Alex Griffin is a PhD student (2024-2028) funded by the De Pass Studentship within the ReSpect Lab. Supervised by Professor Francesca Happé and Professor Emily Simonoff, Alex works closely with fellow PhD student Oliver Lack to study the cognitive underpinnings of the Pathological Demand Avoidance (PDA) behaviour profile.

Alex’s research primarily concerns better understanding the underlying cognitive traits associated with PDA. They intend to use both qualitative and quantitative methods to understand how PDA is conceptualised by both clinicians and people with lived experience, with the eventual aim of creating a screening tool. Themselves autistic, Alex is committed to involving those with lived experience in their work and sharing that work with communities that could benefit from it.

Alex holds a BSc in Psychology from the University of Warwick (2017-2021) and an MSc in Cognitive Neuroscience from University College London (2021-2022) – they have also spent time at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam during a study abroad programme. Alex has previously worked as a research assistant in the Blakemore Lab, University of Cambridge (2022-2024), focussing on a project looking at social cognition in adolescents with Type I diabetics.

Research interests

• Autism
• Cognitive Neuroscience
• Pathological Demand Avoidance