Overview

I work on hallucinations, delusions, psychosis, psychological trauma, brain injury, and the nature of illness and wellbeing. I also have a general interest in perception, action and emotion as viewed from predictive processing and embodied perspectives, and especially in the way that the mind harnesses social and cultural context to enhance and shape cognition.

My office is Byrne House FF12, and my Office Hours are Thursdays at 1pm and Fridays at 2pm.

Back to top

Research

My main research interests lie in philosophy of psychiatry and cognitive science. More specifically, I work on hallucinations, delusions, psychosis, trauma, and the nature of mental illness and wellbeing. I also have a general interest in perception, action and emotion as viewed from predictive processing and embodied perspectives, and especially in the way that the mind harnesses social and cultural context to enhance and shape cognition.

Back to top

Supervision

 Please email me if you are interested in doing a PhD (or MA by Research) in the following areas:

• Philosophy of psychiatry - especially on psychosis, delusions, voice hearing, depression, or on the nature of mental illness in general;
• Philosophy of cognitive science - especially on the nature of explanation in the cognitive sciences, or anything related to predictive processing and Bayesian approaches to cognition.

Back to top

Publications

_{Copyright Notice: Any articles made available for download are for personal use only. Any other use requires prior permission of the author and the copyright holder.}

| 2024 | 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2020 | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013 |

2024

• Wilkinson S. (2024) Mental patient—Psychiatric ethics from a patient's perspective By Abigail Gosselin, Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. 2022. 308pp. $45.00 (Paperback), ISBN: 9780262544313, Bioethics, DOI:10.1111/bioe.13309.
• Chesterfield A, Harvey J, Hendrie C, Wilkinson S, Vera San Juan N, Bell V. (2024) Meaning and role of functional-organic distinction: a study of clinicians in psychiatry and neurology services, Med Humanit, volume 50, no. 1, pages 170-178, DOI:10.1136/medhum-2023-012667. [PDF]

2023

• Russell G, Wilkinson S. (2023) Co-opting the “neuro” in neurodiversity and the complexities of epistemic injustice, Cortex, volume 169, pages 1-4, DOI:10.1016/j.cortex.2023.09.002. [PDF]
• Chesterfield A, Harvey J, Hendrie C, Wilkinson S, San Juan NV, Bell V. (2023) The meaning and role of the functional-organic distinction: a study of clinicians in psychiatry and neurology services, DOI:10.1101/2023.03.29.23287901. [PDF]
• Rappe S, Wilkinson S. (2023) Counterfactual cognition and psychosis: adding complexity to predictive processing accounts, PHILOSOPHICAL PSYCHOLOGY, volume 36, no. 2, pages 356-379, DOI:10.1080/09515089.2022.2054789. [PDF]

2022

• Wilkinson S. (2022) Psychiatric fictionalism, Mental Fictionalism: Philosophical Explorations, 235-252, DOI:10.4324/9781003091073-16.
• Wilkinson S. (2022) Psychiatric fictionalism and narratives of responsibility, Philosophical Explorations, volume 26, no. 1, pages 91-109, DOI:10.1080/13869795.2022.2116473. [PDF]
• Wilkinson S, Green H, Hare S, Houlders J, Humpston C, Alderson-Day B. (2022) Thinking about hallucinations: why philosophy matters, COGNITIVE NEUROPSYCHIATRY, volume 27, no. 2-3, pages 219-235, DOI:10.1080/13546805.2021.2007067. [PDF]

2021

• Deamer F, Wilkinson S. (2021) Metaphorical Thinking and Delusions in Psychosis, Language, Cognition, and Mind, 119-130, DOI:10.1007/978-3-030-71434-5_6.
• Wilkinson S. (2021) What Can Predictive Processing Tell Us about the Content of Perceptual Experience?, Purpose and Procedure in Philosophy of Perception, Oxford University Press, DOI:10.1093/oso/9780198853534.003.0009.
• Bell V, Raihani N, Wilkinson S. (2021) Derationalizing Delusions, Clinical Psychological Science, volume 9, no. 1, pages 24-37, DOI:10.1177/2167702620951553.

