Suilin Lavelle
Senior Lecturer
- Philosophy
- School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences
Contact details
- Tel: 0131 650 3651
- Email: j.s.lavelle@ed.ac.uk
- Web: www.suilinlavelle.co.uk
Address
- Street
-
Room 7.11
- City
- 40 George Square, Edinburgh
- Post code
- EH8 9JX
Availability
My working days are Monday - Wednesday (9am - 5pm) and Fridays (9am - 5pm).
My office hours are by appointment. Please do not feel you need a 'problem' to come to office hours, I am always happy to chat about philosophy or your studies more generally.
Background
Suilin joined the department in Spring 2011, having completed a PhD at the University of Sheffield. Her primary interest is the field of social cognition, and more specifically, in the various answers given to the question 'How do we understand other people's psychological states?' She defends a 'theory-theory' answer to this question, maintaining that the cognitive processes which facilitate our grasp of our own mental states and those of others are best understood as being theory-like. Her research is strongly inter-disciplinary, drawing on research in psychology, neuroscience, animal behaviour and anthropology.
Suilin is also interested in the nature of the cognitive mechanisms underlying joint attention, and believes that developing a clearer understanding of these mechanisms will enable us to have a more comprehensive grasp of social phenomena such as pedagogy and altruism.
Representative publications
- Cross cultural considerations in social cognition. In J. Kiverstein (Ed.) The Routledge Handbook of the Social Mind. 2016
- Is a modular cognitive architecture compatible with the direct perception of mental states?. Consciousness and cognition, 36, 2015.
- Contrastive Explanation and the Many Absences Problem (first author; co-authored with George Botterill and Suzanne Lock). Synthese, online first™ 2012. DOI 10.1007/s11229-012-0205-9
- Two challenges to Hutto's account of pre-linguistic social cognition. Philosophia, online first™ 2011. DOI 10.1007/s11406-011-9356-z
- Theory-theory and the direct perception of mental states. Review of Philosophy and Psychology, online first™ 2012. DOI 10.1007/s13164-012-0094-3
Activities and awards
Misc
Chatting with Mark Dance on 'The Headspace' radio show about mirror neurons.
Responsibilities & affiliations
- Programme Director, Epistemology, Ethics and Mind MSc
- School online learning development leader
Undergraduate teaching
Philosophy of Mind and Cognitive Science (MSc)
- Advanced Philosophy of Mind and Cognitive Science (MSc)
- Introduction to Philosophical Methodology (MSc)
- Philosophy of Science (MSc)
- Philosophy of Science 1 (Pre-hons)
Postgraduate teaching
Social Cognition (MA)
previous
- Philosophical Issues in Evolution (MA)
- Philosophy of Psychology (MA)
- Metaphysics of Mind (MA)
Open to PhD supervision enquiries?
Yes
Current PhD students supervised
Past PhD students supervised
Olle Blomberg
Ashleigh Watson
Joseph Dewhurst
Research summary
Philosophy of psychology, philosophy of mind, cognitive science, moral psychology, philosophy of science,