Previous experiences
Hear from some students who have previously taken part in the Junior Research Associate scheme in the Informatics Department.
Alexander Jeffery, BSc Computer Science:-
“I'm implementing an interpreted programming language that shifts to and from just-in-time compilation dynamically according to a cost-benefit analysis. If the interpreter decides that a part of the program 'hot code', it will compile that part of the program and jump to the compiled code. When the hot code finishes, control returns to the interpreter.
I've found the project enjoyable and interesting, it has greatly challenged and sharpened my ability as a programmer and has given me an opportunity to learn to use new programming tools.”
Georgina Ralph, BSc Psychology:-
“For my JRA project I am working within the Sackler Centre for Consciousness Science, investigating whether non-synaesthetes show a Stroop-effect for certain letter-colour associations. The Stroop-task was originally performed using colour words either presented in their colour or a different colour; participants are quicker to name the colour of the word if it matches the word meaning (e.g. the word Red displayed in Red) compared to if they have to name a colour when they do not match (e.g. the word Red displayed in Green). Our research uses a variant of this Stroop-task to test whether non-synaesthetes are faster to respond when letters are displayed in the colour most commonly associated with them (e.g. A=Red, D=Brown) compared to if they do not match. It has already been found that people in the general population have certain non-random letter-colour associations, similar to those in grapheme-colour synaesthesia. This research will examine these associations further, investigating whether they are automatic and therefore show congruency-based reaction time differences on this Stroop-like task.
I have found the project to be interesting and beneficial on so many levels. Experiencing the research process first-hand has been more valuable than I can put into words. I now have a realistic idea of what it is like to carry out research, the highs and lows included! It is not just the research I have been working on that has benefited my understanding, but also working in a lab with the amazing researchers here has opened my eyes to so many different ideas and techniques. The JRA scheme has definitely been a high point of my University experience so far!”
Milan Gritta, BSc Computer Science:-
"I'm involved in building a software tool for social scientists which will help them analyse and understand the huge amount of data available through Twitter status messages. I'm responsible for extracting the location of the Twitter user based on their profile information as well as some minor additions to the software.
I have learnt more than I thought I was capable of absorbing to be honest, it's been a great experience, very stimulating and enlightening. I'm really pleased I was selected to take part in the scheme."
Thomas Kober, BSc Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence:-
“I am working on a Language Engineering project which aims to automatically classify tweets into different categories (ie. relevant to a certain topic, not relevant; positive towards a certain topic, negative; etc). This is achieved through an Active Learning process, where a human annotator guides a machine learning algorithm on how to classify a set tweets.
The current machine learning algorithm is a Naive Bayes classifier and my tasks were to a) improve the classification performance (accuracy) of the Naive Bayes classifier by incorporating wordlists of ie. positive and negative words and b) implement and evaluate the performance of a Maximum Entropy classifier on the same tasks.
I am enjoying my JRA in the lab a lot, I'm getting a lot of useful feedback on my work and the internship gives me lots of insights on how different parts of my degree fit together and how I can apply the methodologies I have learnt and skills I have gained in actual research projects.”