Dorota is a PhD student within the Re:Spect Research group, supervised by Francesca Happé, a Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience, and Will Mandy, a Professor of Neurodevelopmental Conditions at University College London. She is funded by the Social Science Doctoral Training Partnership (LISS DTP) via the Economic & Social Research Council (ESRC).

Dorota’s research centres around the stressors and burnout of autistic people. She is taking a mixed-methods approach, quantitatively exploring the relationships between stress and burnout, and experiences that may be relevant to stress and burnout (e.g., ‘masking’/’camouflaging’), as well as qualitatively exploring the subjective experiences of ‘autistic burnout’ by those who have experienced it.

Dorota has a BSc (Hons) in Psychology from Open University and an MSc in Neuroscience from King’s College London. Throughout her PhD, Dorota has been on a clinical placement across the Neurodevelopmental Pathway at the South London and Maudsley Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, and, alongside research, hopes to train as a clinical psychologist in the future.

When not studying, Dorota loves to read, write (fiction and not-fiction) and draw.