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Dr Gillian Porter

Research Associate

telephone: +44 (0) 117 954 6847 email: Gillian.Porter@bris.ac.uk

Room 5D27a

Biographical Details

After graduating in Psychology from the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, I spent several years working in market research with Research International in London. I completed a PhD at the University of Bristol in 2004 under the supervision of Tom Troscianko, and have since spent most of my time as a post-doctoral researcher with Andrea Tales.

Research Interests

My PhD research investigated the use of pupil dilation as a measure of processing load, particularly with visual input while avoiding confounds associated with the pupil’s visual reflexes. I am also interested in studying eye movement patterns and psychophysical methods. I use these techniques to investigate various aspects of how visual information is processed and how attentional resources are allocated. My current work focuses on how such processes are compromised in healthy ageing and with the onset of dementia.

Grants



Sep 2007 (joint application with Dr Andrea Tales): equipment grant from the BRACE Charity for purchase of an eye-tracker and pupillometer (£30,000).

Publications

Tales, A., Porter, G. and Butler, S. (in press): “Automatic change detection during the performance of a continuous visual task”. Neuroreport

Tales, A., Snowden, R.J., Phillips, M., Haworth, J., Porter, G., Wilcock, G. and Bayer, A. (in press): “Exogenous phasic alerting and spatial orienting in mild cognitive impairment compared to healthy ageing: study outcome is related to target response requirement”. Cortex

Porter, G., Tales, A., Troscianko, T., Wilcock, G., Haworth, J. & Leonards, U. (in press): “New insights into feature and conjunction search: I. Evidence from pupil size, eye movements and ageing”. Cortex

Porter, G., Leonards, U., Wilcock, G., Haworth, J., Troscianko, T. & Tales, A. (in press): “New insights into feature and conjunction search: II. Evidence from Alzheimer’s disease” Cortex

Tales, A. & Porter, G. (2008): “Visual attention-related processing in Alzheimer’s disease”. Reviews in Clinical Gerontology, 18, 229-243.

Mohr, C., Porter, G., & Benton, C. (2007): “Psychophysics reveals a right-hemispheric contribution to body image distortions in women but not men”. Neuropsychologia, 45, 2942-2950

Benton, C.P., Etchells, P., Porter, G., Clark, A.P., Penton-Voak, I.S. & Nikolov, S.G. (2007): “Turning the other cheek: the viewpoint dependence of facial expression after-effects”. Proceedings of the Royal Society Section B, 274(1622), 2131-2137.

Porter, G., Troscianko, T. & Gilchrist, I.D. (2007): “Effort during visual search and counting: insights from pupillometry”. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 60(2), 211-229

Porter, G., Hood, B.M., Troscianko T., & Macrae, C.N. (2006): “Females, but not males, show greater pupillary response to direct than deviated gaze faces”. Perception, 35(8), 1129-1136

people | academic and research staff | support staff | PhD students