About Dr Laura Sexton
I completed a BSc in Psychology at the University of Manchester, followed by an MSc in Health Psychology and a PhD in Cognitive Psychology at Teesside University. I joined the University of Sunderland as a Lecturer in 2023.
My research focuses on how we perceive and recognise faces. In particular, I am interested in the role of biological motion in face recognition, face processing in developmental prosopagnosia (face blindness), and how facial ageing affects identity recognition. I use behavioural and eye-tracking methods to investigate these areas.
Teaching and supervision
I am Programme Leader for the MSc Psychology (Conversion) programme and teach across undergraduate and postgraduate Psychology programmes.
I am Module Leader for:
- PSYC202: Human Development and Cognition (Level 5)
- PSYM114: Understanding Growth and Change: Developmental Psychology (Level 7)
- PSYM115: Ordinary and Extraordinary Minds: Cognitive Psychology (Level 7)
- PSYM118: Research Project (Level 7)
- PSYM103: Diversity in Child Development (Level 7)
I also contribute to teaching on PSYM101: Mind and Social World (Level 4)
Interests
I am interested in supervising projects across a range of topics in face perception and recognition. Areas of particular interest include facial motion, developmental prosopagnosia, facial ageing and identity recognition, and individual differences and expertise in face perception.
Research
My research focuses on face perception and recognition, particularly the factors that influence our ability to recognise facial identity.
My PhD examined the effect of facial motion on recognition in typical recognisers and individuals with developmental prosopagnosia (face blindness). My research also explores the effects of facial ageing on identity recognition and individual differences in face recognition ability, including in super-recognisers and forensic facial examiners.