Dear Hoover
Please could you post the following announcement on CVnet? Many thanks.
RESEARCH APPOINTMENTS
________________________________________________________________
Department of Psychology University of Essex, England
Applicants with relevant professional qualifications or work experience are
invited to join a team of specialists from psychology, education and
optometry who are investigating the use of coloured overlays and lenses.
The project has already discovered techniques that provide for a 25%
improvement in reading fluency in 5% of children. Full and part-time posts
are available.
=46urther details may be obtained
by telephoning Colchester, England +44 1206 872462 (24 hours), quoting
reference R/277,
by e-mail:
staffing@essex.ac.uk
or by writing to the Personnel Section, University of Essex, Wivenhoe Park,
Colchester CO4 3SQ UK.
Closing date: Monday 16 March 1998.
Applications
There will be appointments available at a variety of positions, depending
on the skills and interests of applicants. We need to develop a
multidisciplinary team which can take the research forward in the fields of
education, neuropsychology, clinical neurology, optometry and orthoptics.
Applicants should have relevant professional qualifications or work
experience in a related area.
Posts are available on a full or part time basis on contracts of up to two
years. Salaries will be at an appropriate level up to =A322,785 per annum
depending upon qualifications and experience. The terms of appointment
relating to research officer appointments are attached.
Informal inquiries should be made to Professor Arnold Wilkins, e-mail:
arnold@essex.ac.uk.
About the project
Summary of findings to date:
Coloured overlays are tinted translucent plastic sheets designed to be
placed upon a page of text. They colour the text beneath with minimal
optical degradation. There is now evidence that such overlays can help
many children to read. Each child needs a colour that has been
individually chosen as suitable.
* The Intuitive Overlays =AE come in 10 different colours. They can be used
singly or in pairs (one overlay superimposed upon another of similar
colour) so as to sample chromaticity systematically, efficiently and
comprehensively.
* When children aged 7-11 are invited to sample the overlays, placing each
in turn over a page of print, about 50% report that one or more of the
colours improves the clarity of the text beneath. When offered a suitable
overlay free of charge, about 30% of children use it for classwork, without
prompting, for upwards of a year.
* The children who use an overlay read more quickly with the overlay, both
before and after experience of its use. The improved fluency can readily
be demonstrated using a new test that emphasises the visual rather than the
linguistic aspects of reading. The test requires the child to read aloud
randomly ordered common words arranged in a paragraph of closely spaced
text (Rate of Reading Test =AE).
* The use of overlays for 3 months leaves children able to read more
quickly, even when they are not using an overlay.
* The improvement in reading speed cannot be attributed to a placebo
effect, a change in motivation, a speed/accuracy trade-off, or conventional
optometric/orthoptic abnormalities.
* It remains unclear whether the use of overlays appreciably affects
scholastic attainment in reading, given that such attainment is a product
of many factors. Nevertheless, 5% of children (23/430) show an improvement
in fluency of more than 25%.
* It is not possible to identify all the children who benefit from overlays
simply on the basis of their symptoms. Some children are unaware of the
symptoms until they experience reading with an appropriate colour.
* Children who benefit from overlays usually find coloured glasses easier
to use, and at least as effective, if not more so. The colour optimal in
glasses is not the same as that optimal in overlays.
=46uture directions
* We are seeking objective correlates of the benefits of coloured filters.
Given the improvements in reading fluency with colour, we propose to
measure eye movements during reading, tracking and scanning.
* Initial studies have shown that colour filters can normalise the visual
evoked potential in some patients. These findings will be followed up.
* Given that text resembles a visual texture to those unfamiliar with its
meaning, an investigation of the effects of colour on texture segregation
would seem promising. Initial studies have shown improvements in texture
segregation.
* Coloured filters appear to reduce symptoms associated with neurological
dysfunction of the visual system. The symptoms occur in a variety of
neurological disorders. We are investigating the therapeutic potential of
filters in migraine and propose to do so in multiple sclerosis and head
injury.
About the University and the Department
The University is situated in Wivenhoe Park on the outskirts of Colchester,
the oldest town in England. The Psychology Department is the newest in
Britain: the first psychology degrees were awarded in 1995. It has rapidly
gained a reputation for excellence in research and was awarded a 4B in the
recent research assessment exercise - an outstanding achievement within 4
years of its foundation and indicative of the international recognition of
research success within the department.
Every room in the Psychology Department is wired with a connection to the
local network, providing access to the library catalogue, mainframe
services and printing facilities. The internet teaching facilities include
a purpose-built undergraduate laboratory with 12 experimental booths, and
equipped with 21 Macintosh LCII and 6 Macintosh PPCs networked to a main
fileserver. This facility is available for running experiments when it is
not in use as a teaching laboratory.
The Visual Perception Laboratory has equipment for presenting visual
stimuli and recording eye movements. It also has a separate optometric
examination room. There are links with the local hospitals and with
schools in neighbouring counties.