Dr Diana Burman took the overall prize, winning £5,000. Two runners-up, Dr Michael Naughton and Dr Michelle Ryan, each received £500. In addition, all the winners will receive assistance in publishing and promoting their work.
First prize for former teacher of the deaf
Dr Burman, a former teacher of the deaf, took the first prize for ground-breaking research in developing a highly successful method for improving profoundly deaf children's English literacy.
This method uses morphemes - the smallest meaningful unit in the grammar of a language - to teach spelling. For example, the word unladylike contains three morphemes: -un, -lady and -like.
With one in 1,000 babies born profoundly deaf every year and only two per cent of these children leaving school able to read to an appropriate age-level, Dr Burman's research has the potential to make a big impact on many young lives.
The deaf children taught using Dr Burman's method showed a 38 per cent improvement in their writing skills compared with only a 12 per cent improvement amongst the children who were taught usinga more traditional approach. Similarly there was a 30 per cent improvement in the spelling assessment of children who were taught to use morphemes compared to a 3 per cent improvement among the children who were not .
Dr Burman commented: "Deaf adolescents' writing often fails to mark important grammatical distinctions, such as plural, past tense and different types of nouns. For example, they may write 'magic' when they mean 'magician'.
"Because they don't pay attention to these grammatical endings they have difficulty communicating in writing and in interpreting texts. Teaching deaf children about morphemes effectively improves their text-writing and comprehension".
Runner up: Typology of Innocence
Picture (right): Dr Michael Naughton and Mr Geoff Mulgan - Director of the Young Foundation
Dr Naughton was awarded one of two runners-up prizes for his research entitled 'Prisoners maintaining innocence: towards deeper understanding and effective reform'.
With many thousands of prisoners currently maintaining their innocence, Naughton has developed a system for classifying those prisoners who maintain their innocence into specific types. He terms this a 'typology of innocence'.
With his prize money he plans to make a public information film based on his typology which seeks to explain justice and wrongful convictions of the innocent. The audiences for this film include the Home Office, campaigning groups, the various agencies that comprise the post-conviction system, as well as the prisoners themselves.
Runner up: The glass cliff
Picture (right): Dr Michelle Ryan and Mr Geoff Mulgan - Director of the Young Foundation
Dr Ryan's research seeks to understand the more subtle forms of gender discrimination encountered by women who reach the upper echelons of management. Termed the 'glass cliff', Dr Ryan has identified that these circumstances are not confined to women but may also affect other marginalised groups such as those based on ethnicity, age or disability.
Her prize money will be used to help raise awareness among minority groups of the glass cliff phenomenon as well as targeting HR professionals and policymakers.