Research Seminar: John Dunn

The Speaker

I am a native Sandgroper who went to UWA at an impressionable age to study Psychology. I completed Honours in 1976 and, after working for a year in the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, I went back to school and eventually completed my PhD supervised by Kim Kirsner in 1985. I then joined the (then) Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural Science where, for a number of years, I taught medical students all about Psychology. My time there was interrupted for one year spent in the Department of Psychology at the University of Queensland after which I moved to the School of Psychology at the University of Adelaide. Here, I served as Deputy Head of School and then as Head of School during which time I was also the Chair of the Heads of Departments and Schools of Psychology Association. I am also a Director of the Australian Psychology Accreditation Council with two periods as Chair. In 2016, I “retired” from Adelaide and relocated to Perth, taking up an Adjunct Professorship at UWA. As there is no rest for the wicked, I also took up an appointment as Interim Dean of Psychology and Exercise Science at Murdoch University and then a part-time Professorship at Edith Cowan University which finished in 2021. I remain active in research and have held several grants with colleagues interstate and overseas.

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Abstract

Loftus [(1978), Memory & Cognition, 6, 312-319] highlighted the distinction between a theoretical concept such as memory or attention, and its observed measure such as hit rate or percent correct. If the functional relationship between the concept and its measure is non-linear then only some interaction effects are interpretable. This is an example of the wider `problem of coordination' which pervades scientific measurement. Loftus drew on the principles of additive conjoint measurement to interpret interactions when the coordination function is only monotonic. This led to the distinction between removable interactions that are consistent with an additive effect on the underlying theoretical concept and nonremovable interactions that are not. However, the adoption of these ideas by researchers has been greatly limited by the fact that no statistical procedure exists to determine if and to what extent an interaction is removable or otherwise. The aim of this presentation is to describe such a procedure.

The Seminar

In this event in a series, speakers from within the Hub, the University, and the broader research community tell us about their research. Our Research Seminar Series involves speakers covering a broad range of themes surrounding our Hub’s interests, so we’ll hopefully all learn something interesting. Whether you want to learn to inform your own research or to simply satisfy a personal curiosity, we hope to see you there.

Watch the Replay

Watch the recording of this seminar on the CHDH Youtube Channel