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| University of Cambridge > School of the Biological Sciences > Department of Experimental Psychology > Academic Staff |
 J. Russell, MA (Oxon), PhD (London)Reader in Cognitive
Development Director of the
Cambridge Developing Cognition Laboratory (CDCL) My current research interests lie in the following areas The early development of episodic memory For the past two or three years I have been working out a minimalist theory of episodic memory; and have recently been awarded funding for three years from The Leverhulme Trust to test its predictions. By minimalist I mean ‘not requiring concepts of self, mental representation, or temporal sequence to be ascribed to the subject’–– an essentially non-conceptual form of re-experiential memory. I argue (a) that if episodic memory is a form of re-experiencing then it must inherit that which is necessary for something to be an experience ‘in the first place’, and (b) that this is, following Kant, spatiotemporal content –– in addition to its being as of the experience of a single person (so-called ‘synthetic unity’). I suggest that there is no reason why these minimal conditions should not be met by children too young to be credited with concepts of time and of mentality –– and indeed by animals. With regard to animals, in fact, this minimalist view should not be confused with, though it was distantly inspired by, my colleagues’ Nicky Clayton and Tony Dickinsons' work on ‘episodic-like’ memory in birds. Both concern What-When-Where (WWW) binding, but in my case the What can be an action or object, the Where must be in perspective-relative space, and, crucially, the When must mean simultaneity or order of elements within the event. Also, for the memory to be episodic I argue that there must be a high ‘coefficient of binding’, meaning that recalling a subset of the Ws will virtually guarantee recalling the others. This is an aspect of the ‘synthetic unity’ mentioned above. I welcome applications from people interested in this line of work. The relation between the development of executive functioning and theory of mind. My engagement in this topic, mainly expressed in research children with autism, has been dormant of late, partly because of my interest in the role of reasoning in theory of mind performance (see Russell 2007, below) and partly due to my being at least a little persuaded by Josef Perner’s arguments about the need for a ‘theory’ of intention in executive control. That said, I would be very happy to supervise work in this area. Language development I am a nativist about syntax (see my 2004 book below) and about lexical development. That said, I am open to approaches from prospective supervisees who do not share these views. |
Selected and recent publications
Books
Russell, J. (1978) The acquisition of knowledge. London: Macmillan Press. 294 pages. (This is mainly a comparison of J. M. Baldwin's and J. Piaget's theories of mental development).
Russell, J. (1984) Explaining mental life: Some philosophical issues in psychology. London: Macmillan. 291 pages.
Russell, J. (1987, as editor) Philosophical perspectives on developmental psychology. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. 262 pages.
Russell, J. (1996) Agency: Its role in mental development. Hove: Erlbaum (UK), Taylor & Francis. 326 pages.
Russell, J. (1997,as editor). Autism as an executive disorder. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 320 pages.
Russell, J. (July, 8th, 2004) What is language development? Rationalist, Empiricist and Pragmatist approaches to the acquisition of syntax. Oxford University Press. (555 pages)
Articles
Russell, J. (1975) The interpretation of conservation instructions by 5-year-old children. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 16, 233-244.
Russell, J. (1976) Nonconservation of area: Do children succeed where adults fail? Developmental Psychology, 12, 376-379.
Russell, J. (1979) Verbal and nonverbal judgements of length invariance. British Journal of Psychology, 70, 313-317.
Russell, J. (1979) The status of genetic epistemology. Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, 9, 53-71.
Russell, J. (1980) Action from knowledge and conditioned behaviour: Part one: the stratification of behaviour. Behaviourism, 8, 87-98.
Russell, J. (1980) Action from knowledge and conditioned behaviour: Part two: criteria for epistemic behaviour. Behaviourism, 8, 133-148.
Russell, J. (1981) Action from knowledge and conditioned behaviour: Part three: The human case. Behaviourism, 9, 107-125.
Russell, J. (1982) Propositional attitudes. In M. Beveridge (ed.) Children Thinking through language. London: Edward Arnold.
Russell, J. (1988) Making judgements about thoughts and things. In J. Astington, P. L. Harris and D. R. Olson (eds.) Developing theories of mind. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Russell, J. (1988) Cognisance and cognitive science. Part one: The 'Generality Constraint'. Philosophical Psychology, 1, 235-258.
Russell, J. (1989) Cognisance and cognitive science. Part two: Towards an empirical psychology of cognisance. Philosophical Psychology, 2, 187-223.
Russell, J. (1995) At two with nature: The role of agency in mental development. In J. Bermúdez, A. J. Marcel, and N. Eilan. The body and the self. Cambridge Mass.: MIT Press (Bradford Books).
Russell, J. (1996) Development and evolution of the symbolic function: The role of working memory. In P. A. Mellars and K. R. Gibson (Eds.) Modelling the early human mind. Cambridge: McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research.
Russell, J. (1999) "Cognitive development as an executive processs - in part: A homeopathic dose of Piaget." A 'target article'. Developmental Science. 2, 247-295
Russell, J. (1981) Children's memory for the premises in a transitive measurement task assessed by elicited and spontaneous justifications. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 31,16-26.
Russell, J. (1981) Dyadic interaction in a logical reasoning task requiring Inclusion ability. Child Development, 52, 1322-1325.
Russell, J. (1984) Should I believe you or what you say? Children's belief of children's statements. Developmental Psychology, 20, 261-270.
