EXPERTS SEARCH

Dr Cleo Anderson is an Associate Lecturer in the School of Psychology. She completed her PhD in 2025 in the area of eating disorders and digital health. As part of her research program, she developed and evaluated a smartphone application for binge eating disorder using a user-centred design approach. Her work integrates both qualitative and quantitative research methods to better understand the user experience and effectiveness of digital interventions. She has also contributed to clinical trials of other digital mental health interventions, including single-session interventions. Ms Anderson is particularly interested in the real-world implementation and scalability of digital mental health programs. In addition, she has a research interest in body image, with a particular focus on positive body image and its relationship with a broad range of mental health and wellbeing outcomes.

I am a clinician-researcher trained as a clinical neuropsychologist and specialise in the field of cognitive ageing, particularly the development, evaluation, synthesis, and translation of evidence related to cognitive interventions for people with cognitive decline and dementia. I am among the most cited researchers globally on cognitive training in dementia and my synthesis of the evidence in this area has had an impact on clinical practice guidelines in Australia and in the UK.

After completing my undergraduate training in Psychology at Ben-Gurion University in Israel, I went on to complete my postgraduate and postdoctoral qualifications at the University of Melbourne, Monash University and the Australian National University. Specifically, I completed my clinical training and PhD at Monash University, and my postdoctoral training at the Centre for Research on Ageing, Health, and Wellbeing at the Australian National University. Between July 2014 and December 2016, I was based at the Joseph Sagol Centre for Neuroscience at Sheba Medical Centre, Israel, as part of an NHMRC Overseas-Based Clinical Early Career Fellowship. In 2017, I was awarded a Boosting Dementia Research Leadership Fellowship from the National Health and Medical Research Council.

I joined the School of Psychology at Deakin University in 2023, while maintaining an honorary appointment as A/Prof in the Department of Psychiatry and School of Psychology at the University of Melbourne. My research group at Deakin (The ALE research group) includes students, research assistants, interns and placement students, and I collaborate widely with other researchers in the School of Psychology, at Deakin University, nationally and internationally.

My earlier research focused on early detection of cognitive decline and dementia, with a particular focus on the role of olfactory processes. Since 2011, my research focus shifted to the development, evaluation and synthesis of non-pharmacological interventions aimed at primary and secondary prevention of cognitive decline and dementia. See my Google Scholar Profile for a full list of publications. 

My work has been funded by the Australian NHMRC, Dementia Australia, the Alzheimer's Association, and the NIH. Between 2016 and 2019 I served as the Chair of the nonpharmacological interventions Professional Interest Area of the ISTAART (the International Society to Advance Alzheimer's Research and Treatment). Since 2021, I co-chair the Cognitive Interventions Working Group of ADNeT (the Australian Dementia Network). I also continues working in private practice where I support clients with or at risk of dementia and their families.

Dr Neil Bailey is a Senior Lecturer and Data Science Lead within the School of Psychology at Deakin University. He has published over 90 studies that explore the links between brain activity, mental health, cognitive performance, and the effects of different treatments.

One major focus of Neil’s research is the development and improvement of methods to process and analyse neural activity data recorded using electroencephalography (EEG). This work has led to the publication of several open access software packages to enable automated state-of-the-art EEG pre-processing, improving signal to noise ratios and reducing the confounds in analysis of EEG data.

Neil has then applied these methods to the examination of brain activity in individuals who practice mindfulness. The goal of his mindfulness research is to explain the mechanism of action by which meditation leads to improved mental health. His research also uses machine learning and EEG to assess measures of brain activity that predict who will respond to different treatments for depression. The goal of this research is to enhance the efficacy of current depression treatments. He has also published research examining how brain activity differs between typical depression and depression that commonly follows a traumatic brain injury, whether online mindfulness is effective at improving mental health, and a range of different brain stimulation treatments for depression, schizophrenia, obsessive compulsive disorder, and Alzheimer’s disease.

He has published more than 90 peer reviewed publications, several book chapters, an industry commissioned evidence-based guidelines document for the application of mindfulness in schools, and his work his highly cited across multiple scientific fields.

I completed my PhD on the relationship between sleeping brain waves and memory for declarative and procedural information at Deakin University under the supervision of Associate Professor Jarrad Lum in 2021.

My current research interests lie in evaluating the effectiveness of non-invasive brain stimulation techniques such as Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) and neuroimaging techniques such as Electroencephalography (EEG) to examine cognition in clinical and non-clinical groups. Specifically, I have an interest in data science / research methods, including the use of 'big' data analytics to understand sources of variability and improve efficacy of non-invasive brain stimulation (NIBS) techniques.

I primarily teach into core first year Psychology subjects 'Introduction to Psychology' (HPS111/HPY711) and 'Health Psychology: Behaviour Change' (HBS110), in addition to specialised research methods / statistucs units including 'Research Methods: Introductory' and 'Research Methods: Advanced' (HPS434).

Research Groups
Cognitive Neuroscience Unit (CNU)
https://www.deakin.edu.au/faculty-of-health/research/cognitive-neuroscience-unit

Big 'Non-Invasive Brain Stimulation' (NIBS) Project

https://bignibsdata.com