The Emotional Development, Interventions and Treatment (EDIT) lab is led by Prof Thalia Eley and consists of post doctoral researchers, PhD students, and both undergraduate and masters students. We are based at the SGDP Centre at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, King’s College London. We study genetic and environmental influences on the development and treatment of anxiety and depression. The EDIT lab team members write a blog which covers a range of topics related to our research. Our current series is called ‘mythbusters’ and addresses many common questions and concerns raised by our participants.
Several studies are led from this group. Prof Eley’s most long-standing study is Genesis1219, a twin study of adolescent emotional development. Prof Eley has also recently become Director of the Twins Early Development Study (TEDS) and she and Dr Tom McAdams run the Children of TEDS study (CoTEDS) . We also work very closely with the Translational and Neuropsychiatric Genetics (TNG) group, which is run by Prof Gerome Breen. Profs Eley and Breen jointly lead both the Fear Learning and Anxiety Response study (FLARe) and the Genetic Links to Anxiety and Depression Study (GLAD), which is the world's largest study on depression and anxiety, designed to investigate the influence of our genes on depression and anxiety.
The EDIT Lab strives to be a diverse and supportive research environment that is open and welcoming to all. We recognise that certain groups have a more difficult journey into academia, so we would especially like to hear from you. We have a particular focus on open and collaborative approaches to science. You can read more about this in the "Group Culture" tab below.
People
Postdoctoral Research Associate
NIHR Bioresource Maudsley Deputy Research Coordinator
Senior Lecturer in Statistical Genetics
Professor of Developmental Behavioural Genetics
PhD student
Projects
GLAD: Genetic Links to Anxiety and Depression
The GLAD Study is the largest anxiety and depression project ever undertaken. The study is part of the National Institute of Health Research (NIHR) BioResource.
TEDS: Twins Early Development Study
The Twins Early Development Study (TEDS) is one of the leading twin studies in the world. The study began in 1994 led by Professor Robert Plomin, and has followed over 15,000 pairs of British twins throughout their childhood, adolescence and into early adulthood. Professor Thalia Eley is the incoming director of TEDS. The study's main goal is to investigate how genetic and environmental factors contribute to children’s development, including their behaviour and cognitive abilities, and what kind of influence they have in later life. Over 13 waves of data collection, the twins and their families have provided us with invaluable information about their experiences and other individual factors that might have influenced them during their lives. Additionally, we have collected DNA samples from more than 5,000 pairs of twins and are using this data to improve our understanding of the effect of genes on abilities and behaviours. We actively encourage and facilitate the sharing of our data. On the TEDS project website there is a page specifically for researchers. This includes access to the TEDS data dictionary which provides documentation on all the data that has been collected. There is also a TEDS publication search engine and a current TEDS project search engine. On these pages, researchers can learn about the steps involved in accessing and using our data.
CoTEDS: Children of Twins Study
The Children of TEDS study, or CoTEDS, was launched in 2017. We are collecting data from the children of the now grown-up TEDS twins, making this the first ever twin study to include information on both twin parents and their offspring. This will help us establish how different behaviours and traits are passed down through generations. As the adult parents are twins, we are able to disentangle whether traits run in families because of genetic inheritance, because of living together, or both. This is because when identical twins have children, those children are as just as genetically similar to their parents as they are to the twin of their parent. However, it is only their own parent that will provide the child with their rearing environment, since the adult twin pairs will raise their respective children in different environments. Identifying the ways in which emotional problems are transmitted from one generation to the next provides clues for the best places to focus on in regards to intervention and early treatment. If you are a TEDS twin and are interested in becoming a part of this research, please register with the link below for further information. It doesn't matter how much or how little you were were involved in past TEDS research, this is a new and equally exciting opportunity!
FLARe: Fear Learning and Anxiety Response
FLARe aims to model the processes underlying the development, maintenance and treatment of anxiety disorders, and post-treatment relapse. Some people learn very quickly that certain things make them feel anxious, whereas others are less likely to experience these feelings. Similarly, there is variation in how quickly anxiety reduces following a stressful experience, and in how successfully people who are anxious respond to exposure based treatments. In this study, we are interested in how people learn to be anxious of new things, and how they learn that some things that make them feel anxious might not always be unpleasant. We are also interested in the ways in which genes and the environment might contribute to this.
