Hale is an affiliated lecturer in Psychology and Education  at the Faculty of Education. Her main line of research focuses on the language and cognition interaction. She studies the development of linguistic structures and their relationships to cognitive and social abilities in different types of discourse. Her second line of research focuses on how and why we are using social network sites and technological devices, and how their use interacts with cognitive abilities. 

Hale obtained her BA in Psychology and her MA in Developmental Psychology from Bogazici University, Istanbul. She received her PhD in Cognitive Science from Middle East Technical University, Ankara.   She has taught courses on cognitive psychology, developmental psychology and cognitive science at the undergraduate and graduate level. 

See Hale's profile with the Faculty of Education webpage (link coming soon)

Maria is an affiliated lecturer in Psychology and Education at the Faculty teaching undergraduate and master students. Maria’s research interests include designing learning environments to promote conceptual and procedural understanding of science concepts, phenomena and skills and utilising cognitive science and neuroscience to improve educational practice, especially in the primary school years. Maria is an open science advocate and strives to incorporate its principles in her research.  

Maria completed her doctoral studies as part of the INSTRUCT lab in 2020. She explored the effects of different learning environments on primary school children's decision-making skills in socio-scientific issues. She has previously pursued an MPhil in Educational Research (Cantab) and an MA in Science Education (University of Athens) and is particularly interested in utilising cognitive psychology findings and methods to improve science education. 

She is a primary school teacher by training and her research has a strong focus on teaching practice with a keen interest in conducting classroom-based experiments. 

See Maria's profile with the Faculty of Education webpage

Julie is an experienced teacher, educator, academic mentor and researcher based in Cambridge. She gained a BA in Geography at the University of Cambridge before completing a PGCE at Oxford University. Following a career as a teacher and leader in secondary schools, Julie returned to studying, and to Newnham College, to compete a MEd in Psychology and Education. Her current doctoral research explores barriers to inclusion for autistic pupils in mainstream secondary school.

Julie’s work focuses on using observational data to both expand our understanding of the ways in which autistic pupils experience classroom activities and support teachers in developing their inclusive educational practice. Her doctoral research builds on her MEd study in which she developed behavioural measures to explore differences in attention, reasoning and discomfort associated with autism in a scientific reasoning task. 

Alongside her research, Julie is a specialist learning mentor for the University of Cambridge and supervises undergraduates studying education. She is also a school governor, working with The Morris Education Trust on the design of The Cavendish School, opening in September 2021 to provide specialist provision for children with autism. 

https://cambridgeeducationperspectives.co.uk/  

https://twitter.com/JulieBailey222 

Elisabeth has recently completed a PhD at the University of Warwick, continuing her research there as a post-doctoral research fellow. The focus of her research includes how visual attention is affected by emotional stimuli; more specifically, the spatial and temporal selection of schematic e motional faces and their effect on attention capture and engagement. She is interested in the differences between negative and positive facial expression and their relation to the theories of threat relevance and negative affect bias associated with underlying mechanisms of visual attention. In addition, she does work in sublimin al motor priming and visuo-motor control, and the development of executive function. Dr. Blagrove has been an integral part of our task switching projects in arithmetic and reading.

Reinaldo is interested in researching about the chess and its relationship among metacognition and problem solving to improve the cognitive skills for better achievement in the teaching-learning process. He is a Visiting Researcher in Education and Psychology at the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge, and also an Associate Professor in Electronics at the Federal Institute of Education, Science and Technology of São Paulo, Campus Sertãozinho, Brazil. Experienced in teaching Electronics, Mathematics and Chess classes for a broad age range of students, from 13 to 50 years old, during several years. Furthermore, he is the PI of the Research & Study Group in Teaching and Learning (GEPEA), which has registered at the Brazilian National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) since 2015. Bachelor in Electrical Engineering majored in Electronics from Federal School of Engineering of Itajubá (1995), Licentiate in Mathematics from University of Franca (2006), Bachelor in Law from Universidade Paulista (2011), Licentiate in Electrical Engineering majored in Electronics (2012) and in Law (2013) from Federal Institute of Education, Science and Technology of São Paulo, Campus Sertãozinho, Master’s degree in Electrical Engineering, majored in Power Electronics and Drives for Electrical Machines, from Federal University of Santa Catarina (1997) and Doctoral degree in Electrical Engineering, majored in Telecommunications and Telematics, from University of Campinas (2006). See Reinaldo’s profile and curriculum vitae here.

