Person

I investigate how the brain represents and processes language, and how specialized linguistic abilities emerge from more general cognitive systems. My research combines structural and functional brain imaging with behavioral and genetic approaches to understand how the brain builds language networks that vary between individuals.

A major focus of my work is auditory and speech processing, including how the brain analyzes speech sounds and melody and uses them to predict linguistic structure. I have also investigated how fine-grained differences in brain structure relate to language and reading abilities, and how inherited differences and experience shape these relationships. A broader goal is to understand how the brain integrates multimodal information into networks that support language.

My previous work has also addressed short-term memory in sentence processing, semantic associations in aphasia, and applications of research on speech melody and grammar to second-language learning.