Stephen Langton

Academic Staff

		Dr Stephen Langton
		University of Stirling Stirling FK9 4LA Scotland UK
		Tel: + 44 (0) 1786 467659
		Fax: + 44 (0) 1786 467641
		Email: srhl1@stir.ac.uk
		Web: www.stir.ac.uk

Job Title

Lecturer

Section

Psychology

About

I studied for my first degree in Psychology at the University of Nottingham and then stayed there to study for a PhD, part time, whilst working as a Research Assistant in the Department of Psychology. I moved to Stirling as a Research Fellow in 1995 and have been a Lecturer here since 1998.

Research

My main interest is in face perception and, in particular, the influence that faces exert on the allocation of a viewer's visual attention. For example, research in which I have been involved has suggested that not only are faces able to capture a viewer's attention, but that social attention cues worn by these faces (gaze and head orientation) also produce shifts of a viewer's spatial attention which appear to be reflxive in nature. I am also interested in eye-gaze perception and the development of this ability. I am a member of the Face and Devlopment of Communication research group and the Stirling Developmental Psychology Researchers Group.

Teaching

I co-ordinate the department's Cognition module (PSY9AC) in the Autumn semester and a final year elective in the Spring.

Recent Publications

Burton, A. M., Bindemann, M., Langton, S. R. H., Schweinberger, S. R., & Jenkins, R. (2009). Gaze perception requires focused attention: Evidence from an interference task. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 35, 108-118.
Langton, S. R. H., Law, A. S., Burton, A. M., & Schweinberger, S. R. (2008). Attention capture by faces. Cognition, 107, 330-342.
Bindemann, M., Burton, A. M., & Langton, S. R. H. (2008). How do eye-gaze and facial expression interact? Visual Cognition, 16, 708-733.
Carbon, C. C., Strobach, T., Langton, S. R. H., Harsányi, G., Leder, H., & Kovács, G. (2007). Adaptation effects of highly familiar faces: immediate and long lasting. Memory and Cognition, 35(8), 1966-1976.
Bindemann, M., Burton, A. M., Langton, S. R. H., Schweinberger, S. R., & Doherty, M. J. (2007). The control of attention to faces. Journal of Vision, 7(10):15, 1-8.

Langton, S. R. H., O’Donnell, C., Riby, D. M., & Ballantyne, C. J. (2006). Gaze cues influence the allocation of attention in natural scene viewing. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 59, 2056-2064.
Cooper, R. M., & Langton S. R. H. (2006). Attentional bias to angry faces using the dot-probe task? It depends when you look for it. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 44, 1321-1329.
Langton, S. R. H., Honeyman, H., & Tessler, E. (2004). The influence of head contour and nose angle on the perception of eye-gaze direction. Perception & Psychophysics, 66, 752-771.

Jenkins, J., & Langton, S. R. H. (2003). Configural processing in the perception of eye-gaze direction. Perception 32, 1117-1125.

Kingstone, A., Danziger, S., Langton, S. R. H. & Soto-Faraco, S. (2002). Attentional capture: Biological relevance, multisensory stimulation, and consciousness. Psicológica: International Journal of Methodology and Experimental Psychology. 23, 343-345.

Doherty-Sneddon, G., McAuley, S., Bruce, V., Langton, S., Blokland, A., & Anderson, A. H. (2000). Visual signals and children’s communication: Negative effects on task outcome. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 18, 595-608.

Bruce, V., Campbell, R. N., Doherty-Sneddon, G., Import, A., Langton, S., MacAuley, S., & Wright, R. (2000). Testing face processing skills in children. British Journal of Developmental Psychology. 18, 319-333.

Langton, S. R. H. (2000). The mutual influence of gaze and head orientation in the analysis of social attention direction. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology.53, 825-845.

Langton, S. R. H., & Bruce, V. (2000) You Must See the Point: Automatic Processing of Cues to the Direction of Social Attention. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 26, 747-757.

Langton, S. R. H., Watt, R. J., & Bruce, V. (2000). Do the eyes have it? Cues to the direction of social attention. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 4, 50-59.