Tamer is a PhD researcher and practitioner who seeks to build the bridge between theory and practice based on cognitive psychology principles and neuroscience to design a research-based learning environment that engages learners' minds and hearts.

He is mainly interested in examining the links between cognitive processes such as executive functions and motivational aspects in learning, with a special focus on science learning for middle and high school students,  using psychological development as a lens

Rui Wang is a Ph.D. Candidate in Psychology and Education in Cambridge. She has graduated with an MPhil in Psychology and Education, Cambridge, and a BA in International Liberal Art at Waseda University. Over the course of studying at Cambridge, she has been involved in the Thinking of Science project, which explores executive functions' role in thinking counterintuitive science questions. With her past teaching experience in China, Japan, and Kenya, she is particularly interested in pedagogy related to pedagogy using multimedia and the relationship between cognitive development and online education. She is also a member of the Cambridge China Education Forum (CCEF), and is funded by the Cambridge Trust-CSC scholarship.

Ibtehaj is a language instructor and educator. She taught English as a foreign language to students of different levels, ages, nationalities and socio-economic backgrounds. She gained a BA in English Language Translation from King Saud University and an MA in Linguistics for Language Teaching from the University of Southampton. She also holds a DELTA (Diploma in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) qualification, provided by Cambridge Assessment. Ibtehaj worked as a professional development Coordinator for seven months and as an academic and curriculum Supervisor for two years at King Saud University. Her main role was to assist and train language teachers on different language teaching methods and strategies.

From her experience, one of the most important language skills that her students tend to struggle with is reading comprehension. This has motivated her to find the links between executive functions, language competence and reading comprehension, aiming to help students improve their reading skills in their first and the second language, which, in return, could contribute to their academic achievement.

Jiayin is a first-year PhD student whose interest falls in the early-stage development of preschoolers’ executive functions. Jiayin looks to investigate the impact of preschooling quality on children’s cognitive development and she intends to carry out her research in the preschools in mainland China. Previously, Jiayin completed an MPhil study in Research in Second Language Education within the faculty and an undergraduate in linguistics at Fudan University. 

Tinker (Baoyu Chen) is an MPhil student in Psychology and Education at the University of Cambridge. Her current research explores contingent self-worth and its associations with imposter syndrome, self-defensive mechanisms, and mental health outcomes.

She completed her BSc in Psychology with Education at University College London, where she conducted a qualitative dissertation titled “Why We Listen to Sad Music When We Are Sad”, exploring university students’ emotional and behavioural experiences through in-depth interviews.

She has worked as a research assistant with several UK-based charities, supporting the learning of neurodivergent children and leading a virtual reality (VR) workshop for autistic individuals while investigating the potential of VR to promote socio-emotional learning. She also contributed to an LGBTQ+ charity project, conducting qualitative interviews to examine the impact of inclusive programmes on identity and wellbeing.

Her academic interests lie at the intersection of educational, social, and cognitive psychology. She is particularly interested in how psychological insights into motivation, emotion regulation, and self-worth can inform inclusive and supportive practices in diverse learning environments.

Yaomin Huang is now an MPhil student in Psychology and Education at the University of Cambridge. His current research interest is in the relationship between executive functions, particularly working memory, and academic performance (e.g., reading) in preschoolers and primary school-aged children.

Before joining Cambridge, Yaomin obtained his BSc in Psychology with Education from University College London, where he completed a cognitive psychology dissertation on the relationships among multilingualism, working memory, and sleep quality in young adults. During undergraduate studies, he also interned in several labs in both the UK and Hong Kong, gaining hands-on experience across psycholinguistics, clinical psychology, developmental psychology, and cognitive psychology. Most recently, he completed the Summer Research Programme at the University of Hong Kong, fully funded by the university’s scholarship. There, he conducted secondary analyses of the International Early Learning and Child Well-being Study dataset to investigate the link between working memory and emergent literacy skills in Russian- and Estonian-speaking kindergarteners.

Yilin Ma is a full-time MPhil student in Psychology and Education at the University of Cambridge. Before joining Cambridge, she earned her Bachelor’s degree in Psychology in China. She previously worked as a Research Assistant in the Cross-Cultural Adaptation Psychology Lab, where she participated in research projects related to cross-cultural psychology, positive psychology, social cognitive psychology, and human–AI interaction. Currently, Yilin aims to further extend her research interests to include executive functions and metacognition, particularly focusing on the development and assessment of metacognitive abilities in problem-solving contexts.