PDF (PhD Thesis Susan Chipchase) - Nottingham eTheses ...

Acknowledgements
Completing the research in this PhD and writing this thesis has been the
most challenging and rewarding experience of my academic life. There are
several people whom I wish to thank for their help and support throughout the
three years in which I completed my PhD. Firstly, thank you to Dr Peter
Chapman who supervised my work throughout this lengthy process and whose
guidance and support helped me successfully develop a disjointed collection of
ideas into a cohesive programme of research.
Thank you to the School of Psychology, University of Nottingham for
providing the resources which enabled me to conduct this research. Thank you
to Dr Richard Tunney and Dr David Clarke for providing feedback on the first
two years of my PhD work and asking challenging questions in my progression
vivas which helped prepare me for the final viva voce. Thank you to members
of the Cognition and Language Research Group for providing support on the
technicalities of eye-tracking and listened supportively to several presentations
on my work in progress.
Thank you to Dr Dana Samson and Dr Dinkar Sharma for examining
my PhD, making the viva voce an enjoyable experience and for providing me
with insightful and constructive comments on how to successfully publish and
continue the research in this thesis.
Finally, thank you to my family for supporting me and enduring the
stress and challenges of life with a PhD student. Thank you to Otto for his
bounding enthusiasm for the simple joys in life which was renewed afresh each
morning and was often the kick-start needed on mornings when my confidence