I completed my graduate work at Carnegie Mellon University under the advisorship of Jay McClelland and defended my dissertation in August of 2007.. My main interests revolve around the interaction between language and other cognitive processes: How does language change the way we categorize and perceive the world? What non-communicative aspects of human behavior are impaired in cases of acquired language deficits such as aphasia? What kinds of thinking depends most on language? Asked another way: what aspects of human cognition were made possible or improved with the evolution of language? An additional interest of mine is trying to understand why language is the way it is by analyzing sociolinguistic factors. For example, how do languages vary as a function of whether they are used by a diverse population that includes adult learners of the language, or in a tightly-knit small group in which the language is acquired exclusively as a native language by infants.

Some of my/my colleagues' work has recently been profiled here: When Language can Hold the Answer (NYT link)

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