You probably already know that the school of psychology has two dedicated technicians, Dan Hyndman and Martha Casey, who are here to provide research and technical support to all members of the school. But you might not have heard of us if you’ve only recently joined the school, and even if you’ve been here a while, you might not be aware of the services we offer.

Overall, we provide technical support to faculty, postgrads and undergrads. This covers all kinds of areas, from software training to archiving data, building web surveys to budgeting and general troubleshooting. We are involved with sourcing, setting up and maintaining lab equipment, and we provide training in using it. We can turn VHS data digital, lend you a dictaphone or a video camera, help you b
uild your experiment in Photoshop or Dreamweaver, or help you back up your data. We also liaise with ITS, who cover desktop IT support, and assist them in their program of rolling out new PCs.

Day-to-day we spend a lot of time providing fast, on-the-spot support for anyone who arrives at our office with an emergency. And when we’re not reacting to the latest challenges, we can often be found seeking out new kinds of useful software and getting to grips with it, so that we can support people who are planning to use it. We are both part of ATSIP, an association of psychology technical staff from many UK institutions, which enables us to keep on top of the ever-changing series of challenges in the field.

In addition, we each cover our own specialist areas. For instance, Dan keeps track of our inventory, keeping a careful eye on the condition of equipment and working hard to replace it as necessary. Meanwhile, Martha runs Sona, our system for managing experimental bookings and student course credits. She’s also the person to approach if you need help finding an appropriate lab in which to carry out your research.

You can also come to us if you have questions about printing conference posters, connecting to the main printers, setting up an online questionnaire, or borrowing equipment. There’s no such thing as an average day for a psychology technician, so we can usually advise on most technical matters – and if we can’t help, we should be able to point you in the direction of someone who can.