Key details
Professor Damian Poulter
Associate Head of School in Research & Knowledge Exchange
Professor Damian Poulter is Associate Head of School for Research & Knowledge Exchange in the School of Human Sciences. His research focuses primarily on human perception and performance, particularly in road traffic environments. His research has received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and Medical Research Council (MRC) for projects investigating the crash risk of novice and young drivers. He is currently leading a Road Safety Trust-funded grant on promoting the use of Intelligent Speed Assistance among UK drivers.
Posts held previously:
- 2021 - 2023 Academic Portfolio Lead, School of Human Sciences, University of Greenwich
- 2019 - 2023 Centre Lead, Centre for Thinking & Learning, Institute for Lifecourse Development, University of Greenwich
- 2012 - 2016 Senior Lecturer, Department of Psychology, University of Greenwich
- 2011 - 2012 Lecturer, Department of Psychology, University of Greenwich
- 2008 - 2011 Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Department of Psychology, Royal Holloway, University of London
- 2007 - 2008 Postdoctoral Research Fellow, School of Psychology, University of Nottingham
- 2004 - 2007 Postdoctoral Research Fellow, School of Psychology, University of Reading
Responsibilities within the university
Associate Head of School for Research & Knowledge Exchange, School of Human Sciences
Recognition
- Fellow of the Higher Education (FHEA)
- Chartered Psychologist (CPsychol)
- Member of Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety (PACTS).
Research / Scholarly interests
Damian's research interests are in applied cognitive psychology, particularly in the context of human behaviour in road traffic environments. He has investigated developmental trends in perceptual judgements of vehicle speeds and how children, young adults and older adults detect and gauge the speed of approaching vehicles.
He has acted as primary investigator and co-investigator on UKRI-funded research projects and has collaborated with researchers at the University of Sheffield, King's College, London, Royal Holloway, Erasmus University and the Transport Research Laboratory. He has also worked with a number of other external partners in the road safety community including Transport for London, The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, Thames Valley Safer Roads Partnership, and Thames Valley Police. He also holds an NCRM placement fellowship, acting as an expert advisor to the Department for Transport on a nationwide randomised controlled trial of road safety interventions.
Key funded projects
- Road Safety Trust (RST 440_15_24). e-SAFE (Equity, Social determinants, Anti-social behaviour, Future E-mobility). 2025
- Road Safety Trust (RST 411_100_24). Promoting Intelligent Speed Assistance in Car Showrooms: Preparation for a Randomised Controlled Trial. 2024
- Department for Transport. Drivers' Understanding of Recent Highway Code Changes: A Focus on Hierarchy of Road Users and 'Using the Road' Rules at Junctions. 2024
- Road Safety Trust (RST 235_8_21), "Promoting Intelligent Speed Assistance to Reduce UK Road Traffic Crashes”. 2021
- School of Hard Knocks & University of Greenwich Vice Chancellors Scholarship: “Evaluation of sport mentoring-based interventions for children at risk of low educational attainment, and unemployed adults”. 2019
- Department for Transport. Placement Fellowship: Improving young driver safety – phase 2. 2018
- Economic & Social Research Council / National Centre for Research Methods. “Placement Fellowship: Improving young driver safety”. 2017
- Medical Research Council (MR/N011198/1). “Reducing newly-qualified driver crash risk: Identifying behavioural targets”. 2015.
- Economic and Social Research Council (ES/K004565/1). “Modelling developmental trajectories of novice drivers with high and low crash liability”. 2012
- Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents. “Perceptual judgments by elderly road users when observing vehicle approach”. 2010.