Peter McKenna

Academic journey

Pete earned his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Psychology from the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow. His initial motivation to study psychology stemmed from a high school interest in autism spectrum disorder (henceforth, autism).

Throughout his academic career, Pete pursued several autism-related projects, including studies on language comprehension, motor skill development, and robot-assisted therapy. These experiences led him to focus on technology—its potential to improve lives and the challenges it presents.

Teaching philosophy and qualifications

Pete enjoys teaching statistics and programming, particularly the challenge of introducing R to novice programmers. He advocates for immersive engagement with research data to fully understand its significance—and admits he probably spends too long designing plots.

His courses emphasise co-design and case-based learning. For example, on C91ED, students contribute weekly to an online annotated bibliography, with each week’s topic chosen by a different student to support their research.

Pete is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (FHEA), earning this title following completion of Heriot-Watt's PGCert in Teaching and Learning in 2024. 

Engagement

Pete has collaborated with several organisations for research and development. He was a consultant for Data Driven Innovation (https://ddi.ac.uk/), teaching introductory R programming and data visualisation skills.

He has also worked with Autism Initiatives (https://autisminitiatives.org/) and ENABLE Scotland (https://www.enable.org.uk/) on autism-related studies.

For the past two years, he has served as Review Associate Chair for the Human-Agent Interaction conference and regularly reviews submissions for Transactions on Human–Robot Interaction.

Interests

Outside of work, Pete is an avid reader with a particular interest in science fiction, war history, and emotionally resonant fiction. He also plays guitar, enjoys running, and is a keen squash player.