2020

• Bell V, Wilkinson S, Greco M, Hendrie C, Mills B, Deeley Q. (2020) What is the Functional / Organic Distinction Actually Doing in Psychiatry and Neurology?, DOI:10.31234/osf.io/bwa6m.
• Deane G, Miller M, Wilkinson S. (2020) Losing Ourselves: Active Inference, Depersonalization, and Meditation, Frontiers in Psychology, volume 11, DOI:10.3389/fpsyg.2020.539726. [PDF]
• Jones M, Wilkinson S. (2020) From Prediction to Imagination, The Cambridge Handbook of the Imagination.
• Bell V, Wilkinson S, Greco M, Hendrie C, Mills B, Deeley Q. (2020) What is the functional/organic distinction actually doing in psychiatry and neurology?, Wellcome Open Res, volume 5, DOI:10.12688/wellcomeopenres.16022.1. [PDF]
• Wilkinson S. (2020) Correction to: Distinguishing volumetric content from perceptual presence within a predictive processing framework (Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences, (2020), 19, 4, (791-800), 10.1007/s11097-019-09632-7), Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences, volume 19, no. 4, DOI:10.1007/s11097-019-09638-1.

2019

• Bell V, Raihani N, Wilkinson S. (2019) De-Rationalising Delusions, DOI:10.31234/osf.io/4p9zs.
• Wilkinson S, Deane G, Nave K, Clark A. (2019) Getting warmer: Predictive processing and the nature of emotion, The Value of Emotions for Knowledge, 101-119, DOI:10.1007/978-3-030-15667-1_5.
• Larøi F, Thomas N, Aleman A, Fernyhough C, Wilkinson S, Deamer F, McCarthy-Jones S. (2019) The ice in voices: Understanding negative content in auditory-verbal hallucinations, Clinical Psychology Review, volume 67, pages 1-10, DOI:10.1016/j.cpr.2018.11.001.
• Wilkinson S. (2019) Hearing Soundless Voices, Philosophy, Psychiatry and Psychology, volume 26, pages E-27-E-34, DOI:10.1353/ppp.2019.0028.

2018

• Alderson-Day B, Mitrenga K, Wilkinson S, McCarthy-Jones S, Fernyhough C. (2018) The varieties of inner speech questionnaire – Revised (VISQ-R): Replicating and refining links between inner speech and psychopathology, Consciousness and Cognition, volume 65, pages 48-58, DOI:10.1016/j.concog.2018.07.001.
• Bell V, Marshall C, Kanji Z, Wilkinson S, Halligan P, Deeley Q. (2018) Uncovering Capgras delusion using a large-scale medical records database, BJPsych Open, volume 3, no. 4, pages 179-185, DOI:10.1192/bjpo.bp.117.005041. [PDF]

2017

• Bell V, Mills KL, Modinos G, Wilkinson S. (2017) Rethinking Social Cognition in Light of Psychosis: Reciprocal Implications for Cognition and Psychopathology, Clinical Psychological Science, volume 5, no. 3, pages 537-550, DOI:10.1177/2167702616677079.
• Woods A, Wilkinson S. (2017) Appraising appraisals: role of belief in psychotic experiences, The Lancet Psychiatry, volume 4, no. 12, pages 891-892, DOI:10.1016/s2215-0366(17)30434-0. [PDF]
• Bell V, Mills KL, Modinos G, Wilkinson S. (2017) Phenomenology and Social Agent Representation in Psychosis: A Welcome Integration, Clinical Psychological Science, volume 5, no. 5, pages 769-770, DOI:10.1177/2167702617709559. [PDF]
• Wilkinson S, Dodgson G, Meares K. (2017) Predictive Processing and the Varieties of Psychological Trauma, Frontiers in Psychology, volume 8, article no. 1840, DOI:10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01840.

