Episode 14: The Babylab, children and nature

Senior Lecturer, School of Sport, Rehabilitation and Exercise Sciences, University of Essex

Jo is interested in Green Exercise - the idea that exercising outside uses nature to enhance both physical and mental well being.

Professor of Environment and Society, University of Essex

Department of Psychology, University of Essex

Maria Laura completed her undergraduate and master degrees in Developmental and Educational Psychology at University of Padua, in Italy. She then moved to London to start a PhD (funded by the Marie Curie Early Stage Researcher Fellowship) at the Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck College London, under the supervision of Prof Mark H. Johnson. Here she investigated body perception in newborns and infants.

Maria Laura's first post-doctoral position at Royal Holloway University of London focused on the interaction between interoceptive and exteroceptive body-related signals in the development of body-awareness in infants and adults. In 2016, she moved to University College London to further her expertise on self- and body-awareness across the lifespan, with a specific focus on affective touch.

Maria Laura joined the Department of Psychology of University of Essex in Autumn 2017 as a lecturer.

Department of Psychology, University of Essex

She joined the Department of Psychology at the University of  Essex in September 2013. She completed her BSc and MSc in Developmental and Educational Psychology  at University of Padua, Italy. She then worked with Dr. Teresa Farroni at  the Hospital of Monfalcone (Trieste), Italy, investigating face  perception in newborns. She then moved to London where she obtained a PhD at the Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck  College, supervised by Professor Mark Johnson. She then spent three years  working as a postdoc at the Goldsmiths InfantLab, directed by Dr. Andy  Bremner, investigating the development of the neural basis of tactile localisation.