I am interested in how humans acquire grammar, and in how that
acquisition and development continue through life in response
to changing patterns of language use. I am pursuing these
questions in the realm of phonological development in both
children and in adult developing bilinguals, testing
behavioral and online sensitivity to emergent lexical
probabilities. I am also interested in how various cognitive
abilities interact with communication in both language and
gesture.

email: carlsonmt@uchicago.edu

(Also affiliated with Dr. Susan Levine)

My research interests center on the evolution of language and the cognitive antecedents to language. I am particularly interested in the relationship between gestural and vocal communication on both evolutionary and ontogenetic timelines. My current work explores the relationship between gesture and speech in child language acquisition, and examines the role gesture plays as language moves beyond the 2-word stage and complex grammatical constructions begin to emerge. My previous research involved the study of gestural communication and social cognition in orangutans. By combining results from both lines of inquiry, I hope to identify cognitive and communicative structures that exist prior to the development of full-blown language.

email: cartmill@uchicago.edu

My research focuses on language creation and language genesis. To better understand what learners bring to the task of language acquisition, I study the gesture systems that deaf people invent to communicate in the absence of contact with a conventional spoken or sign language. For the last 15 years I have conducted field work with several deaf Nicaraguans and their families to characterize the linguistic properties of these "home sign" systems. The conventionalization of these homesign systems formed the basis for the emergence of Nicaraguan Sign Language, a new, indigenous sign language, in the late 1970s.

I also examine the resources available to homesigners to build their systems, which include the physical environment, their interactions with family members and friends, and cultural knowledge, such as conventional gestures. In a related line of work, I study the cognitive consequences of a lack of exposure to conventional linguistic input. Please click on the link below to download my cv and selected publications.

email: mariec@uchicago.edu

Click here for my Research Homepage

Manos Unidas

My research focuses on understanding the interaction between language and nonlinguistic cognition. Specifically I focus on a specific interaction between vision and language and investigate the mechanism by which language affects visual processes (and vice versa), the representational consequence and development of such interactions.

email: Banchi@uchicago.edu

My current research explores when and how children acquire both the spatial concepts and words that map on to relational terms like motion verbs, spatial prepositions, and spatial adjectives. In my previous research I examined infants' ability to abstract spatial concepts that are eventually encoded in relational terms (e.g. path and manner). My current research continues this line of research and asks whether gesture plays a role in the acquisition of these spatial concepts and words.

email: spruden@uchicago.edu

Personal Homepage

(Also affiliated with Dr. Susan Levine)

My work is centered on understanding individual differences in children’s early language development and in how parents communicate with children. Specific issues I have studied recently include: 1) the relation between early gesture and later language learning, 2) the role of linguistic input in child language development for typically-developing children and children with brain injury, and 3) relations between socioeconomic status and parental talk to children. Currently I am using the longitudinal data from the Language Development Project here at the University of Chicago to investigate different ways of measuring and modeling growth in children’s early lexical development.

email: rowemer@uchicago.edu

Personal Homepage

(Also affiliated with Dr. Susan Levine)

I am interested in the interaction of motor information with concepts of objects and actions. In behavioral studies, we have found that young children (both 3- and 5-year-olds) categorize novel tools based on abstract information about the tools' function and ignore motor information about the tools' use. They do so even when the tools' functions are not perceptually accessible, suggesting that early tool concepts are fixed by abstract representations. Current projects investigate the role of linguistic labels in this process: do children categorize by abstract information only when it is labeled? Is there a developmental difference in the ability to attend to abstract information in the absence of linguistic cues?

Another line of research explores the role of motor information in literal and metaphoric use of verbs. A TMS study on adults will determine if there is an effect on processing metaphoric verbs - i.e., to pick a cherry versus to pick a winner - when relevant areas of the primary motor cortex are disabled.

email: elena.zinchenko@gmail.com

(Also affiliated with Dr. Susan Levine)