G1219: Genesis 1219
G1219 is a longitudinal study that aims to examine the interplay between genes and the environment on the development of anxiety and depression over time. We have also regularly assessed other aspects of development including aggression and sleep quality, and environmental experiences including life events and peer group difficulties.
Awards
PROJECTS
Genesis 1219
- Awarded the Lilly-Molecular Psychiatry Award for the paper:
- Eley, Sugden, Gregory, Sterne, Plomin and Craig (2004). Gene-environment interaction analysis of serotonin system markers with adolescent depression, Molecular Psychiatry, 9, 908-915.
PEOPLE
Thalia Eley
- 2018 Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology
- 2017 The James Shield Lifetime Achievement Award for Twin Research in Behavioural Genetics
- 2015 Macquarie University Excellence in Research Award
- 2011 Macquarie University Excellence in Research Award
- 2005 Pierre Janet Award (International Society for the Study of Dissociation)
- 2004 Lilly-Molecular Psychiatry Award (for best original research by a young investigator)
- 2002 British Psychological Society Spearman Medal (for outstanding published work in psychology within 10 years of graduation)
Joni Coleman
- 2015 King's Centre for Doctoral Studies Conference Fund to attend and present research at World Congress of Psychiatric Genetics, Toronto
- 2014 Genetics Society Junior Scientist Travel Grant to attend and present research at 2nd Annual Molecular Psychiatry Meeting, San Francisco, USA
- 2013 BRC Travel Award to attend and present research at World Congress of Psychiatry Genetics, Boston
Kirstin Purves
- 2019 BGA Thompson award for an outstanding paper delivered by an associate member
- 2019 BGA student travel award
- 2019 Cohen's Veterans Travel Support (PGC-PTSD meeting)
- 2018 WCPG best lightning talk award (Glasgow)
- 2018 Lundbeck, J&J & Illumina travel award (Pathways to drugs)
- 2017 Else Kröner-Fresenius-Stiftung prize
- 2015/16 UCL/Yale Developmental Neuroscience and Psychopathology award for best MSc research thesis
Rosa Cheesman
- 2019 Maudsley Biomedical Research Council poster prize
- 2019 Guarantors of Brain Travel Award
- 2019 King’s College London Conference Funding
- 2019 Behaviour Genetics Association travel award
- 2019 Funding from the Russell Sage Foundation to attend the Summer Institute in Social Science Genomics
- 2018 Guarantors of Brain Travel Award
- 2018 King’s College London Conference Funding
- 2018 Behaviour Genetics Association travel award
- 2016-20 Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) 1+3 studentship
Chris Rayner
- 2016-20 Social, Genetic & Developmental Psychiatry Centre 1+3 Studentship
- 2015 MRC UCL Genetics Institute Masters Excellence Scholarship
Megan Skelton
- 2017-2021 NIHR Maudsley BRC funded 1+3 studentship
- 2014 British Psychological Society Award for Undergraduate Psychology, University of Leeds
- 2013 Wellcome Trust Biomedical Vacation Scholarship
Daniel Wechsler
- 2017-21 King’s MRC DTP PhD Studentship
- 2014/15 and 2013/14 University of Westminster Achievement Awards and Dean’s List Awards for outstanding achievement on the Psychology BSc (Hons) course
Georgina Krebs
- 2016-20 Clinical Research Training Fellowship awarded by the Medical Research Council. The role of parental factors in the development and treatment of paediatric obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Yasmin Ahmadzadeh
- 2019 Travel Award to attend Behavior Genetics Association, Stockholm
Alicia Peel
- 2018-22 1+3 PhD ESRC LISS DTP Collaborative (CASE) Studentship
Group Culture and Alumni
The EDIT Lab strives to be a diverse research environment that is open and welcoming to all. We are committed to encouraging, promoting and maintaining diversity of all kinds in both our research group and in our studies. We believe that research can only be relevant to all if we have voices that represent everyone and are trying to produce a truly representative research base.
We are also engaging actively with the open science movement. We strongly believe in the importance of undertaking and reporting our science to the highest possible standards, with a particular focus on collaborative approaches and replication.
Our specific efforts in these domains are listed below.
Diversity
- The EDIT Lab stands with the Black Lives Matter movement.
