Macquarie University

Our people

Director

Dr Celia Harris

Celia Harris is a Lecturer in the Department of Cognitive Science. Her research background is in social and autobiographical memory, memory functions, and memory cuing. In more recent research, she has studied how remembering is shared in older couples, the functions that conversations about the past play in supporting relationships, and the way that couples might provide a rich cuing context for each other’s memories and help to protect against cognitive decline.

Deputy Directors

Professor John Sutton

John Sutton is a Professor in the Department of Cognitive Science. He works in the philosophy of mind, cognition, and action, in cognitive psychology, and in the interdisciplinary cognitive humanities. His main research topics are autobiographical and collaborative memory, embodied memory and skilled movement, distributed cognition, and cognitive history.

Professor Greg Savage

Greg Savage is a Professor in the Department of Psychology. His research has examined a variety of topics, including developing theoretically-informed tests of memory, early detection of Alzheimer’s disease, and the impact of hearing loss on cognition, particularly as a risk factor for the development of dementia.

Members

	Professor Amanda Barnier Amanda Barnier is the Associate Dean of Research in the Faculty of Human Sciences and a Professor in the Department of Cognitive Science. Her current research explores relationships among individual memory, small group ‘collective memory’, and the costs and benefits of remembering alone vs together, especially in older adults.
	Dr Amee Baird Amee Baird is an NHMRC-ARC Research Fellow in the Department of Psychology. Her main current research is in music and memory in people with dementia, including music-evoked autobiographical memory, and music and non-music cognitive functions in musicians with dementia.
	Dr Monique Crane Monique Crane is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Psychology. Her primary area of research examines how organisations are able to foster psychological resilience in the workplace, evaluating the effectiveness of resilience training programs and the effect of workplace characteristics on the psychological resilience of their personnel. Her recent work has led to the development of a unique resilience training program that focuses on enhancing coping and emotion regulatory self-reflection.
	Professor William Forde (Bill) Thompson Bill Thompson is a Distinguished Professor in the Department of Psychology, the Director of the Music, Sound and Performance Lab, and the Founding Director of the Centre for Elite Performance, Expertise and Training. His research interests include music perception and cognition, music and emotion, music and language, disorders of music, and music-based treatments for neurological disorders such as dementia.
	Dr Paul Strutt Paul Strutt is a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Department of Cognitive Science. His research interests are in the early detection and prevention of cognitive decline and dementia, with particular experience working with adults with brain injuries. He is currently investigating hearing loss as a risk factor for dementia and hearing-based interventions for dementia.
	Dr Kath Bicknell Kath Bicknell is a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Department of Cognitive Science. Her research investigates the relationships between thinking and doing in a performance context, using interdisciplinary research methods to expand upon ideas from phenomenological anthropology, performance studies, embodied cognition, psychology and sports science. She also studies collaborative remembering in older adults.