Alan Kennedy (psychologist)

Alan Kennedy
Alan Kennedy at Marciac Jazz Festival, 2015
Occupation	experimental psychologist, writer, reviewer

Robert Alan Kennedy is emeritus professor of Psychology at the University of Dundee, and research associate at the Laboratoire de Psychologie et Neurosciences Cognitives of Paris Descartes University, Boulogne-Billancourt, France. He carries out research into eye movement control in reading and the viewing of static and moving images and is the author of over 100 journal articles.

Educated at King Edward VI Grammar School, Stourbridge, Kennedy was one of three brothers at the school, all of whom had academic careers. His older brother Stuart Charles Kennedy (1936–1999), was a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons and his younger brother Ian McColl Kennedy, is a fellow of the British Academy.

Kennedy obtained an undergraduate degree in English Literature and Psychology at the University of Birmingham and won a research scholarship to complete a PhD in Psychology at the Institute of Education, University of Birmingham.

From 1963 to 1965, Kennedy was Senior Tutor and then Lecturer in Psychology at the University of Melbourne and then from 1965–1968, Lecturer then Senior Lecturer in Psychology at St. Andrews University.

From 1968–1972, he was Senior Lecturer at the University of Dundee. From 1972 to 2006 he held the established chair in Psychology at the University of Dundee and was Head of the Department.