School of Life Sciences

I graduated from Leeds with a 1st in Zoology and then did a PhD on hormones in marine fishes.  Before coming to Keele I worked at Glasgow and Newcastle-on-Tyne Universities.  As Keele is about as far as you can get from the sea in England I had to change from working on sea fish, so with the help of numerous research students I began investigating the effects of stress during pregnancy on offspring in mice.  We found that this retards their brain development, and that it feminises the male offspring.  Both sexes are made more susceptible and responsive to stress by their mother’s experience before they are born.  On the other hand, especially attentive mothering while they are being suckled, particularly tactile stimulation makes the babies more placid, grow faster and become more resistant to stress as adults.

Recently I have turned my attention to research into teaching methods, including replacing some lectures with prescribed reading, supported by frequent objective tests.  I’ve also been looking into whether these tests are more effective when presented on line, and into how students use audio recordings of lectures placed on the VLE for them to refer to.  The presence of two visually impaired students in our classes from 2005 to 2008 prompted me to develop, with Adela Nacer, some ways of allowing them to participate in laboratory classes that normally depend heavily on being able to see.  We have now made a large number of Neuroscience and Biology classes accessible for blind.

Now retired I continue to teach on a number of modules on a part-time basis

On coming to Keele I changed from working on hormones of fish to interactions between hormones, brain and behaviour in mammals. The influence of stress, both during development and in adult life, on behaviour and on reproductive function, has been the main lines of enquiry. During my time as Head of Department, I found it impossible to continue with this work, as well as carry an above average teaching load. However, since 1995, with the help of a part-time research student, I have been able to initiate new work that will take the topic of stress and early post-natal influences into its effects on ageing and cognitive deterioration. Publications are listed separately.

Since 2000 I have begun to develop my research interests in teaching methods. I have conducted a small project entitled "Programmed Learning to Replace Lectures" funded by a Keele Teaching Innovations Award and by the LTSN Bioscience Teaching Development Fund. Since 2007 with Adele Nacer I have investigated ways of supporting visually impaired students particularly in lab classes.

• LSC-10029 Introduction to Neuroscience
• LSC-10040 Introduction to Human Physiology
• PHA-10004 Introduction to Human Physiology
• LSC-20031 Human and Animal Cognition
• LSC-30001 Behavioural neurobiology