Psycholinguistics Research

What is Psycholinguistics?

While linguistics studies the structure of natural language, psycholinguistics studies how people process natural language. A review of previous research will show that humans have a propensity for language that is far greater than any other species. Some argue that the complexity of human language is a reflection of the human mind’s vast cognitive ability, and many believe that language is special and interestingly different from any other cognitive function. Current research is beginning to show how language can interact with other cognitive domains as well as emotional processes.

Our research:

Below are summaries of some of the lab’s past projects related to Psycholinguistics. For a list of selected studies relating to Psycholinguistics, visit the Publications page.  Our ongoing Psycholinguistics research is available under the Current Research Projects tab.

Bilingualism and emotional response

This project aimed to map out the connection between bilingualism and different types of emotional response; for example, whether one reacts more strongly to certain stimuli in their native language or their second language, etc.

English as a second language in deaf children

This project investigated the way that deaf children learn to read and understand English through print, without having heard the sounds or phonics that make up the word usage and flow.

Video games and second language acquisition

Why is it so hard for adults to learn a foreign language? Our lab is developing a theory that emphasizes multiple causes. Foreign language learning is difficult because of entrenched and routinized first-language structures, decline in brain plasticity, and decreased motivation to practice the second language because immediate rewards are so low. Adult learners may highly desire the end-state of fluency, just as they value other long-term goals like weight gain or smoking cessation; immediate rewards are minimal. The intervention we propose is a virtual reality learning environment. The virtual world is the place to learn and practice a foreign language with game characters providing language recasts and diverse skill levels. The immediate rewards of video-games (solving puzzles, finding clues) means that language learning is part of making progress in the game.

Speech Perception in noise

We aim to assess the ability of a person to perceive and understand speech through noise, whether it be in a native language, a made-up language, or a second or third language, and see how the noise affects these perceptions.