All Posts By

Kirstin Purves

Reflecting on resilience: Part 1

By | Life Scientific

In the first of a pair of blogs, Dr Kirstin Purves reflects on resilience from the perspective of an early career researcher. Next up will be the sister blog where Prof Thalia Eley will answer the same questions from the perspective of a senior academic.            What…

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A winter tale

By | The Wider World

I have always been a fan of the Christmas ghost story. I think more so since moving to the northern hemisphere. Whether or not you celebrate Christmas, the dark nights draw in, and we get more of those chilly days with that strange pale light that never really blooms into…

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Genetic discovery in depression

By | Mythbusters

The last few years have seen an incredible increase in the discovery of genetic variants associated with depression. In this Mythbusters blog, Kirstin [EDIT Lab PhD student] and Joni [SGDP Postdoc] describe this recent progress, and explain why there isn’t just a single gene for depression.

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I is for Individual Differences

By | A-Z

If we start this blog post with the statement that “people differ from each other”, you will probably snort with derision thinking of snowflakes and popular cheesy quotes about being unique like everyone else, but it is true. People do differ and in so many ways. This week Elena and…

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H is for Heritability

By | A-Z

Heritability is the proportion of variation in a given population that is due to genetic differences. If a trait is highly heritable, it is more likely to be shared between individuals of close genetic relatedness, regardless of whether they share the same environment. This concept can be difficult to wrap…

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F for Fear

By | A-Z

Fear is an emotional response vital for our survival. However, overwhelming fear can lead to excessive avoidance of situations that are not actually dangerous, causing distress and impairing daily functioning. Here, we give an overview of fear, explaining when it becomes pathological and how it can be studied experimentally.

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