Emma James

🧵So, what works when teaching reading comprehension in the classroom? To a whole class?

I dedicated a entire chapter of my Phd thesis to exploring the literature on this.

In fact, we do not know a lot about what works when teachers teach, to whole classes.

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Join us in York! 12-month full-time *development-focused* psychology lectureship in our very friendly York St John team. Quant research methods too. Deadline 24th February. Please share: www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DQL260/l...

What's new in the world of Generalized Additive Models YouTube video by Bottom of the Heap

🚨 GAMs have moved on—so it’s time for an update.

On March 3, 2026 (17:00–19:00 CET) I’ll be livestreaming an updated introduction to Generalized Additive Models in R

📺 YouTube livestream link: youtube.com/live/A9U8e1K...

#RStats #mgcv #GAMs #gratia #statistics 🧪

Calling #primary schools in/around #York! We've got a brand new project investigating how learning and memory for new words changes over development 🧠 We're looking for Year 4/5 classes to take part in game-like activities. Please email (psychology-learnlab@york.ac.uk) for more info & to discuss 🙂🎓

York Open Research Awards: Innovation, advocacy and good practice in open research across all disciplines at York. Supported by UKRI Research England.

The York Open Research Awards are back for 2026! 🎉

The call for submissions is open until Monday 27 April 📆

We are keen to recognise and reward a diverse range of projects, and this year we are offering additional prizes to ensure that all researchers at York have the opportunity to participate...

New paper by PD student Bob Kapteijns (not on bsky) How do reading, math, and various cognitive skills "grow together" in early childhood? 🧠📚
osf.io/preprints/ps...

The 1.3.0 version of my {brms} + {tidyverse} translation of Kruschke's "Doing Bayesian data analysis" is up!

solomon.quarto.pub/dbda2

#rstats

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LINGUIST List 36.3850 Internships: Cognitive Science, General Linguistics, Language Acquisition, Neurolinguistics, Psycholinguistics: 3- to 4-month Fellowships at the University of Potsdam, CRC1287 L... The LINGUIST List, International Linguistics Community Online.

Short-term fellowships for 2026 at the University of Potsdam, Germany (linguistics and psychology): linguistlist.org/issues/36/38...

screenshot of my post

Big new blogpost!

My guide to data visualization, which includes a very long table of contents, tons of charts, and more.

--> Why data visualization matters and how to make charts more effective, clear, transparent, and sometimes, beautiful.
www.scientificdiscovery.dev/p/salonis-gu...

Morpheme knowledge is shaped by information available through orthography - Psychonomic Bulletin & Review A large portion of words in a language are formed by combining smaller meaningful units called morphemes (e.g., teach + -er → teacher). Understanding a language’s morphology is vital for skilled readi...

*New paper* showing that adults’ morpheme knowledge in English is shaped by what readers can readily pick up from spelling, even when this means relying on cues that don’t accurately reflect morphological structure or overlooking informative exemplars
doi.org/10.3758/s134...

🚨 Funded PhD on ageing, social cognition & self/other differentiation! 🚨

🧠 Supervised by myself (University of St Andrews) & Prof. Louise Phillips (University of Aberdeen), the project includes EEG & eye-tracking training.

🌍 Open to UK + international students!

📅 Deadline: 15th Dec 2025

The Science of Visual Data Communication: What Works - Steven L. Franconeri, Lace M. Padilla, Priti Shah, Jeffrey M. Zacks, Jessica Hullman, 2021 Effectively designed data visualizations allow viewers to use their powerful visual systems to understand patterns in data across science, education, health, an...

I'm surprised I only came across it now, but this review on improving communication in data visualization is excellent.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Two-group pre/post data are deceptively simple, and you could analyze them in many different ways, depending on your goals. Here are three blog posts on the topic:

solomonkurz.netlify.app/blog/2022-06...

solomonkurz.netlify.app/blog/2020-12...

solomonkurz.netlify.app/blog/2023-06...

Next Meeting EPS Meeting: University College London. 7th – 9th January 2026. This meeting will include the 54th EPS Bartlett Prize Lecture by Matthew Botvinick (with an accompanying symposium organised by Patri…

The meeting programme for EPS London 2026 is now live on our website!

Please use the link below to see all the exciting planned presentations. 😄

eps.ac.uk/next-meeting/

The #cogsci of reading, shared by the people who actually do the research. This will be spectacular!

