Early symbolism; Modern human behaviour in the Middle and Later Stone Age of North Africa; Human adaptations to environmental change in the Later Upper Palaeolithic and Mesolithic of Britain and northern Eurasia; Lithic technology and experimental archaeology; Cave taphonomy
Co-director with Professor Bouzouggar, Rabat University, of excavation at Taforalt Cave in Morocco, which is aimed at the understanding of human behaviour and environmental change in North Africa over the last 200,000 years. Recently completed a major collaborative NERC project as Co-Principal Investigator concerning the response of humans to rapid environmental change. Nearing completion of a monographic study on the Middle and Later Stone Age levels at Taforalt cave, for which he received a Leverhulme Fellowship in 2012-13. Most recently, with Dr Louise Humphrey (Natural History Museum) and Professor Martin Bell (Reading University), has been awarded a Major Leverhulme Research Award for a project on Cemeteries and Sedentism in North Africa, to investigate changes in hunter-gatherer behaviour prior to the Neolithic.