Sarah-Jayne Blakemore FBA FMedSci FRS (born 11 August 1974) is a British neuroscientist who is

Professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other tertiary education, post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin ...

Psychology Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Its subject matter includes the behavior of humans and nonhumans, both consciousness, conscious and Unconscious mind, unconscious phenomena, and mental processes such as thoughts, feel ...

and

Cognitive Neuroscience Cognitive neuroscience is the scientific field that is concerned with the study of the Biology, biological processes and aspects that underlie cognition, with a specific focus on the neural connections in the brain which are involved in mental ...

at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

Education

Blakemore was born in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a List of cities in the United Kingdom, city and non-metropolitan district in the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It is the county town of Cambridgeshire and is located on the River Cam, north of London. As of the 2021 Unit ...

and educated at Oxford High School and the

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...

where she was an undergraduate student at St John's College. She graduated with a Congratulatory First

Bachelor of Arts A Bachelor of Arts (abbreviated B.A., BA, A.B. or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is the holder of a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the liberal arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts deg ...

degree in

experimental psychology Experimental psychology is the work done by those who apply Experiment, experimental methods to psychological study and the underlying processes. Experimental psychologists employ Research participant, human participants and Animal testing, anim ...

in 1996. She completed postgraduate study at

University College London University College London (Trade name, branded as UCL) is a Public university, public research university in London, England. It is a Member institutions of the University of London, member institution of the Federal university, federal Uni ...

where she was awarded a

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

in 2000 for research co-supervised by Daniel Wolpert and Chris Frith. During her PhD, she was a POST Fellow at the

UK Parliament The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, and may also legislate for the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of ...

Research and career

After her PhD, she was appointed an international

postdoctoral research A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). Postdocs most commonly, but not always, have a temporary acade ...

fellow from 2001 to 2003 to work in Lyon, France, with Jean Decety on the perception of causality in the human brain. This was followed by a

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

Dorothy Hodgkin Dorothy Mary Crowfoot Hodgkin (née Crowfoot; 12 May 1910 – 29 July 1994) was a Nobel Prize-winning English chemist who advanced the technique of X-ray crystallography to determine the structure of biomolecules, which became essential for ...

Fellowship (2004–2007) and then a Royal Society University Research Fellowship (2007–2013) at UCL. She is actively involved in increasing the

public awareness of science Public awareness of science (PAS) is everything relating to the awareness, attitudes, behaviors, opinions, and activities that comprise the relations between the general public or lay society as a whole to scientific knowledge and organization. ...

, frequently gives public lectures and talks at schools and acted as scientific consultant on the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

series ''The Human Mind'' in 2003. Blakemore has an interest in the links between neuroscience and education and co-wrote a book with Uta Frith on ''The Learning Brain: Lessons for Education''. She co-directed the

Wellcome Trust The Wellcome Trust is a charitable foundation focused on health research based in London, United Kingdom. It was established in 1936 with legacies from the pharmaceutical magnate Henry Wellcome (founder of Burroughs Wellcome, one of the predec ...

four-year PhD programme in Neuroscience at UCL and was founding

editor-in-Chief An editor-in-chief (EIC), also known as lead editor or chief editor, is a publication's editorial leader who has final responsibility for its operations and policies. The editor-in-chief heads all departments of the organization and is held accoun ...

of the journal ''Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience''. Blakemore's research covers the development of social cognition and

decision-making In psychology, decision-making (also spelled decision making and decisionmaking) is regarded as the Cognition, cognitive process resulting in the selection of a belief or a course of action among several possible alternative options. It could be ...

during human

adolescence Adolescence () is a transitional stage of human Developmental biology, physical and psychological Human development (biology), development that generally occurs during the period from puberty to adulthood (typically corresponding to the age o ...

. She serves on the

BrainWaves working group for neuroscience and vision committee for

mathematics education In contemporary education, mathematics education—known in Europe as the didactics or pedagogy of mathematics—is the practice of teaching, learning, and carrying out Scholarly method, scholarly research into the transfer of mathematical know ...

and

science education Science education is the teaching and learning of science to school children, college students, or adults within the general public. The field of science education includes work in science content, science process (the scientific method), some ...

Awards and honours

Blakemore was awarded the

's Rosalind Franklin Award in 2013 and the Klaus J. Jacobs Research Prize in 2015. Blakemore held a prestigious Royal Society University Research Fellowship from 2007 to 2013. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where: In March 2015 Blakemore was interviewed by Jim Al-Khalili on

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. The station replaced the BBC Home Service on 30 September 1967 and broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes from the BBC's headquarters at Broadcasti ...

's ''

The Life Scientific ''The Life Scientific'' is a BBC Radio 4 science programme, presented by Jim Al-Khalili, in which each episode is dedicated to the biography and work of a living scientist. The programme consists of an interview between Al-Khalili and the featur ...

''. She was awarded

Humanists UK Humanists UK, known from 1967 until May 2017 as the British Humanist Association (BHA), is a charitable organisation which promotes secular humanism and aims to represent Irreligion in the United Kingdom, non-religious people in the UK throug ...

's Rosalind Franklin lectureship in 2017. In July 2018 Blakemore was elected

Fellow of the British Academy Fellowship of the British Academy (post-nominal letters FBA) is an award granted by the British Academy to leading academics for their distinction in the humanities and social sciences. The categories are: # Fellows – scholars resident in t ...

(FBA). The

British Psychological Society The British Psychological Society (BPS) is a representative body for psychologists and psychology in the United Kingdom. History It was founded on 24 October 1901 at University College London (UCL) as ''The Psychological Society'', the org ...

awarded Blakemore the Presidents' Award for Distinguished Contributions to Psychological Knowledge in August 2018 which provides a lifetime membership to the Society. Blakemore was the winner of the 2018 Royal Society Prize for Science Books for her book ''Inventing Ourselves: The Secret Life of the Teenage Brain''. She won

Suffrage Science award The Suffrage Science award is a prize for women in science, engineering and computing founded in 2011, on the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day by the MRC London Institute of Medical Sciences (LMS). There are three categories of awar ...

in 2011. She was elected a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci) in 2022. She was elected a

Fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the Fellows of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural science, natural knowledge, incl ...

(FRS) in 2024.

Personal life

Blakemore is the daughter of

Colin Blakemore Sir Colin Blakemore (1 June 1944 – 27 June 2022) was a British neurobiologist, specialising in vision and the development of the brain. He was Yeung Kin Man Professor of Neuroscience and senior fellow of the Hong Kong Institute for Advanced S ...

and Andrée Blakemore (née Washbourne). She has two sons. In 2024, she wrote in ''The Times'' about assisted dying and her father's experience with his terminal illness.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Blakemore, Sarah-Jayne 1974 births Living people People educated at Oxford High School, England Academics of University College London Royal Society University Research Fellows Blakemore, S British women scientists Alumni of St John's College, Oxford British neuroscientists British women neuroscientists Fellows of the British Academy Fellows of the Royal Society of Biology Fellows of the Royal Society