I have always been fascinated by the mental journey inherent in the simplest mathematical thought. By allowing me to share some of their journeys, the students and the tutors that participated in this study — whose names I have promised not to reveal but I will never forget — helped me in this attempt to translate my overwhelmed gaze at mathematical cognition into a coherent discourse. For this I am profoundly grateful.

This work was completed under the supervision of Dr Barbara Jaworski whom I deeply thank. Throughout these years I felt constantly that I could wish for no more challenge and support than those provided by Barbara. Her formative influence on my way of thinking about research will continue well beyond the completion of this thesis.

A D.Phil. is, I think, an all-consuming, mind-stretching activity the intensity of which would have been unbearable without the affective presence of empathetic friends. I feel immense gratitude both to those who endured painstakingly long discussions about work and to those who blissfully insisted on distracting me from work. I am especially grateful to my friends in Greece for tolerating our holidays and travelling all these years revolving around the various stages of this study — data collection / transcribing / analysis /... ; also for mastering the skill of sustaining a friendship through long-distance phonecalls.

This piece of research was partly supported by the Economic And Social Research Council and by the British Federation of Women Graduates whom I sincerely thank. However it would have been simply impossible to start, continue and complete it without the support of my parents who, wholeheartedly, made the resources of the family available to me and to whom this work is dedicated: I shall always consider myself extremely fortunate to have had the opportunity — all due to them — to discover the seductive powers lying in the pursuit of knowledge.

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