Rate My Professor Caroline Richards

Professor Caroline Richards holds the position of Professor of Neurodevelopmental Conditions in the School of Psychology at the University of Birmingham, where she also serves as Deputy Head of Education. She earned her BSc (Hons) in Psychology from the University of Birmingham in 2007, followed by a PhD in Psychology in 2012 under the supervision of Professor Chris Oliver, and a ClinPsyD in 2015, both from the same institution. Beginning her clinical training as a Clinical Psychologist at the University of Birmingham in 2010, she commenced a post-doctoral fellowship at the Cerebra Centre for Neurodevelopmental Disorders in 2015, where she led research on sleep problems in children with rare genetic syndromes. In June 2017, she joined the University of Birmingham as a Lecturer in Neurodevelopmental Disorders, advancing to Senior Lecturer in 2020.

Professor Richards' research specializations centre on mitigating negative clinical outcomes in individuals with neurodevelopmental disorders, encompassing self-injury, sleep disturbances, and social development in autism spectrum disorders and rare genetic syndromes, including Angelman syndrome, Smith-Magenis syndrome, Tuberous Sclerosis Complex, and Phelan-McDermid syndrome, as well as in children born preterm. Her methodological approaches include experimental, epidemiological, single-case, and meta-analytic techniques. Notable publications comprise Richards et al. (2015) 'Prevalence of autism spectrum disorder phenomenology in genetic disorders: a systematic review and meta-analysis' in The Lancet Psychiatry; Richards et al. (2012) 'Self-injurious behaviour in individuals with autism spectrum disorder and intellectual disability' in the Journal of Intellectual Disability Research; Oliver and Richards (2015) 'Practitioner Review: Self-injurious behaviour in children with developmental delay' in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry; and Agar et al. (2021) 'Sleep disorders in rare genetic syndromes: a meta-analysis of prevalence and profile' in Molecular Autism. She holds the role of Associate Editor for Research in Developmental Disabilities and serves as Secretary for the Autism Spectrum Disorder Special Interest Research Group of the International Association for the Scientific Study of Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities. Additionally, she leads the module 'Atypical development and early intervention' and supervises PhD and ClinPsyD candidates. Her research has attracted grants from the Economic and Social Research Council, Shionogi B.V., the Baily Thomas Charitable Fund, and Cerebra.