- The EDIT Lab supports the LGBTQI+ community.
- We welcome and support team members regardless of their age, gender identity, race, sexual orientation, disability or religion.
- Members of the EDIT lab are active in the KCL SGDP Diversity and Inclusion panel meetings.
- Members of the EDIT lab are actively engaged in encouraging secondary school students to continue studying science subjects and pursue careers in science.
- The EDIT lab members are committed to learning more about issues of diversity, cultural sensitivity and regularly discuss these within lab meetings.
- Members of the group are working with a highly experienced research assistant to consult on issues of diversity and inclusion (as we recognise we are currently not best placed to do this).
- The EDIT lab intends to share best practice on all matters of inclusivity within our department and across wider KCL faculties.
- The EDIT lab wants to support individuals from groups that are under-represented in academia, and are willing to offer mentoring on a case by case basis (please email thalia.eley@kcl.ac.uk if interested).
Open Science
- We discuss open science strategies including preprints, the Open Science Framework, open access publication and publishing of analysis scripts regularly in the group, with more established team members providing support and examples to newer members of the lab.
- Starting 2020, we are pre-registering all new analysis plans on the Open Science Framework.
- We are regular attendees of the Reproducible Interpretable Open Transparent (RIOT) Science Club.
- Lab members have developed strategies to use GitHub collaboratively to improve peer based review and sharing of code.
- We support sharing of code and data (where possible) on publication of our papers.
- We archive our papers at the point of submission whenever possible.
- The EDIT lab views mistakes made by those at all levels as opportunities for shared learning; this is not a blame culture.
Alumni
Past PhD students
Dr Christopher Rayner, 1+3 student, 2016 to 2020
Dr Georgina Krebs, clinical doctoral fellow, 2016 to 2020
Dr Rosa Cheesman, 1+3 student, 2016 to 2020
Dr Kirstin Purves,1+3 student, 2015 to 2019
Dr Laurie Hannigan, 1+3 student, 2014 to 2018
Dr Jonathan Coleman, 1+3 student, 2012 to 2016
Dr Monika Waszczuk, 1+3 student, 2011 to 2015
Dr Susanna Roberts, 1+3 student, 2011 to 2015
Dr Hannah Brown, 1+3 student, 2010-2014
Dr Helena Zavos, 1+3 student, 2007-2011
Prof Jennifer Lau, 1+3 student, 2001-2005
Prof Alice Gregory, 1+3 student, 2000-2004
Past post-docs
Dr Georgina Krebs, post-doc fellow, 2020 to 2021
Dr Elena Constantinou, post-doc, 2017 to 2019
Dr Rob Keers, post-doc fellow, 2013 to 2016
Dr Tom McAdams, post-doc fellow, 2011 to 2016
Dr Kate Lester, post-doc, 2010 to 2014
People
Postdoctoral Research Associate
NIHR Bioresource Maudsley Deputy Research Coordinator
Senior Lecturer in Statistical Genetics
Professor of Developmental Behavioural Genetics
PhD student
Projects
GLAD: Genetic Links to Anxiety and Depression
The GLAD Study is the largest anxiety and depression project ever undertaken. The study is part of the National Institute of Health Research (NIHR) BioResource.
TEDS: Twins Early Development Study
The Twins Early Development Study (TEDS) is one of the leading twin studies in the world. The study began in 1994 led by Professor Robert Plomin, and has followed over 15,000 pairs of British twins throughout their childhood, adolescence and into early adulthood. Professor Thalia Eley is the incoming director of TEDS. The study's main goal is to investigate how genetic and environmental factors contribute to children’s development, including their behaviour and cognitive abilities, and what kind of influence they have in later life. Over 13 waves of data collection, the twins and their families have provided us with invaluable information about their experiences and other individual factors that might have influenced them during their lives. Additionally, we have collected DNA samples from more than 5,000 pairs of twins and are using this data to improve our understanding of the effect of genes on abilities and behaviours. We actively encourage and facilitate the sharing of our data. On the TEDS project website there is a page specifically for researchers. This includes access to the TEDS data dictionary which provides documentation on all the data that has been collected. There is also a TEDS publication search engine and a current TEDS project search engine. On these pages, researchers can learn about the steps involved in accessing and using our data.