2016

• Wilkinson S. (2016) What gets passed in “Chunk-and-Pass” processing? A predictive processing solution to the Now-or-Never bottleneck, Behavioral and Brain Sciences, volume 39, article no. e90, DOI:10.1017/s0140525x15000941. [PDF]
• Wilkinson S. (2016) Can there be belief without evidence?, Teorema, volume 35, pages 13-34.
• Wilkinson S, Bell V. (2016) The Representation of Agents in Auditory Verbal Hallucinations, Mind & Language, volume 31, no. 1, pages 104-126, DOI:10.1111/mila.12096. [PDF]
• Ratcliffe M, Wilkinson S. (2016) How anxiety induces verbal hallucinations, Consciousness and Cognition, volume 39, pages 48-58, DOI:10.1016/j.concog.2015.11.009. [PDF]

2015

• Wilkinson S. (2015) Dennett’s Personal/Subpersonal Distinction in the Light of Cognitive Neuropsychiatry, Content and Consciousness Revisited, Springer Nature, 111-127, DOI:10.1007/978-3-319-17374-0_6.
• Ratcliffe M, Wilkinson S. (2015) Thought Insertion Clarified, Journal of Consciousness Studies, volume 22, no. 11-12, pages 246-269.
• Wilkinson S. (2015) Forward models and passive psychotic symptoms, Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, volume 9, DOI:10.3389/fnhum.2015.00022. [PDF]
• Deamer F, Wilkinson S. (2015) The speaker behind the voice: therapeutic practice from the perspective of pragmatic theory, Frontiers in Psychology, volume 6, DOI:10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00817. [PDF]
• Smailes D, Moseley P, Wilkinson S. (2015) A commentary on: Affective coding: the emotional dimension of agency, Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, volume 9, DOI:10.3389/fnhum.2015.00142. [PDF]
• Wilkinson S, Alderson-Day B. (2015) Voices and Thoughts in Psychosis: An Introduction, Review of Philosophy and Psychology, volume 7, no. 3, pages 529-540, DOI:10.1007/s13164-015-0288-6. [PDF]
• Wilkinson S. (2015) A Mental Files Approach to Delusional Misidentification, Review of Philosophy and Psychology, volume 7, no. 2, pages 389-404, DOI:10.1007/s13164-015-0260-5. [PDF]

2014

• Moseley P, Wilkinson S. (2014) Inner Speech is not so Simple: A Commentary on Cho and Wu (2013), Frontiers in Psychiatry, volume 5, DOI:10.3389/fpsyt.2014.00042. [PDF]
• Wilkinson S. (2014) Accounting for the phenomenology and varieties of auditory verbal hallucination within a predictive processing framework, Consciousness and Cognition, volume 30, pages 142-155, DOI:10.1016/j.concog.2014.09.002. [PDF]
• Wilkinson S. (2014) Levels and kinds of explanation: lessons from neuropsychiatry, Frontiers in Psychology, volume 5, DOI:10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00373. [PDF]

2013

• Wilkinson S. (2013) Delusions, dreams, and the nature of identification, Philosophical Psychology, volume 28, no. 2, pages 203-226, DOI:10.1080/09515089.2013.830351. [PDF]
• Wilkinson S. (2013) Egocentric and Encyclopedic Doxastic States in Delusions of Misidentification, Review of Philosophy and Psychology, volume 4, no. 2, pages 219-234, DOI:10.1007/s13164-012-0125-0. [PDF]
• Wilkinson S. (2013) Beyond Believing Badly, Teorema, volume 32, pages 105-119.
• Wilkinson S. (2013) The Status of Delusion in the Light of Marcus’s Revisionary Proposals, THEORIA. An International Journal for Theory, History and Foundations of Science, volume 28, no. 3, pages 421-421, DOI:10.1387/theoria.6910. [PDF]

Back to top

Biography

Before joining the department at Exeter in September 2018, I was a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Edinburgh on the ERC-funded project "Expecting Ourselves: Embodied Prediction and the Construction of Conscious Experience" (March 2017 - September 2018). This project sought to understand consciousness in terms of the predictive processing framework.

Before that (August 2013 - March 2017), I was a postdoc on the interdisciplinary Wellcome Trust-funded "Hearing the Voice" project, which examined the phenomenon of hearing voices in a wide variety of contexts (including, importantly, non-clinical contexts).

From September 2009 to May 2013 I worked towards the completion of my PhD at the University of Edinburgh. My thesis was on delusions and the nature and norms of believing. Previously, I got a Masters in Philosophy and Cognitive Science at the Jean Nicod Insititute in Paris, and an undergraduate degree at the University of Oxford.

Back to top