A tutorial-based flipped classroom approach was implemented to support small group teaching in very large cohorts (350+) The key aim was to provide individualized support for students in research methods, whilst promoting flexibility and inclusivity through a blended delivery model Benefits included improved student experience and performance, as well as improvements in the experience of group work How Microsoft (MS) Teams can be used to provide an effective blended learning environment for group work is demonstrated The introduction of the approach has been overwhelmingly positive, for both students and staff We hadn't anticipated students using the general lab space as heavily (some would come at 9am and stay all day to work with their group), and so we had to book a second lab and support this There were also logistical issues with setting up 100+ MS Teams groups, we are hoping for the introduction of private channels on Teams which will allow us to manage the group work within a single team The Covid-19 pandemic also meant that on campus support had to be withdrawn from one module (not the one evaluated here), and comparative data is only available for one module that was unaffected by this However, our existing use of MS Teams made this transition easy to navigate (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved)

The move to university can be difficult for students- a transition often characterised by a risk of loneliness and poor mental health. Previous work highlights the important role social media can play in this transition. We report findings from a large-scale survey of 510 first year undergraduates across the UK, identifying factors that predict student loneliness, and exploring their social media use. Higher levels of social capital, induction satisfaction, and sense of community are significantly associated with lower levels of loneliness. Conversely, those reporting a more ‘liminal self’- the desire to edit and reinvent yourself online - experience greater loneliness- with an indirect relationship between online social information seeking and loneliness, through social capital. We surmise that being ‘true to yourself’ online is important when starting university, and that social media can be a useful tool in facilitating offline relationships and maintaining ties to old friends.

In this study, we examined electrophysiological indices of episodic remembering whilst participants recalled novel shapes, with and without semantic content, within a visual working memory paradigm. The components of interest were the parietal episodic (PE; 400-800 ms) and late posterior negativity (LPN; 500-900 ms), as these have previously been identified as reliable markers of recollection and post-retrieval monitoring, respectively. Fifteen young adults completed a visual matrix patterns task, assessing memory for low and high semantic visual representations. Matrices with either low semantic or high semantic content (containing familiar visual forms) were briefly presented to participants for study (1500 ms), followed by a retention interval (6000 ms) and finally a same/different recognition phase. The event-related potentials of interest were tracked from the onset of the recognition test stimuli. Analyses revealed equivalent amplitude for the earlier PE effect for the processing of both low and high semantic stimulus types. However, the LPN was more negative-going for the processing of the low semantic stimuli. These data are discussed in terms of relatively ` pure' and complete retrieval of high semantic items, where support can readily be recruited from semantic memory. However, for the low semantic items additional executive resources, as indexed by the LPN, are recruited when memory monitoring and uncertainty exist in order to recall previously studied items more effectively.

Art is one of life’s great joys, whether it is beautiful, ugly, sublime or shocking. Aesthetic responses to visual art involve sensory, cognitive and visceral processes. Neuroimaging studies have yielded a wealth of information regarding aesthetic appreciation and beauty using visual art as stimuli, but few have considered the effect of expertise on visual and visceral responses. To study the time course of visual, cognitive and emotional processes in response to visual art we investigated the event-related potentials (ERPs) elicited whilst viewing and rating the visceral affect of three categories of visual art. Two groups, artists and non-artists viewed representational, abstract and indeterminate twentieth century art. Early components, particularly the N1, related to attention and effort, and the P2, linked to higher order visual processing, was enhanced for artists when compared to non-artists. This effect was present for all types of art, but further enhanced for abstract art, which was rated as having lowest visceral affect by the non-artists. The later, slow wave processes (500-1000ms), associated with arousal and sustained attention, also show clear differences between the two groups in response to both type of art and visceral affect. Abstract art increased arousal and sustained attention in artists, whilst it decreased in non-artists. These results suggest that aesthetic response to visual art is affected by both expertise and semantic content.

