My name is Shannon Rosbotham, and I am a PhD candidate in the CDL lab. On the 2nd December I had the pleasure of presenting a poster at UCD’s 3rd annual Aidan P. Moran Research Day. The poster outlined a plan for a study that I have been working on as part of my PhD titled, “Does socioeconomic status moderate the spatial-mathematics association?”. Overall, the day was a rewarding learning experience, especially as it was one of my first opportunities to present my research to an audience outside of the lab.
The Aidan P. Moran Research Day is a conference style event consisting of several lightning talks by UCD faculty members, two presentations by keynote speakers and a poster session. It was clear that everyone presenting has a real passion for their area and I found their interest to be infectious. The lightning talks were a terrific way of showcasing the wide breadth of work carried out by the students and faculty of the School of Psychology at UCD. The talks spanned a multitude of topics, such as health, disability, neuropsychology, media and entertainment, cognition, development and education. Additionally, the presentations by keynote speakers provided a glimpse of other forms of work being completed outside the university. The first keynote speaker, Dr Alison Darcy, provided an insight into how research can be combined with industry. Dr Darcy describing her experience creating a startup, Woebot Health, which utilises AI technology to support mental health services.
It was fascinating to hear about her transition to a job in industry, as this had not previously been something I considered. The second keynote speaker, Professor Laura Shapiro from Aston University, discussed how learning to read was a lifelong process. I found Professor Shapiro’s talk to be of relevance to my own research as she described several longitudinal data analysis techniques that I plan to use during my PhD.
I personally believe a school wide research day is a brilliant idea. As researchers, we often present our work solely to experts in our fields and while this has obvious benefits, we also gain a lot from receiving an outside perspective. For example, my project includes measuring socioeconomic status. This is not something which is exclusive to research on cognitive development, and I found myself having many helpful discussions with a range of other researchers regarding how best to measure such a uniquely human construct. Moreover, as a first year PhD student the idea of presenting my research is something I find extremely daunting. Therefore, the Aidan P. Moran Research Day was a good way of gently easing myself into the world of academic conferences, without feeling like I was being fed to the sharks. It was also quite reassuring to discover that I can explain some of the nuanced spatial cognitive theories I have read about, which has given me confidence that I do already have a better understanding (to some extent) of what I am talking about!
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