I conducted my PhD in physiological psychology at UCL and then worked as a researcher at UCL on a project funded by the Medical Research Council. I then moved to the US National Institute on Drug Abuse for 5 years before returning to the UK as a Lecturer (subsequently Reader) at the University of Birmingham. I have published over 70 papers in peer-reviewed journals, contributed to edited works and textbooks, made over 100 conference presentations, organized and chaired several international symposia, served as PI on grants from the ESRC, ARUK, ERAB, the Department of Transport and others. I have also served as a member of the ESRC peer-review college and as a panel member of Belgian FNRS. I am currently an Assistant Editor of the journals "Addiction" and "Substance Use and Misuse". My research over the last 25 years has centred on the behavioural pharmacology of abused drugs, from characterising drug action at the receptor level to the social psychology of problematic drug use. Much of my recent externally-funded research concerns people's understanding of how alcohol affects behaviour and health. I have particular interests in the role of learning processes in alcohol's effects and how conditioning processes contribute to the aetiology of alcohol abuse and other kinds of problematic drug use. I am also interested in the psychopharmacology of appetite and how monoamines and peptides (particularly, oxytocin) modulate eating behaviour. More broadly, I am in interested in functional drug use as a way of managing daily challenges. In a previous life, I published extensively on the neuropharmacology of cocaine.