Applicants must be ordinarily resident in the UK or another EU state (for eligibility, please see the ESRC requirements: http://www.esrc.ac.uk/funding-and-guidance/postgraduates/prospective-students/eligibility/index.aspx ).

Applicants should have a good (2:i or above) undergraduate degree in Psychology or a related discipline in addition to a Masters level degree in psychology or a related discipline, recognised as research training by the ESRC.

You should apply online here www.postgraduate-applications.lancaster.ac.uk

by the deadline of 30^th May 2014. In the application, please state that you are interested in the LuCiD PhD in EEG for infant gesture, and including a 300-500 word proposal of why the project is of particular interest and how the project meets your skills and future aspirations.

Interviews will be held in the week beginning Monday 23^rd June 2014 at Lancaster University.

The successful candidate will need to make a full application here if they have not already done so: www.lancs.ac.uk/study/postgraduate/how-to-apply-for-postgraduate-study/

For further information concerning the studentship topic, please contact Dr. Eugenio Parise (e.parise@lancaster.ac.uk) or Dr. Vincent M. Reid (v.reid@lancaster.ac.uk), and about postgraduate study more generally, please contact  the Department of Psychology postgraduate office (postgraduate.psychology@lancaster.ac.uk).