I explore what language perception looks like in the brain (its perceptual shape and neural representation), with the goal of understanding the link between the objective biological mechanisms and subjective perceptual processes of communication. My research to date has primarily examined the influence of native language (L1) processing on the perception and acquisition of second languages. I examine electrical brain activity, recorded with electroencephalography (EEG), in order to understand how an individual’s native first language (L1) will affect that person’s perception and production of nonnative speech sounds and contrasts present in a target second language (L2).

General interests: psycholinguistics, neurolinguistics, neuroplasticity, language learning, speech perception, bilingualism, cognitive individual differences, EEG/ERP methods, training studies.

Specific interests: how variability in the input affects later language learning, the crowdedness vs compactness of the L1 influencing L2 perception and production, translating laboratory methods to field settings, perception of speaker identity cues (accent, sex, age, etc.).