Russell, J. (1987) "Can we say...?" Children's understanding of intensionality [sic]. Cognition, 25, 289-308.
Russell, J. and Haworth, H. M. (1987) Perceiving the logical status of sentences. Cognition, 27, 73-96.
Russell, J. and Haworth, H. M. (1988) Appearance versus reality in dyadic interaction: Evidence for a lingering phenomenism. International Journal of Behavioural Development, 11, 155-170.
Russell, J., Mills, I. and Reiff-Musgrove, P. (1990) The role of symmetrical and asymmetrical social conflict in cognitive change. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 49, 58-78.
Russell, J., Mauthner, N., Sharpe, S. and Tidswell, T. (1991) The 'windows task' as a measure of strategic deception in preschoolers and autistic subjects. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 9, 331-349.
Hughes, C. H. and Russell, J. (1993) Autistic children's difficulties with mental disengagement from an object: Its implications for theories of Autism. Developmental Psychology, 29, 498-510.
Russell, J., Jarrold, C. and Potel, D. (1994). What makes strategic deception difficult -- the deception or the strategy? British Journal of Developmental Psychology. 12, 301-314.
Hughes, C., Russell, J. and Robbins, T. W. (1994) Evidence for executive dysfunction in autism. Neuropsychologia, 32, 477-492.
Moore, C., Jarrold, C., Russell, J., Lumb, A., Sapp, F. and MacCallum, F. (1995) Conflicting desire and the child's theory of mind. Cognitive Development. 10, 467- 82.
Russell, J. and Jarrold, C. and Henry, L. (1996) Working memory in children With autism and with moderate learning difficulties. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry. 37, 673-688
Russell, J., McCormack, T., Lillis, G., and Robertson, J. (1996) Associative (versus logical) performance on transitive reasoning problems by children: Its implications for animal performance. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 49B, 231-244.
Fernyhough, C. and Russell, J. (1997) Distinguishing one's own voice from those of others: A function for private speech? International Journal of Behavioural Development., 20, 651-665.
McCormack, T. and Russell, J. (1997) The development of recency and frequency memory: Is there a developmental shift from reliance on trace-strength to episodic recall? Journal of Experimental Child Psychology. 56, 22-45.
Russell, J., and Jarrold, C. ( 1998) Error-correction problems in autism: Evidence for a monitoring impairment? Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders. 28, 45-61.
Russell, J., Jarrold, C. and Hood, B. (1999) Two intact executive capacities in children with autism: Implications for the core executive dysfunctions in the disorder. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 29, 103-112.
Russell, J., Saltmarsh, R. and Hill, E. (1999) What do executive factors contribute to the failure on the false belief task by children with autism? Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry. 40,859-868.
Russell, J. and Jarrold, C. (1999) Memory for actions in children with autism: Self versus other. Cognitive Neuropsychiatry. 4, 301-331.
Bíró, S. and Russell, J. (2001) The role of arbitrary procedures in means- end behaviour in autism. Development and Psychopathology , 13, 96-108.
Russell, J. and Hill, E. J. (2001) Action-monitoring and intention reporting in children with autism. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry. 42, 317-328.
Hala, S. M. and Russell, J. (2001) Executive control within strategic deception: A window on early cognitive development. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 80, 112-141.
Russell, J., Hill, E. J & Franco, F. (2001) The role of belief veracity in understanding intentions–in-action: Preschool children’s performance on the Transparent Intentions Task. Cognitive Development. 16, 775-792
Russell, J., Hala, S,.M. & Hill, E.J. (2003) The automated windows task: Performance of preschool children, children with autism, and children with moderate learning difficulties. Cognitive Development. 18, 111-137.
Russell, J. & Thompson, D. (2003) Memory development in the second year: For events or locations? Cognition,87, B97-B105.
Thompson, D. & Russell, J. (2004). The 'ghost condition': imitation versus emulation in toddlers' observational learning. Developmental Psychology, 40, 882-889.[pdf]
Russell, J. (2005) Justifying all the fuss about false belief. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 8,307-309. [pdf]
Russell, J. and Danish, D. ( in press) The role of 'action effects' and perceived agency in infant imitation. Cognitive Development.[pdf]
Russell, J. (forthcoming 2007) Controlling core knowledge: conditions for the ascription of intentional states to self and others by children. Synthêse. 159, 167-196. [pdf]
Klossek, U. M. H., Russell, J. and Dickinson, A. (2008) The control of instrumental action following outcome devaluation in young children aged between 1 and 4 years. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General [pdf]
Clayton, N. S, & Russell, J. (2009) Looking for episodic memory in animals and young children: Prospects for a new minimalism. Neuropsychologia, 47, 2330-2340. [pdf]
Russell, J., Alexis, D., & Clayton, N. (2010) Episodic future thinking in 3- to 5-year-old children: The ability to think of what will be needed from a different point of view. Cognition, 114, 56-71. [pdf]
Russell, J. and Hanna, R. (2012) A minimalist approach to the development of episodic memory. Mind and Language, 27, (1) 29-54.[pdf]
Russell, J, Cheke, L, Clayton, N. & Meltzoff, A. N. (2011) What can What-When- Where (WWW) binding tasks tell us about young children's episodic foresight? Theory and two experiments? Cognitive Development, 26, 356-370.[pdf]
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