Dawes grew up in a family of scientists, and became interested in the way that atoms form molecules. She studied chemistry, physics and mathematics at the University of Sydney. She was a Rotary International Foundation Fellow at the University of Rochester. She earned her doctoral degree in 1988. She joined the American Physical Society and Optica as a student in 1984. Dawes joined the University of Toronto as a postdoctoral researcher, and moved to Macquarie University in 1991.