Leeds Beckett University - City Campus,
Woodhouse Lane,
LS1 3HE
Dr Kata Pauly-Takacs
Senior Lecturer
Kata is a cognitive neuropsychologist specialising in human memory. She obtained her doctorate from the University of Leeds in 2012 and joined Leeds Beckett University in 2013.
Kata's PhD thesis focused on how childhood brain tumours and subsequent treatment affect developing memory systems and how specific cognitive rehabilitation techniques and tools might be used in this special population. In relation to this, she was involved in pioneering research exploring the efficacy of SenseCam, a novel memory rehabilitation device. Overall, Kata's doctoral work has implications for effective clinical assessment following childhood-acquired brain injury as well as cognitive rehabilitation in this special population.
Current Teaching
Kata teaches across different courses of our university and has particular expertise in teaching cognitive psychology and cognitive neuropsychology. Current taught modules include:
- Cognitive Psychology (Level 5, BSc Psychology)
- Language and Cognition (Level 5 and 7, BSc/MSc Speech and Language Therapy)
- Cognitive Psychology (Level 7, MSc Psychology Conversion)
She also supervises BSc, MSc and PhD projects within the domain of human memory.
Research Interests
Kata’s primary focus of research considers how memory and the subjective experience of remembering is affected following brain injury across the lifespan. She often adopts the single-case approach of neuropsychology to better understand the functional architecture of the human memory system as well as to appreciate psychological distress caused by idiosyncratic memory failures.
Kata is also interested in human memory more broadly. For example, considering the relationship between memory and associated cognitions such as creativity and future thinking.
Currently supervised PhD projects:
- Sarah Martin: Characterising memory loss in autoimmune limbic encephalitis (Director of Studies)
- Sophie Cawkwell: Investigating the interplay of interoception, memory and emotion regulation across the lifespan (Supervisor)
