![Dr Rachel Swainson Dr Rachel Swainson](/img/200x200/staffpages/uploads/psy470/RachelSwainson_150_200.jpg)
Lecturer
- About
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- Email Address
- r.swainson@abdn.ac.uk
- Telephone Number
- +44 (0)1224 273918
- Office Address
School of Psychology William Guild Building Room F08 Kings College Old Aberdeen AB24 3FX
- School/Department
- School of Psychology
Biography
I received my BSc in Neuroscience (1994) from the University of Sheffield and my PhD (1998) from the University of Cambridge, where I was supervised by Prof. Trevor Robbins. I then worked with Prof. Barbara Sahakian at the University of Cambridge (1998-1999) and with Prof. Georgina Jackson and Prof. Stephen Jackson at the University of Nottingham (2000-2006). I held a Leverhulme Special Research Fellowship (2002-2004) and my first lectureship (2004-2006) at the University of Nottingham. I have been a lecturer at the University of Aberdeen since 2007.
Internal Memberships
Staff Development Lead, School of Psychology
Member of the School's Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Committee
- Research
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Research Overview
Human cognition is massively flexible. There are innumerable ways in which we can process stimuli and respond to them, and when situations change, we can change our behaviour. This flexibility brings the need for control so that our behaviour is reasonably consistent over time and yet also able to be changed when necessary. Task-switching research enables us to examine these aspects of cognitive control in the lab.
Tasks can be thought of as rules for processing stimuli and selecting actions. I am interested in the reasons for the switch costs in performance that arise when we need to switch between alternative tasks. Recent research questions include: whether the subsequent switch costs generated by simply preparing one of two tasks (without performing it) differ from those generated by performing the prepared task; and what it takes to abolish the effects of preparation – when we abandon a prepared task – before they impact upon subsequent performance in the form of a switch cost.
Research Areas
Accepting PhDs
I am currently accepting PhDs in Psychology.
Please get in touch if you would like to discuss your research ideas further.
Psychology
Accepting PhDs - Teaching
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Teaching Responsibilities
- PS1009: Introductory Psychology I: Concepts & Theory (Biological Psychology lectures)
- PS3014: Biological Psychology (Psychopharmacology lectures)
- Publications
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ERP Correlates of executive control during repeated language-switching
Bilingualism, vol. 4, no. 2, pp. 169-178Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728901000268
Early detection and differential diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease and depression with neuropsychological tasks
Dementia and Geriatric Cognitive Disorders, vol. 12, pp. 265-280Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1159/000051269
Rule-abstraction deficits following a basal ganglia lesion
Neurocase, vol. 7, no. 5, pp. 433-444Contributions to Journals: ArticlesProbabilistic learning and reversal deficits in patients with Parkinson's disease or frontal or temporal lobe lesions: possible adverse effects of dopaminergic medication
Neuropsychologia, vol. 38, no. 5, pp. 596-612Contributions to Journals: ArticlesDissociable deficits in the decision-making cognition of chronic amphetamine abusers, opiate abusers, patients with focal damage to prefrontal cortex, and tryptophan-depleted normal volunteers: Evidence for monoaminergic mechanisms
Neuropsychopharmacology, vol. 20, no. 4, pp. 322-339Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/S0893-133X(98)00091-8