
Professor William Browne
M.Sc., Ph.D.(Bath)
Current positions
Professor and Head of School
School of EducationProfessor of Statistics
School of Education
Contact
Press and media
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Research interests
My research spans the area of statistical modelling, from the development of statistical methods to fit realistically complex statistical models to describe real-life problems, through the implementation of those models in statistical software to the application of the methods in several application areas.
Further details of my work are available at http://seis.bris.ac.uk/~frwjb/
Much of my computational work has been in the development of statistical software within the Centre for Multilevel Modelling that I direct wih Professor George Leckie and in particular in the development of the MLwiN and StatJR packages. I have also developed the software package MLPowSim for performing power calculations for multilevel models.
My methodological work has been with regard MCMC methods for fitting these multilevel models and also for tailoring MCMC algorithms for specific other models.
With regard applications I have worked on applying multilevel and other statistical models to problems as diverse as bullying in schools, assessing welfare in chickens, modelling herd breakdowns with TB in cattle, investigating nesting behaviour of great tits and the impact of class sizes on primary school children. Much of this work is in collaboration with discipline experts and I firmly believe that statistics and in particular statistical modelling is the glue that binds together interdisciplinary research
My research has been funded by various sources - my major funder has been the ESRC who have repeatedly funded my work over a 13 year period however I have also had my work or collaborative work funded by British Academy, Home Office, BBSRC, EPSRC, NERC, Wellcome, DEFRA, John Oldacre Foundation, RSPCA, DairyCo, UFAW and FAO.
Research keywords- Multilevel Modelling
- MCMC
- Bayesian Statistics
- Random Effect Modelling
- Applied Statistics
- Computational Statistics
My former ESRC research grants including a node in the Digital Social Research programme, developed the statistical software package STAT-JR and in particular it's eBook interface, facilities for creating statistical training materials and fitting models using small area estimation. More details are available at the multilevel modelling centre website: http://www.bristol.ac.uk/cmm/
Further information about Professor William Browne can be found here.
Projects and supervisions
Research projects
ESRC NCRM - project partner
Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of EducationDates
01/01/2020 to 31/12/2024
Efficient and transparent methods for linking and analysing longitudinal population studies and administrative data
Role
Co-Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of EducationDates
01/05/2019 to 30/04/2022
Turing Fellowship - Bridging the Statistical Skills Gap through Automation and Improved Statistical Training
Principal Investigator
Description
Unfunded Fellowship to be part of Turing InstituteManaging organisational unit
School of EducationDates
01/10/2018 to 30/09/2021
Borrowing Strength- a collaborative software development for Small Area Estimation
Principal Investigator
Description
Small Area Estimation (SAE) is the name given to the process of calculating statistics of interest for each of a set of small areas within a larger population, for example…Managing organisational unit
School of EducationDates
01/03/2018 to 31/07/2019
British Academy - non standard call
Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of EducationDates
01/04/2016 to 30/09/2018
Thesis supervisions
Evaluation of the Validity of Large-scale Examinations
Supervisors
Investigating the efficacy of automated writing evaluation as a diagnostic assessment tool in L2 writing instruction
Supervisors
A mixed methods approach to understanding the relationship between computing students’ approaches to learning and academic performance for different entry pathways
Supervisors
Volunteers or conscripts? Investigating the impact of compulsory mathematics on students’ mathematics choices, motivation and attainment in a Further Education college
Supervisors
Using simulation with Simulated Patients and Peer Role-play for adverse event disclosure training in an undergraduate nursing program
Supervisors
Students’ Perceptions of the Effectiveness of Online Problem-Based Learning in Financial Education at Bahrain Polytechnic
Supervisors
A meta-theory analysis of teachers’ beliefs and practice with regard to low prior attaining students in mathematics
Supervisors
Leveraging the Power of Household Surveys in Agricultural Research for Development
Supervisors
The Implementation of the Scientific Approach (SA) in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) Classes and Its Influence on Students’ Critical Thinking Development Processes
Supervisors
The impact of visual cues on second language listening comprehension process and performance
Supervisors
Publications
Selected publications
12/05/2020A Large-Scale Replication of the Effectiveness of the KiVa Antibullying Program
Prevention Science
Partitioning variation in multilevel models for count data
Psychological Methods
A Bayesian model for measurement and misclassification errors alongside missing data, with an application to higher education participation in Australia
Journal of Applied Statistics
Reporting animal research
bioRxiv
Recent publications
01/03/2024Comparisons of Aerosol Generation Across Different Musical Instruments and Loudness
Journal of Aerosol Science
State and wealth inequalities in foundational literacy and numeracy skills of secondary school-aged children in Nigeria
International Journal of Educational Development
The effects of family, culture, and sex on linguistic development across 20 languages
Developmental Science
Affective trajectories: Are hens influenced by positive and negative changes in their living conditions?
Applied Animal Behaviour Science
The filtration efficiency of surgical masks for expiratory aerosol and droplets generated by vocal exercises
Aerosol Science and Technology