Dr Rachael Miller (Harrison)

Comparative Psychology | Developmental Psychology |

Behavioural Ecology | Conservation Behaviour

I am currently a Visiting Scholar (previously Research Associate 2015-2022) at the Department of Psychology,

University of Cambridge, and an Affiliate (previously Senior Lecturer 2021-2024) at the School of Life Sciences, Anglia Ruskin University, with extensive knowledge & skills in: research (42 publications; h-index: 20; i10-index = 29; citations: 1308) primarily with birds, non-human primates and children; university-level teaching in Biology, Psychology & Zoology (with a PG Cert in Learning & Teaching), academic supervision & mentoring, funding acquisition, national and international collaborations, project management & administration, with expertise in comparative cognition, animal behaviour, welfare & conservation, and child development.

 

My research programme, incorporating fundamental and applied approaches and impacts, includes lead roles in three interconnected areas, with long-term projects, collaborations and funding opportunities: 1) Comparative and Developmental Psychology, 2) Big-Team Open Science, 3) Applications of fundamental research in cognition and behaviour for conservation and welfare impact. I am passionate about investigating the evolutionary and developmental drivers of cognition, including individual differences, decision-making and learning, in birds and humans. For example, I demonstrated corvid and child cognitive flexibility in response to differing social or environmental conditions.

 

I use my skills in research, organisation, leadership and team-work to increase accessibility, transparency, inclusivity and representation of science, to change the narrative from competition to collaboration, and address broad evolutionary questions through Big-Team Science. I co-founded and co-lead the “ManyBirds Project” (www.themanybirds.com) - a large-scale collaborative approach to avian cognition and behaviour research. With 129 collaborators over 23 countries, we tested the evolutionary drivers of neophobia (responses to novelty) across the avian clade in 136 species, 25 orders and 1400+ subjects. I strive to utilise cognitive and behavioural research to enhance animal conservation and welfare efforts, including during reintroduction of threatened species like red-billed chough and Critically Endangered Bali myna. See "Current Projects"  page for more info. ​

 

I advocate Open Science practices, including publishing all data-sets associated with my papers, pre-registering (from Nov 2018) and pre-printing my work.