Grant winners – 30 July 2015

Leverhulme Trust

Research project grants

• Award winner: Brian Charlesworth
• Institution: University of Edinburgh
• Value: £164,333

Analysing genome-wide patterns of DNA sequence variation and evolution in Drosophila

• Award winner: Antonios Kanaras
• Institution: University of Southampton
• Value: £191,412

Nanoparticles with synergistic roles: sensing and drug delivery

• Award winner: James McLaughlin
• Institution: Northumbria University
• Value: £199,773

Revealing the fundamental nature of time-dependent, wave-generating reconnection

Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council

Standard Research

• Award winner: Geetha Balakrishnan
• Institution: University of Warwick
• Value: £514,769

Single crystal growth at Warwick

• Award winner: Nick Quirke
• Institution: Imperial College London
• Value: £346,711

Advances in polymer material for energy security – POLYMAT

• Award winner: Yonghao Zhang
• Institution: University of Strathclyde
• Value: £379,691

Pore-scale study of gas flows in ultra-tight porous media

Economic and Social Research Council

Research grants

• Award winner: Jan Wiener
• Institution: Bournemouth University
• Value: £215,992

Dementia-friendly architecture: reducing spatial disorientation in dementia care homes

• Award winner: Anthony McGregor
• Institution: Durham University
• Value: £362,465

Flexible and habitual mechanisms of human navigation

• Award winner: Kate Reed
• Institution: University of Sheffield
• Value: £314,310

“End of” or “start of” life? Visual technology and the transformation of traditional post mortem

• Award winner: Philip Durrant
• Institution: University of Exeter
• Value: £317,843

Growth in grammar: a multi-dimensional analysis of student writing between 5 and 16

In detail

Award winner: David Williams
Institution: University of Kent
Value: £278,648

Metacognition and mind-reading: one system or two?

The ability to monitor one’s own thoughts is termed “metacognition”, whereas the ability to monitor others’ thoughts is termed “mind-reading”. Some researchers theorise that distinct psychological mechanisms underpin metacognition and mind-reading, and that metacognition is evolutionarily and developmentally prior to mind-reading. Others contend that the two functions rely on exactly the same core psychological mechanism, and metacognition actually emerged as a by-product of the evolutionary need to mind-read others. This project will test these theories by employing multiple kinds of metacognitive tasks across two sets of experiments. The first will manipulate the demands of metacognitive tasks to establish whether the kinds of tasks used to test metacognition in non-human primates really do require awareness of one’s own thoughts. In the second, the team will assess metacognitive monitoring among adults with autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) and neurotypical adults of similar age and general intelligence. These experiments will allow the team to decide between the competing theories of the relation between metacognition and mind-reading. Additionally, it is hoped that the project will improve understanding of the nature of cognitive functioning in people with ASD.