Personal website: www.andywills.info

Research interests:

My principal interest is the categorization of visual objects. This interest has also led me to work on the role of errors and attention in learning more generally. By some metrics, I'm in the top 1% of my field worldwide (the methodology for this calculation can be found here).

Most recently, I have been working on human-centred AI - an emerging field at the intersection of AI and psychology. 

I'm also a strong advocate for open science, and the maintainer of a number of R packages, including catlearn (an open repository of learning and categorization models, with over 43,000 downloads to date).

Academic background

I became interested in artificial intelligence through an early interest in computers (I was paid for my first computer program at age 12). I studied psychology as an undergraduate (Southampton, 1990 - 1993) because of a (still-held) belief that psychology can inform the design of intelligent systems. A continuing interest in neural networks led to me studying for a Ph.D. with computational learning theorist Ian McLaren (Cambridge, 1994 - 1998). I continued my Ph.D. research as a Junior Research Fellow (Emmanuel College, Cambridge, 1998 - 2000).

Keen to secure a permanent position, and interested in teaching as well as research, I moved to Exeter University, where I became a lecturer (2000), senior lecturer (2005), and then associate professor (2006). In 2012, I moved to Plymouth as a full professor.

2023: Lenard Dome

2019: Angus Inskter

2017: Charlotte Edmunds

2014: Henrietta Roberts

2014: Fayme Yeates

2006: Fraser Milton

2005: Alice Welham

2004: Kazuhiro Goto

Research methods, cognitive psychology and neuroscience.

I'm the lead author of the Creative Commons teaching materials Research Methods in R.