CoTEDS: Children of Twins Study
The Children of TEDS study, or CoTEDS, was launched in 2017. We are collecting data from the children of the now grown-up TEDS twins, making this the first ever twin study to include information on both twin parents and their offspring. This will help us establish how different behaviours and traits are passed down through generations. As the adult parents are twins, we are able to disentangle whether traits run in families because of genetic inheritance, because of living together, or both. This is because when identical twins have children, those children are as just as genetically similar to their parents as they are to the twin of their parent. However, it is only their own parent that will provide the child with their rearing environment, since the adult twin pairs will raise their respective children in different environments. Identifying the ways in which emotional problems are transmitted from one generation to the next provides clues for the best places to focus on in regards to intervention and early treatment. If you are a TEDS twin and are interested in becoming a part of this research, please register with the link below for further information. It doesn't matter how much or how little you were were involved in past TEDS research, this is a new and equally exciting opportunity!
FLARe: Fear Learning and Anxiety Response
FLARe aims to model the processes underlying the development, maintenance and treatment of anxiety disorders, and post-treatment relapse. Some people learn very quickly that certain things make them feel anxious, whereas others are less likely to experience these feelings. Similarly, there is variation in how quickly anxiety reduces following a stressful experience, and in how successfully people who are anxious respond to exposure based treatments. In this study, we are interested in how people learn to be anxious of new things, and how they learn that some things that make them feel anxious might not always be unpleasant. We are also interested in the ways in which genes and the environment might contribute to this.
G1219: Genesis 1219
G1219 is a longitudinal study that aims to examine the interplay between genes and the environment on the development of anxiety and depression over time. We have also regularly assessed other aspects of development including aggression and sleep quality, and environmental experiences including life events and peer group difficulties.
Awards
PROJECTS
Genesis 1219
- Awarded the Lilly-Molecular Psychiatry Award for the paper:
- Eley, Sugden, Gregory, Sterne, Plomin and Craig (2004). Gene-environment interaction analysis of serotonin system markers with adolescent depression, Molecular Psychiatry, 9, 908-915.
PEOPLE
Thalia Eley
- 2018 Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology
- 2017 The James Shield Lifetime Achievement Award for Twin Research in Behavioural Genetics
- 2015 Macquarie University Excellence in Research Award
- 2011 Macquarie University Excellence in Research Award
- 2005 Pierre Janet Award (International Society for the Study of Dissociation)
- 2004 Lilly-Molecular Psychiatry Award (for best original research by a young investigator)
- 2002 British Psychological Society Spearman Medal (for outstanding published work in psychology within 10 years of graduation)
Joni Coleman
- 2015 King's Centre for Doctoral Studies Conference Fund to attend and present research at World Congress of Psychiatric Genetics, Toronto
- 2014 Genetics Society Junior Scientist Travel Grant to attend and present research at 2nd Annual Molecular Psychiatry Meeting, San Francisco, USA
- 2013 BRC Travel Award to attend and present research at World Congress of Psychiatry Genetics, Boston
Kirstin Purves
- 2019 BGA Thompson award for an outstanding paper delivered by an associate member
- 2019 BGA student travel award
- 2019 Cohen's Veterans Travel Support (PGC-PTSD meeting)
- 2018 WCPG best lightning talk award (Glasgow)
- 2018 Lundbeck, J&J & Illumina travel award (Pathways to drugs)
- 2017 Else Kröner-Fresenius-Stiftung prize
- 2015/16 UCL/Yale Developmental Neuroscience and Psychopathology award for best MSc research thesis
Rosa Cheesman
- 2019 Maudsley Biomedical Research Council poster prize
- 2019 Guarantors of Brain Travel Award
- 2019 King’s College London Conference Funding
- 2019 Behaviour Genetics Association travel award
- 2019 Funding from the Russell Sage Foundation to attend the Summer Institute in Social Science Genomics
- 2018 Guarantors of Brain Travel Award
- 2018 King’s College London Conference Funding
- 2018 Behaviour Genetics Association travel award
- 2016-20 Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) 1+3 studentship
Chris Rayner
- 2016-20 Social, Genetic & Developmental Psychiatry Centre 1+3 Studentship
- 2015 MRC UCL Genetics Institute Masters Excellence Scholarship
Megan Skelton
- 2017-2021 NIHR Maudsley BRC funded 1+3 studentship
- 2014 British Psychological Society Award for Undergraduate Psychology, University of Leeds
- 2013 Wellcome Trust Biomedical Vacation Scholarship
Daniel Wechsler
- 2017-21 King’s MRC DTP PhD Studentship
- 2014/15 and 2013/14 University of Westminster Achievement Awards and Dean’s List Awards for outstanding achievement on the Psychology BSc (Hons) course
Georgina Krebs
- 2016-20 Clinical Research Training Fellowship awarded by the Medical Research Council. The role of parental factors in the development and treatment of paediatric obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Yasmin Ahmadzadeh
- 2019 Travel Award to attend Behavior Genetics Association, Stockholm
Alicia Peel
- 2018-22 1+3 PhD ESRC LISS DTP Collaborative (CASE) Studentship
Group Culture and Alumni
The EDIT Lab strives to be a diverse research environment that is open and welcoming to all. We are committed to encouraging, promoting and maintaining diversity of all kinds in both our research group and in our studies. We believe that research can only be relevant to all if we have voices that represent everyone and are trying to produce a truly representative research base.
