I am an Assistant Professor at the Departments of Communication Sciences and Disorders and Psychological and Brain Sciences at the University of Iowa. I’m also the principal investigator of the Speech, Sign, and Systems Lab. I’m also the Director of the Cognitive Science of Language Graduate Program at the University of Iowa. I earned my master’s degree in Cognitive Science at Carleton University (Ottawa, Canada) and my PhD in Linguistics from the University of Florida. I completed my National Science Foundation Postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Iowa’s Psychological and Brain Sciences department.

My work is grounded in the perceptual and social experiences of linguistically diverse individuals and their underlying neural and behavioral mechanisms. I am particularly interested in how speech perception is shaped by ecological factors (attitudes towards linguistic diversity in a specific location), personal social network diversity, and individual factors (experience with linguistic diversity, age, hearing status, language experience). In addition to this line of research, I’m interested in exploring language use in online spaces, computational approaches to quantify language use and change, as well as, word recognition in sign languages. The overarching theme of my research is on science of science where I advocate for fair and just theories and tools in psycholinguistics research.

I use a variety of methodologies such as eye tracking, electroencephalography, and network science tools to explore the crossroads of language, cognition, and society. My work has been funded by different grant agencies such as the National Science Foundation and the National Institute of Health. I currently serve as an editorial board member for Scientific Reports and the Canadian Journal of Experimental Psycholinguistics and serve as an Associate Editor for Applied Psycholinguistics.

In 2022, I co-founded the ROLE Collective (Reframing our language experience). This collective works towards addressing linguistic inequalities in different systems such as research and education.

You can view my CV here.