BIOGRAPHY
I completed my BSc at the University of Essex in 2009, during which I was awarded the BPS Undergraduate Award, the Departmental Prize (for the highest degree mark overall) and the A. T. Welford Memorial Prize (for the highest mark in statistics). In 2010, I was awarded a studentship from the University of Birmingham to fund my Masters of Research (MRes). After this, I worked for a year as a technical specialist in the maritime recruitment industry. In 2011, I returned to the University of Essex to commence my PhD which is funded by the highly competitive Silberrad Scholarship.
RESEARCH OVERVIEW
My research interests lie in the integration of two verbal immediate memory tasks (immediate serial recall and immediate free recall) into a common theoretical framework. I am interested in what the common memory mechanism may look like that underpins performance in these two tasks.
PRINCIPAL SUPERVISOR Geoff Ward
RECENT PUBLICATIONS
Bhatarah, P., Ward, G., Smith, J., & Hayes. L. (2009). Examining the relationship between free recall and immediate serial recall: Similar patterns of rehearsal and similar effects of word length, presentation rate, and articulatory suppression. Memory & Cognition, 37 (5), 689-713.
Presentations
Spurgeon, J., & Ward, G. (Sept, 2013). Why do participants initiate the immediate free recall of short lists of words with the first item? Talk presented at the British Psychology Society's Cognitive and Developmental Sections Joint Conference, Reading, UK.
Spurgeon, J., & Ward, G. (July, 2012). Immediate serial and free recall: The contribution of the phonological loop. Poster presented at the Experimental Psychology Society Conference, Bristol, UK.
Spurgeon, J., & Ward, G. (July, 2012). Immediate serial and free recall: The contribution of the phonological loop. Poster presented at the Graham Hitch Festschrift, Bristol, UK.
