Insider Insights: Professor Anna Wilkinson

So I’ve asked for the help of Professor Anna Wilkinson, an animal lover and researcher, to talk to us about the importance of using animal models in advancing research, the care entailed in involving animals, and more.

• Could you tell us when you first discovered in your time as a student how much animals have helped in building the very same theories you were studying in psychology?

• What can animal models say about the human mind? What can’t it say?
  This is an additional video, hosted on YouTube.

• You work mainly on reptiles, which are not the typical species used in psychological research. What is the contribution of cold-blooded vertebrates in psychology today?
  This is an additional video, hosted on YouTube.

• Can you tell us something about how you develop adequate procedures to study reptiles?

• How do you proceed when you see that a novel procedure is ineffective?

• Don’t you think there is a paradox in this field? The more we discover about an animal, in terms of cognitive abilities, the more legal restrictions we obtain for studying that species (as the species appears to be more similar to humans in terms of higher cognitive processes). Thoughts on this?

• Last but not the least: any tips for a student approaching animal psychology for the very first time?