Julia's broad research interests are around the development of children and young people and factors associated with either achieving, or underachieving relative to their potential at school. Factors of particular interest are social and emotional wellbeing, mental health, and the facilitators / barriers to learning at school.

Julia is an Assistant Professor in the Centre for Educational Development, Appraisal and Research (CEDAR). Her expertise includes child and adolescent education and mental health research both in developing and evaluating interventions including large-scale RCTs. Julia has direct experience in working on projects focused on antibullying and wellbeing whole-school approach programmes for primary school pupils from England and Wales, and bullying, wellbeing and the use of virtual reality in secondary school pupils in England. She has worked on RCTs and small-scale projects with Looked After Children, vulnerable children and young people who have been in trouble with the Police. She has also designed and published educational measures for assessing academic potential to support attainment and has published two children's storybooks designed to subtly support the acquisition of complex grammar.