Key publications
Dr Kirsten Abbot-Smith's main current research interest concerns how typically-developing and autistic children learn pragmatics; that is, how language is used and interpreted in a contextually appropriate manner for the purpose of social interaction. Her main focus is on how children learn to hold a back-and-forth conversation in an appropriate manner. She is also interested in developing interventions and classroom-based strategies to help children improve their conversational ability. Another research interest is how children learn to tailor their language for specific conversation partners (referential communication).
In 2022-2023, Kirsten is module convenor for:
In 2022-2023 Kirsten is teaching on:
Kirsten has grant funding to fully fund (fees and living allowance) a three-year PhD studentship as part of a project entitled 'The cognitive constraints on children's manage a conversation topic".
This studentship is suitable for applicants who have or will completed a Master’s degree or equivalent to high merit or distinction level in either Psychology, Psycholinguistics, Cognitive Science or Human Communication Sciences by September 2023.
The studentship will primarily focus on how children manage topic-switching and task-switching and how this relates to behaviours commonly classed in the category of ‘Repetitive Behaviours and Restricted Interests’ (RRBIs). Please email for further information.
Current PhD students:
First supervisor
Second supervisor
Oct 2021 – Jan 2026 | K Abbot-Smith (PI), S Leekam (CI), M Forrester (CI) and D Matthews (CI)Leverhulme Trust The cognitive constraints on children’s ability to manage a conversation topic | £328, 544 |
Jan – July 2021 | K Abbot-Smith "Teaching teachers to teach conversation" HSS Division Seed Fund | £3000 |
Sept 2020 – Aug 2022 | K Abbot-Smith (PI), M Forrester (CI) and D Matthews (CI) British Academy Impact of speech rate and cognitive load on children’s conversational ability | £9,954 |
Jan 2019 – Jan 2021 | K Abbot-Smith Psychology Seed Fund (Match Funding) Factors associated with the quality of conversation skills in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder | £1,928 |
Jan 2019 – Jan 2021 | K Abbot-Smith Kent Health Strategic Research Development Fund Factors associated with the quality of conversation skills in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder | £2,908 |
Jul 2017 - Jul 2018 | K Abbot-Smith, D Williams (CI) University of Kent Social Sciences Faculty Research Fund What enables children to have good conversation skills? | £4,787.60 |
Dec 2014 - Dec 2015 | K Abbot-Smith, D Williams (CI)University of Kent Social Sciences Faculty Research Fund The role of social shared experience in how typically-developing children and children with ASD interpret linguistic requests | £4,986 |
2013-2016 | K Abbot-Smith, C Floccia (PI), A Cattani (Plymouth), J Goslin (Plymouth), L White (Plymouth), K Plunkett (Oxford), C Rowland (Liverpool), A Krott (Birmingham), D Mills (Bangor) ESRC (via University of Plymouth) Lexicon development in bilingual toddlers | £3,416 |
2011 | K Abbot-Smith University of Kent Social Sciences Faculty Research Fund Relative action salience: when three-year-olds can and can’t learn words for actions | £1,000 |
2011 | K Abbot-Smith British Academy Grant to attend the 12th International Congress for the Study of Child Language | £500 |
2010-12 | K Abbot-Smith, C Rowland, J Pine ESRC The role of the agent in sentence comprehension by preschool children | £98,554 |
2010 | K Abbot-Smith Nufflield Foundation Do children find it easier to learn verb meanings for ‘prototypically’ causative events? | £7,461 |
2007-09 | K Abbot-Smith British Academy Small Grant Interpretation of basic word order in Italian pre-school children | £7,310 |