Here are a few ongoing and recent projects (check back soon for more!).
An fMRI study of language processing in awake toddlers
Toddlers undergo rapid and remarkable changes in their language comprehension and production. To better understand the neural basis of this incredible feat, I am scanning awake toddlers using fMRI! Some of the first questions I’m aiming to answer are:
- Can we measure a language response in awake toddlers using fMRI? (spoiler alert – I think yes!)
- Is language-evoked activation left-lateralized in toddlers?
- Do language regions respond differently to observed conversation than language directed to the child in toddlers? In the adult brain, I found that the answer is no – I am looking forward to seeing what we find in toddlers!
Toddler scanning is in progress – sign up here if you would like to learn more about participating.
Using special interests to study language in the brain
Typically, researchers use generic and impersonal stimuli to understand cognitive function. In this project, we asked – what happens when we use personalized stimuli about children’s absolute favorite interests to measure language-evoked activation in the brain? We found that children’s brains responded more to the personalized language stimuli about their idiosyncratic interests, for both neurotypical and autistic children.
Here is an article describing our work, and here is a recent preprint! You can also listen to me talk about this work here.
Interesting brains in development
In the Interesting Brains Project, we are aiming to better understand how the developing brain functionally organizes, particularly for language, when there are physical constraints (e.g., early damage, congenital cysts).