Congratulations to Nevin Ozden for presenting her poster “Beyond the Here and Now: Theory of Mind, Episodic Memory, Episodic Future Thinking” at the International Society for Autism Research 2025 on Thursday 1st May. Her poster explores how autistic and non-autistic people think about themselves in terms of both their personalities (psychological traits, like being “happy” or “clumsy”) and their physical traits (like being “tall” or “bald”) and how these change over time.
Click here to learn more about INSA to learn more about the event.
Congratulations to Dr. Ceci Qing Cai who has been awarded the British Psychological Society Neil O’Connor Award for her publication titled “Mapping the Differential Impact of Spontaneous and Conversational Laughter on Brain and Mind: An fMRI Study in Autism.”
The British Psychological Society Neil O’Connor Award is given to those who have published research on cognitive conditions that appear in development and persist throughout life.
She wishes to express her heartfelt thanks to Sophie K Scott, Sarah J White, Sam J Gilbert, Nadine Lavan, and the many dedicated students who supported this work! Special appreciation also goes to the incredible staff at ICN and BUCNI, whose efforts made it possible to carry out testing during the challenging times of the COVID pandemic. Deepest thanks are also extended to the autistic and non-autistic participants, whose time, trust, and insights made this research possible. Thank you!
Cai CQ, Lavan N, Chen SHY, Wang CZX, Ozturk OC, Gilbert SJ & White SJ (2024). Mapping the differential impact of spontaneous and conversational laughter on brain and mind: A fMRI study in autism. Cerebral Cortex, 34, Article bhae199.
To find out more about the British Psychological Society Neil O’Connor Award, click here.
We are sad to see Gillian Hughes leave the lab and thank her for all her hard work, including fulfilling her role as Autism Research Coordinator for Autism@ICN. We wish her well in her future endeavours!
Congratulations to Devangana Prasad for presenting her poster entitled “Does age of diagnosis affect how autistic adults mentalize about others?” at the Experimental Psychology Poster Session 2025 on Wednesday 8th January. Her poster explores whether the age at which autistic individuals are diagnosed affects how they mentalize about other autistic and non-autistic people.
To find out more about Devangana’s presentation, click here to see her talk-through video.
On the 25th and 26th of October, Dr. Sarah White attended the first conference in Italy on Autism in Action. The conference, titled “The Role of Executive Functions in Neurodiversity”, focused on the role of executive functions in the autism spectrum, from theory to practice, and from early intervention to empowerment in adults. Sarah delivered a keynote lecture titled “The Social Mind: How Do Executive Function & Mentalizing Interact in Autism?” to an audience of over 100 professionals, researchers, and students.
For more information about Autism in Action, visit here
Dr. Sarah White was invited to a networking event titled “Unlock Your Career Roadmap”, held by In2scienceUK in collaboration with the Royal Society. This event was aimed at connecting young students and encouraging them to discuss their career aspirations and inspire them to pursue research careers in STEM. The event featured poster presentations by students from the In2scienceUK university summer student placements program, which is dedicated to improving social mobility and diversity in STEM.
Congratulations to Anushay on her first published paper on children’s emotion recognition biases, an MRes thesis Anushay did at Yale, investigating how preschool-aged children recognise emotions, focusing on systematic biases in their responses. Notably, children tended to over-identify with anger and sadness, while happiness was the most accurately recognised. The study shows that in general, older children were more accurate and less biased in their emotion recognition, but that biases were not strongly associated with social behaviour. These findings suggest that children’s emotional recognition errors may be systematic, highlighting the need for further research into the cognitive processes involved. It also emphasises the importance of paying attention to children’s mistakes as they could provide insight into their cognitive processes.
Read the full paper here: Mazhar, A., and Bailey, C. S. (2024). Emotion-specific recognition biases and how they relate to emotion-specific recognition accuracy, family and child demographic factors, and social behaviour. Cognition and Emotion, 1-19. View here.
Congratulations to Katherine Ellis for receiving a grant to co-PI a project with Jo Moss aimed at further developing their teacher training e-resource! (https://www.findteacherresources.co.uk/) The e-resource provides condensed and accessible evidence-based information for education practitioners supporting children with genetic syndromes and intellectual disability. The project will focus on establishing an expert panel review of the resource’s scientific content as well as conducting a feasibility study to assess the impact of the resource on education practitioners’ self-efficacy and practices in supporting children with genetic syndromes and intellectual disabilities.
Katherine Ellis is co-author of a recently published paper discussing how medical practitioners can provide a holistic and accurate delivery of a fragile X diagnosis to families, recognising both the strengths and challenges experienced by this community. This article was led by parents and caregivers of people with fragile X syndrome, with input from researchers, including Katherine. Katherine specifically contributed to the scientific discussion of the available evidence outlining the strengths associated with fragile X syndrome, and reflections on how the medical model may have contributed to the research gap on the positive attributes of those with fragile X Syndrome. With acknowledging such strengths, this article aims to enhance our understanding and improve support for families navigating a Fragile X diagnosis.
Read the full paper here:
Herring, J., Johnson, K., Scerif, G., Weight, E., Richstein, J., Crawford, H., Robinson, H., Gawarammana, R., & Ellis, K. (2024). The joys of fragile X: Understanding the strengths of fragile X and delivering a diagnosis in a helpful, holistic way. Institute of Neurodiversity. View here.
David Ruttenberg has been selected as a recipient of the prestigious Fulbright Specialist Award for the 2024-2027 cycle. This program, administered by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) and World Learning, offers the opportunity for David to engage in short-term collaborative projects at eligible institutions in over 150 countries worldwide. As a Fulbright Specialist, Ruttenberg will have the chance to share his cognitive neuroscience, artificial intelligence, and multimodal learning expertise, contribute to capacity-building efforts, and foster mutual understanding between the United States and other nations. The Fulbright program allows for projects ranging from two to six weeks, enabling David to make significant contributions in his field while developing lasting relationships with institutions abroad. His selection for this tenured award recognizes his professional accomplishments and the potential to make valuable contributions to global academic and professional fields.
