Professor Sheila Cunningham

Research grants include:

2022-2025: CI on £75,000 RLINCS2 PhD studentship award

2020-2023: PI on £484,575 project grant awarded by ESRC

2018: CI on £8,500 grant awarded by the Carnegie Trust

2018-2021: CI on £75,000 RLINCS PhD studentship award

2017-2020: CI on £363,321 grant awarded by the ESRC

2017-2018: CI on £7,490 grant awarded by the Carnegie Trust

2015-2018: PI on £106,396 grant awarded by the Leverhulme Trust

2014: PI on £3,500 workshop grant awarded by the Experimental Psychology Society

2009-2012: Named RF on 791,549€ awarded by the European Research Council

I peer review manuscripts for international journals including Consciousness and Cognition, Developmental Science, Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, and Memory. I guest-edited a special issue on self-processing biases for the Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology.

I am an elected committee member of the British Psychological Society's Developmental Section. I am a member of several academic societies including Experimental Psychology Society, the British Psychological Society and the Association for Psychological Science. I also work with the Scottish Graduate School for the Social Sciences, sitting on a working group for the ESRC recommissioning bid.

ACADEMIC CONFERENCE PRESENTATIONS

Ahmed, Z., Mclean, J., March, J., Golden, K., Wilks, C., Ross, J., & Cunningham, S. J. How can ‘you’ support children’s maths word problem solving? The Mathematical Cognition and Learning Society, Antwerp, Belgium. June 2022

Golden, K., March, J., Ahmed, Z., McLean, J. Ross, J., & Cunningham, S. J. Effects of personal pronouns on children's numerical problem solving. Cognitive Development Society Biennial Conference, Madison, WI. April 2022.

March, J., Cunningham, S. J., McLean, J., Golden, K., & Ross, J. The influence of self-referential cues and problem consistency on children's maths performance. Meeting of the Experimental Psychology Society, Keele University. March 2022.

Cunningham, S. J., Hutchison, J., & Ross, J. How do self-reference effects change across childhood? Society for Research in Child Development Biennial Meeting (virtual). April 2021.

Ahmed, Z., Cunningham, S. J., & McLean, J. Can the ‘self’ enhance children’s verbal working memory? Society for Research in Child Development Biennial Meeting (virtual). April 2021.

March, J., Golden, K., Ahmed, Z., McLean, J. & Cunningham, S. J. Investigating the effect of self-referential cues and working memory on children's maths performance. Society for Research in Child Development Biennial Meeting (virtual). April 2021.

Ahmed, Z., Cunningham, S. J. & McLean, J. Investigating the relationship between self-referencing and children’s visuospatial working memory: can ownership support working memory? BPS Developmental and Social Annual Conference. Stoke, August 2019.

Cunningham, S. J., Ahmed, Z., Rhodes, S., Gow, A., Macmillan, K. & Ross, J. Self-processing in children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). International Convention on Psychological Science. Paris, March 2019.Ross, J., Hutchison, J. & Cunningham, S. J. Development of self-reference effects. International Convention on Psychological Science. Paris, March 2019.

Cunningham, S. J., Hutchison, J., & Ross, J. Development of incidental and explicit self-reference effects reveals distinct cognitive mechanisms. BPS Cognitive Section Annual Conference, Liverpool, Sept. 2018.

Ross, J., Hutchison, J., & Cunningham, S. J., The me in memory: Using the self-reference effect to measure development in the
autobiographical self. BPS Cognitive Section Annual Conference, Liverpool, Sept. 2018.

Ahmed, Z., Cunningham, S. J., Ross, J. & Rhodes, S. Exploring the self-reference effect in ADHD. BPS Developmental Section Annual Conference, Liverpool, Sept. 2018.

Ross, J., Hutchison, J., & Cunningham, S. J.,Growing me: The development of the self-reference effect across childhood. BPS Developmental Section Annual Conference, Liverpool, Sept. 2018.

Cunningham, S. J., Hutchison, J., Ross, J. & Martin, D. Self-biases in recall: Applying ownership effects in education. BPS Developmental Section Annual Conference, Stratford-upon-Avon, Sept. 2017.

Ross, J., Hutchison, J., & Cunningham, S. J. Self-processing biases in event memory: Implications for the development of self-awareness. BPS Developmental Section Annual Conference, Stratford-upon-Avon, Sept. 2017.

Cunningham, S. J., Hutchison, J., & Martin, D. The ownership effect in memory: applications for learning. International Convention on Psychological Science, Vienna, March 2017.

Hutchison, J. Cunningham, S. J., & Ross, J. The me in memory: Using self-reference effects to predict autobiographical memory development. BPS Cognitive Section Annual Conference, Barcelona, Sept. 2016.

