BSc, BA (Honours), PhD

First Year Advisor/Lecturer, School of Psychology

Contact details for Dr Michelle Hood

Research expertise

• General Area: Educational and Developmental Psychology

Specific Interests

• Factors in literacy and numeracy development, e.g.,  
  - auditory and visual temporal processing 
  - early home environment and family factors 
  - early home-based literacy interventions
• Academic motivation and achievement, e.g.,
  - effects of different learning goal orientations in the area of literacy and numeracy performance, and, in particular, in performance in statistics courses by university students
  - barriers and enablers to seeking academic help and to succeeding at university

Sample past honours projects

• Attention and perceptual processes in reading
• Family versus peer attachment relationships in facilitating career development
• Parental beliefs in determining literacy practices in the home
• Perceived barriers and enablers and academic motivation in university students
• Loneliness and on-line friendship formation in adolescents and young adults
  

Current teaching areas

• Research Methods and Statistics
• Lifespan Development
• Introductory psychology courses
• Cognitive neuropsychology lectures on reading disability
• First Year Advisor
• Assistance for first year students with issues relating to successful transition and orientation to university and to the psychology program
• Peer mentoring program
• Success in Psychology Program
• Learning About My Profession program
• Individual consultation for first year students who are experiencing difficulties
  

Publications

• Hood, M., Conlon, E., and Andrews, G. (accepted). Pre-school home literacy practices and children’s literacy development: A longitudinal analysis. Journal of Educational Psychology.
• Hood, M., Conlon, E., and Andrews, G. (2006). Active versus passive pre-school home practices and literacy development: A longitudinal comparison. Australian Journal of Psychology, 58 (Supp.), 7.
• Hood, M. (2005).  Can perceptual and cognitive factors explain the relationship between rapid naming speed and reading ability?  Australian Journal of Psychology, 57 (Supp.),    56.
• Hood, M. and Conlon, E. (2004).  Visual and auditory temporal processing and early reading development, Dyslexia, 10, 234 – 252.
• Hood, M. and Conlon, E. (2003).  The role of temporal processing in early reading development. Australian Journal of Psychology, 55 (Supp.), 81.