We are also engaging actively with the open science movement. We strongly believe in the importance of undertaking and reporting our science to the highest possible standards, with a particular focus on collaborative approaches and replication.
Our specific efforts in these domains are listed below.
Diversity
- The EDIT Lab stands with the Black Lives Matter movement.
- The EDIT Lab supports the LGBTQI+ community.
- We welcome and support team members regardless of their age, gender identity, race, sexual orientation, disability or religion.
- Members of the EDIT lab are active in the KCL SGDP Diversity and Inclusion panel meetings.
- Members of the EDIT lab are actively engaged in encouraging secondary school students to continue studying science subjects and pursue careers in science.
- The EDIT lab members are committed to learning more about issues of diversity, cultural sensitivity and regularly discuss these within lab meetings.
- Members of the group are working with a highly experienced research assistant to consult on issues of diversity and inclusion (as we recognise we are currently not best placed to do this).
- The EDIT lab intends to share best practice on all matters of inclusivity within our department and across wider KCL faculties.
- The EDIT lab wants to support individuals from groups that are under-represented in academia, and are willing to offer mentoring on a case by case basis (please email thalia.eley@kcl.ac.uk if interested).
Open Science
- We discuss open science strategies including preprints, the Open Science Framework, open access publication and publishing of analysis scripts regularly in the group, with more established team members providing support and examples to newer members of the lab.
- Starting 2020, we are pre-registering all new analysis plans on the Open Science Framework.
- We are regular attendees of the Reproducible Interpretable Open Transparent (RIOT) Science Club.
- Lab members have developed strategies to use GitHub collaboratively to improve peer based review and sharing of code.
- We support sharing of code and data (where possible) on publication of our papers.
- We archive our papers at the point of submission whenever possible.
- The EDIT lab views mistakes made by those at all levels as opportunities for shared learning; this is not a blame culture.
Alumni
Past PhD students
Dr Christopher Rayner, 1+3 student, 2016 to 2020
Dr Georgina Krebs, clinical doctoral fellow, 2016 to 2020
Dr Rosa Cheesman, 1+3 student, 2016 to 2020
Dr Kirstin Purves,1+3 student, 2015 to 2019
Dr Laurie Hannigan, 1+3 student, 2014 to 2018
Dr Jonathan Coleman, 1+3 student, 2012 to 2016
Dr Monika Waszczuk, 1+3 student, 2011 to 2015
Dr Susanna Roberts, 1+3 student, 2011 to 2015
Dr Hannah Brown, 1+3 student, 2010-2014
Dr Helena Zavos, 1+3 student, 2007-2011
Prof Jennifer Lau, 1+3 student, 2001-2005
Prof Alice Gregory, 1+3 student, 2000-2004
Past post-docs
Dr Georgina Krebs, post-doc fellow, 2020 to 2021
Dr Elena Constantinou, post-doc, 2017 to 2019
Dr Rob Keers, post-doc fellow, 2013 to 2016
Dr Tom McAdams, post-doc fellow, 2011 to 2016
Dr Kate Lester, post-doc, 2010 to 2014
