The School of Biological and Behavioural Sciences at Queen Mary is one of the UK’s elite research centres, according to the 2021 Research Excellence Framework (REF). We offer a multi-disciplinary research environment and have approximately 180 PhD students working on projects in the biological and psychological sciences. Our students have access to a variety of research facilities supported by experienced staff, as well as a range of student support services.
Our PhD students become part of Queen Mary’s Doctoral College which provides training and development opportunities, advice on funding, and financial support for research. Our students also have access to a Researcher Development Programme designed to help recognise and develop key skills and attributes needed to effectively manage research, and to prepare and plan for the next stages of their career.
Understanding another person’s state from their facial expressions (“emotion recognition”) is our most important form of non-verbal communication. As such, facial expressions provide a visual image that a perceiver needs to decode to understand another person’s emotional state. However, there is currently no explanatory framework, or model, with which to understand facial emotion recognition. We contend that this is largely because of the use of impoverished methods that rely on highly posed, caricatured, expressions that are poorly suited to understand emotion recognition.
We have recently created tools for the investigation of the role of perceptual mechanisms in how facial expressions are recognised (Binetti et al. PNAS, in press). This toolset allows users to evolve facial expressions until they reach an expression that they think best reflects a particular emotion. Importantly, we found substantial individual differences in the evolved expressions, meaning that different people have distinct and often non-overlapping templates for how a particular emotion should be reflected in a facial expression.
In the proposed project, we will use expressions evolved by the individual to characterise sensitivity to emotion recognition in healthy adults and in adults with alexithymia (impairment in emotion recognition and regulation). We have the following two aims: Firstly we will compare the facial expressions evolved between participants in our two groups. We expect that participants with alexithymia will create more intense expressions as they have a difficulty recognising emotions. Secondly, we will measure brain activity using EEG to reveal, how, where and when facial expressions are recognised using the facial stimuli created by participants. We expect that if tested with conventional stimuli our groups will differ in brain activity, but if tested with their own evolved stimuli, they will not. If this is the case, this highlights the relevance of perceptual factors in alexithymia.
This studentship is open to students applying for CONACyT funding. CONACyT will provide a contribution towards your tuition fees each year and Queen Mary will waive the remaining fee. CONACyT will pay a stipend towards living costs to its scholars. Further information can be found here: https://conacyt.mx/convocatorias/convocatorias-becas-al-extranjero/
Please refer to the CONACyT website here: https://conacyt.mx/convocatorias/convocatorias-becas-al-extranjero/ for full details on eligibility and conditions on the scholarship.
Applications are invited from outstanding candidates with or expecting to receive a first or upper-second class honours degree in an area relevant to the project such as Psychology, Biology, Computer Science, Neuroscience. A masters degree is desirable, but not essential.
Applicants from outside of the UK are required to provide evidence of their English language ability. Please see our English language requirements page for details: https://www.qmul.ac.uk/international-students/englishlanguagerequirements/postgraduateresearch/
Informal enquiries about the project can be sent to Isabelle Mareschal at i.mareschal@qmul.ac.uk
Applicants will need to complete an online application form to be considered, including a CV, personal statement and qualifications. Shortlisted applicants will be invited for a formal interview by the project supervisor. Those who are successful in their application for our PhD programme will be issued with an offer letter which is conditional on securing a CONACyT scholarship (as well as any academic conditions still required to meet our entry requirements).
Once applicants have obtained their offer letter from Queen Mary they should then apply to CONACyT for the scholarship as per their requirements and deadlines, with the support of the project supervisor.
Only applicants who are successful in their application to CONACyT can be issued an unconditional offer and enrol on our PhD programme.
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