Profile
Mary Jane Spiller
keep the questions coming!!
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About Me:
I live with my husband and kids in Kent. I work as a psychology lecturer, and love travelling, cooking, and trampolining.
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I have 2 cats called Tia and Maria, and they are crazy old lady cats. I love listening to music and watching TV / movies (huge Marvel fan). I used to love running and going to the gym but now I’m old and lazy. I spend too much time on social media.
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I am a psychology lecturer – this means I spend about 2/3 of my time teaching and supervising students, and about 1/3 of my time doing research.
I teach research methods (lovely statistics!) and also do lectures on perception – so how our senses work, how we can see things with our mind’s eye, what it’s like to lose a sense, and looking at differences in how we perceive the world.
My research focuses on how we perceive the world, and how our senses work with each other to form our perception of the world. I’m really interested in something called synaesthesia, which is when people’s senses join together in some way, so they might see colours when they hear music or have tastes for certain words. And I love doing research looking at mental imagery – how we see things with our mind’s eye.
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My Typical Day:
Emails, meeting students, lecturing, reading, thinking and if I’m lucky collecting data
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I love the fact that no 2 days are ever the same, and other than things like teaching which are timetabled by someone else, I can choose what I want to do and when.
I spend a lot of my time writing emails (to students / colleagues) organising things or providing information. I am currently writing lots of new lectures about our senses so spend a lot of time reading, searching the internet and planning my lectures and preparing powerpoint.
I have regular tutorials with students, and supervision sessions when I help them with their projects. As a psychology student you get to do your own piece of research (which can get published!) and I really enjoy supervising students and seeing them become mini experts in their topic of research.
I tend to do most of my research, where I get participants to take part in my studies, over the summer when I have less teaching and student supervision.
It’s hard to sometimes find enough hours in the day to get it all done, but it’s great fun.
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What I'd do with the prize money:
work with an animator to produce an animation that describes how the brain uses information from all our senses
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Education:
Brimsham Green Secondary School (near Bristol) and University of Bath and University of East London
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Qualifications:
10 GCSEs
A level Sociology, English Lit and French
Degree – BSc (hons) Psychology with Sociology
Doctorate – PhD
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Work History:
Worked at a local bakery / cafe
Worked in retail
Worked as research assistant at Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London before starting PhD.
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My Interview
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How would you describe yourself in 3 words?
inquisitive synaesthete psychologist
What did you want to be after you left school?
journalist
Were you ever in trouble at school?
No always a good girl
Who is your favourite singer or band?
Blur
What's your favourite food?
Pizza – veggie with extra cheese
If you had 3 wishes for yourself what would they be? - be honest!
1) to have a million pounds 2) to be able to fly 3) for my friends and family to have healthy happy lives
Tell us a joke.
What do you call a 3 legged donkey? A wonkey
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