Research Fellow - Reading Development

About us

UCL is a top-ranked university in the UK for research in psychology; psychiatry & neuroscience. The post will be based within the Division of Psychology and Language Sciences (PALS) in the Faculty of Brain Sciences. The Division houses a number of research departments, one of which is the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience (ICN). The successful applicant will be based at the ICN and also the cross-departmental Deafness, Cognition and Language Research Centre (DCAL). ICN is an inter-disciplinary research institute, bringing together different disciplines with common interests in the human mind and brain, in both health and disease. The post-holder will be part of the Visual Communication Research Group. DCAL is the leading research centre in the field of Deafness, Cognition and Language in Europe. It is a bilingual centre which brings together leading deaf and hearing researchers in the fields of linguistics, psychology and neuroscience.

About the role

Join a team, led by Prof. Mairéad MacSweeney, on a Wellcome funded project examining the ‘Mechanisms of reading development in deaf children’. The post-holder will lead an ongoing longitudinal research project to identify the role of visual language inputs in reading development in young deaf children. This project examines the contribution of British Sign Language, fingerspelling and visual speech input (lipreading) to reading development by following deaf children over 3 years, from 4-7 years old. The post-holder will be responsible for the overall running of the study and the research team, which involves deaf and hearing Research Assistants. They will be responsible for data management, data analysis (using structural equation modelling) and writing up results for publication. The post-holder may also have the opportunity to be involved in related ongoing neuroimaging research with deaf children and adults.

About you

The post-holder will hold a PhD in Psychology or a closely related discipline. The ideal candidate will have knowledge of BSL or another signed language to a Level 2 standard. If this is not the case, they will have a clear commitment to reach at least this level within 1yr of being in post (training will be provided). The post-holder will have excellent data management and data analysis skills. They will have knowledge of the language and literacy research literature. The post-holder will be responsible for a very large and complex longitudinal study. The post-holder will be based in the Visual Communication Group at the ICN. The post-holder will also be a part of the DCAL.

What we offer

As well as the exciting opportunities this role presents, we also offer some great benefits, please search for UCL rewards and benefits.

Our commitment to Equality, Diversity and Inclusion

As London’s Global University, we know diversity fosters creativity and innovation, and we want our community to represent the diversity of the world’s talent. We are committed to equality of opportunity, to being fair and inclusive, and to being a place where we all belong. We therefore particularly encourage applications from candidates who are likely to be underrepresented in UCL’s workforce. These include people from Black, Asian and ethnic minority backgrounds; disabled people; LGBTQI+ people; and for our Grade 9 and 10 roles, women. DCAL particularly encourage applications from deaf people.