Gillespie-Smith, K., Branigan, H., Ballantyne, C., Turk, D. J., & Cunningham, S. J. Level of functioning in Autism associated with self-processing ability: Evidence from an ownership paradigm. BPS Developmental Section Annual Conference, Belfast, Sept. 2016.

Gillespie-Smith, K., Ballantyne, C., Turk, D. J., & Cunningham, S. J. Children with autism spectrum disorder do show self-processing biases: Evidence from an ownership paradigm. Meeting of the Experimental Psychology Society, Oxford, July 2016.

Martin, D., Swainson, R., Slessor, G., Hutchison, J., & Cunningham, S. J. The simultaneous extraction of emotion and social categories from unfamiliar faces. Meeting of the Experimental Psychology Society, Oxford, July 2016.

Cunningham, S. J. Applying self-processing biases in an educational context. Meeting of the Experimental Psychology Society, Durham, April 2016.

Cunningham, S. J. & Ferguson, A. The effects of self-referencing on children’s mathematical processing. BPS Developmental Section Annual Conference, Manchester, September 2015.

Cunningham, S. J. & Turk, D. J. The selfish learner: advantages of applying a self-referential approach to children's learning. Society for Research in Child Development, Seattle, WA, April 2013.

Cunningham, S. J. Exploring incidental self-reference effects in memory. International Conference on Memory (ICOM) 5, York, August 2011.

Cunningham, S. J. & Turk, D. J. Applying the self in learning. Society for Applied Research in Memory and Cognition XI, New York, June 2011.

Cunningham, S.J. The self-reference effect on memory in early childhood. Society for Research in Child Development, Montreal, Canada, April 2011.

Cunningham, S. J. A world of my own: The emergence of ownership effects in early childhood. 1st joint conference of EPS and SEPEX, Granada, Spain, April 2010.

Cunningham, S. J. It's mine! Children's memory bias for self-owned items. BPS Developmental Section Annual Conference, Nottingham, UK, September 2009.

Cunningham, S. J. Turk, D. J. & Macrae, C. N. Remember your own: The development of self-biases in early childhood. 15th General Meeting of the European Association of Experimental Social Psychology, Opatija, Croatia, June 2008.

Cunningham, S. J. Turk, D. J. & Macrae, C. N. Each to his own: Self-biases in memory for owned objects. 8th Annual Society for Personality and Social Psychology Conference, Memphis, Tennessee, January 2007.

Cunningham, S. J., Milne, A. B. & Crawford, J. R. Alcohol and the control of stereotyping behaviour. Conference of the Society for Experimental Social Psychology, Boston, Massachusetts, September 2003.

Cunningham, S. J. & Milne, A. B. The consumption of executive resources during stereotype suppression. Society for Applied Research in Memory and Cognition V, Aberdeen, July 2003.

Cunningham, S. J. & Milne, A. B. Stereotype suppression: Ironic effects on memory and executive resource consumption. Annual Conference of the British Psychological Society, Bournemouth, March 2003.

McGeorge, P., Milne, A. B., Cunningham, S.J & Rutland, A. Implicit attitudes amongst Scots: The effect of varying the comparison group. Meeting of the European Association of Experimental Social Psychology, San Sebastian, Spain, June 2002.

Outreach

PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT

I have been involved in a number of scientific public engagement sessions, including the British Science Festival and Dundee Science Festival ("I heard it on the Grapevine: The social evolution of information") and Cafe Science Dundee ("Pink for girls and blue for boys? The colour of gender stereotypes").

SCHOOL OUTREACH

I have delivered talks to children in primary and secondary schools on psychology topics such as stereotyping, brain development and self-referencing. 

Our lab group runs CPD workshops for teachers aimed at increasing awareness of the application of self-processing biases in the classroom (see www.selflab.co.uk). I also deliver workshops on this topic to teachers via national CPD provider SSERC, and have published a number of  related resources for teachers:

• Cunningham, S. J. (2021). The importance of self-referencing as a learning technique. Futurum: A Science, Research and Tech Mag for the Next Generation, 11, 26-29. https://futurumcareers.com/Issue-11.pdf

Article and resources also published in:

Times Educational Supplement: https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/the-importance-of-self-referencing-as-a-learning-technique-12581921

Teachers Pay Teachers: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/The-importance-of-self-referencing-as-a-learning-technique-7288477?st=a02158a03274c139fe0221f544c3f81b

• Cunningham, S. J. (2020) What can ‘you’ do to boost learning? TeachPrimary https://www.teachwire.net/news/educational-psychology-how-the-word-you-can-improve-childrens-working-memory

• Cunningham, S. J. (2019). Self-referencing as a tool to improve learning. The Learning Scientists. https://www.learningscientists.org/blog/2019/4/11-1