#ReconstructingReading

bsky.app/profile/jonn...

Are you thinking of starting a #PhD in 2026? 🎓 I'm keen to hear from potential applicants interested in #language, #learning, or #literacy! Visit the website to find out more about developing a proposal ahead of the January deadline sites.google.com/york.ac.uk/l...

The Celebrity Traitors: psychologist explains how to defend yourself when you’re accused of lying Coming clean about something you’re hiding can help when you’re under pressure.

A short piece on #CelebrityTraitors and defending yourself from accusations of lying. Very fun to write! Thanks to @uk.theconversation.com for editing and publishing. theconversation.com/the-celebrit...

We have excellent facilities available @yorkpsychology.bsky.social for incorporating different methods. We have a strong developmental group and school partnerships through @sunray-york.bsky.social, alongside a range of neuroimaging facilities (fMRI, MEG, sleep lab) at York Neuroimaging Centre.

Are you thinking of starting a #PhD in 2026? 🎓 I'm keen to hear from potential applicants interested in #language, #learning, or #literacy! Visit the website to find out more about developing a proposal ahead of the January deadline sites.google.com/york.ac.uk/l...

There are lots of opportunities @yorkpsychology.bsky.social for incorporating different methods! We have a strong developmental group and partnerships with local schools through @sunray-york.bsky.social, alongside a wide range of neuroimaging and sleep lab facilities.

Developmental Language Disorder Awareness Day 2024: Spotlight on Wellbeing - YouTube Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) affects 7.5% of school age children. DLD is a condition that impacts children's oral language, but these children can a...

Today is Developmental Language Disorder Awareness Day #DLDDay! ~2 children in every classroom have significant difficulties with language, yet these often go undetected. Last year we recorded short videos to introduce DLD and put the spotlight on wellbeing youtube.com/playlist?lis...

I had the BEST time soaking up all the stats discussions at SMLP this year, can highly recommend.

This is a nice paper. It faces down a common problem: in order to explain to why a common approach cannot work even in theory, we first need to teach a framework in which regression is not magic that tells us which variables on right cause the variable on left. It's exhausting.

Anyway great paper!

Little Lives, Big Changes: How Covid-19 Shaped Young Children’s Development in the UK Catherine Davies is a Professor of Language Development at the University of Leeds’ School of Languages, Cultures and Societies. Her…

Cat Davies reports to the UK covid-19 inquiry this week "early childhood .... was significantly disrupted...Normally, when one support system falters, families can turn to alternatives... the pandemic removed almost all options simultaneously". medium.com/@ahcresearch...

Figure 2 in the review: Levels of analysis from genes and brain systems to cognition and behaviour. The child both influences and is influenced by parents through genetically shaped interactions, and by the wider school and social environment. Figure design by Neil Usher. Figure from this review paper: https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/w23yz_v1

🧩Learning to talk & read isn’t just about effort or teaching—it’s shaped by biology, experience & context

🧠Our new review links genetics, neuroscience, psychology & education to show why some children find language or reading easier.

📖 doi.org/10.31234/osf...

🖼️genes→brain→cognition→behaviour 🧵👇

Job Opportunity at Royal Holloway University of London: Postdoctoral Research Fellow Applications are invited for a 3-year, full-time Postdoctoral Research Fellow position in the Department of Psychology at Royal Holloway, University of London.This position is funded by an ESRC resear...

** New ** Seeking Postdoctoral Research Fellow (3 yrs) for ESRC project on skilled reading in Arabic. Based in my lab at @rhulpsychology.bsky.social and collaborating with @denisdrieghe.bsky.social (Soton) and Sami Boudelaa (UAE). Please share! jobs.royalholloway.ac.uk/vacancy.aspx...

Plus this week our very own @hannahhobson.bsky.social will be giving an online talk on camouflaging in developmental language disorder. It's a ticketed event (£10) to raise money for a good cause, and you can watch live or access the recording!

Also useful to know all the same! Especially given you are not so far away :)

This is all really helpful, thank you! Doesn't necessarily need to be psych specific, just wanted to make sure I wouldn't be the odd one out and unable to follow specialist applications. I'll figure out the best option when your in-person registration is released!

Thank you! How discipline specific/general will they be? I did spot your Physalia one, but wasn't sure whether it might be biology-heavy (I'm in developmental psychology)