The generation of thought independent of environmental input occupies almost half of mental life and is important for skills such as creativity and planning. To understand how this ubiquitous cognitive process relates to the brain's ‘energy budget’, a cross-sectional study is carried out to examine how the capacity for mental time travel relates to the efficiency with which adults metabolize glucose, the brain’s primary source of fuel. On day 1 the ability of a group of 36 younger and 36 older individuals to metabolize glucose was assessed using the gold standard two-hour glucose tolerance test. Twenty-four hours later, the same group of participants returned to the laboratory to perform a non-demanding choice reaction time task during which experience sampling was used to assess the frequency with which they generated thoughts that were unrelated to the here and now. Analysis indicated that younger individuals who were the most efficient at metabolizing glucose exhibited mental time travel that spanned longer time periods. Given the importance of self-generated thought in daily life these results suggest that the capacity to mentally simulate events not present in the immediate environment is highly dependent on efficient glucose metabolism.

In this study we quantify for the first time electrophysiological components associated with incorporating long-term semantic knowledge with visuo-spatial information using two variants of a traditional matrix patterns task. Results indicated that the matrix task with greater semantic content was associated with enhanced accuracy and RTs in a change-detection paradigm; this was also associated with increased P300 and N400 components as well as a sustained negative slow wave (NSW). In contrast, processing of the low semantic stimuli was associated with an increased N200 and a reduction in the P300. These findings suggest that semantic content can aid in reducing early visual processing of information and subsequent memory load by unitizing complex patterns into familiar forms. The N400/NSW may be associated with the requirements for maintaining visuo-spatial information about semantic forms such as orientation and relative location. Evidence for individual differences in semantic elaboration strategies used by participants is also discussed.

ABSTRACT This thesis aimed to investigate how visual working memory takes advantage of long-term knowledge in order to allow semantic elaboration in the form of chunking and the role of the central executive in this process. Two leading theoretical frameworks of working memory which both emphasise the role of long-term memory are discussed. One of which views working memory as consisting of multiple discrete, modality specific subsystems (Baddeley, 2000) and one which views working memory as an activated subset of long term memory (Cowan, 2005). Both of these models propose the integration of short- and long-term representations to be attentionally demanding. To investigate this assumption, two forms of visual matrix pattern were generated; a high semantic set which lends itself to long-term memory support and a low semantic set which does so to a lesser extent. The initial block of empirical work aimed to establish the characteristics of the patterns sets. Superiority for the high semantic patterns was observed in terms of greater stability across increasing maintenance intervals. The benefit of increased presentation time was also shown to be greater for the high semantic pattern set indicating the importance of time in the semantic elaboration process. A second block of studies was then conducted to identify the implications of the two patterns sets for the functional architecture of working memory. In a secondary interference paradigm the pattern sets were shown to be differentially dependent on visual and verbal interference with low semantic patterns negatively affected by visual and not verbal interference and the opposite pattern observed for high semantic patterns. The use of executive and attentional interference paradigms demonstrated two levels of binding. Firstly, when attentional resources were continually captured by a secondary task, a degree of chunking was observed for both pattern sets, this is discussed in terms of passive binding on the basis of long-term knowledge in the absence of executive resources. In the absence of interference, effortful elaboration of the pattern sets is observed and this is greater for the high semantic patterns. This is discussed in terms of active binding with the involvement of executive resources. These findings are then discussed in terms of both the Cowan (2005) and Baddeley (2000) models and recent observations made by Baddeley et al (in press) to support a modification of the episodic buffer in Baddeley?s model to allow for both passive and active binding and how this leads to striking similarities between the two theoretical perspectives.

It has frequently been demonstrated that repeated presentation of a stimulus can result in facilitated processing of the item, an effect termed repetition priming. Questions remain, however, regarding the boundary conditions of this effect, particularly for faces. For example, is repetition priming for unfamiliar faces dependent on the presentation of identical stimuli at study and test? This question was explored in three experiments in which the pose (i.e., frontal vs. (3/4)) and perceptual distance from the original facial identity (i.e., 100%, 75%, 50%, or 25% of original person) were manipulated between the testing phases of a standard repetition-priming paradigm. The results revealed that priming did not persist following any change to a face between study and test, thereby suggesting that repetition priming for unfamiliar faces is form specific. The theoretical implications of this finding are considered.