Catherine Moran

Catherine Ann Moran is a Canadian–New Zealand academic, and is a full professor at the University of Canterbury, specialising in memory and cognition, and language learning. She is especially interested in how head injuries affected the development and processing of language.

Academic career

Moran completed both Bachelor and Master of Science degrees at the University of Western Ontario. She then moved to New Zealand where she completed a PhD titled Language comprehension and working memory in adolescents with traumatic brain injury at the University of Canterbury in 2002. Moran then joined the faculty of the University of Canterbury, rising to full professor.

Moran's research focuses on cognition, memory, and the processing and production of language. Although she studies language abilities and development in both impaired and healthy adolescents and children, she is particularly interested in how head injuries affect language ability. She has also written about how artificial intelligence can assist in education, and in 2020 spoke about the University of Canterbury's use of AI to monitor student behaviour on the university's "Learn" online platform, to identify students whose reduced engagement compared to their classmates might indicate they are at risk of dropping out.

From 1997 to 2002 Moran chaired the Registration Panel for the New Zealand Speech-Language Therapy Association, and was on the leadership team of the New Zealand Institute of Language, Brain, and Behaviour. She served five years as chair of the University of Canterbury Human Ethics Committee.

Selected works