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Speech Research Lab
Focus of Lab
The Speech Research Laboratory focuses on infant speech perception and production. Current work concentrates on how the infant's own experience affects language learning. In much the same way that the onset of reaching will make concepts of distance more real to the infant, the onset of babbling should make adult speech more accessible to the infant. As the infant begins to concentrate on specific sounds, those sounds become more noticeable to the infant. In addition, as the infant begins to learn their first words, these words attain a special status in segmenting speech. The idea that the infant's own output and emerging lexicon have special status as input contains many benefits to processing a very complex quickly changing speech stream. By self-limiting what aspects of speech are analyzed the infant can actively simplify the learning process. In essence, through interacting with the world around them the infant is interactively creating the knowledge they need to become a competent language user.
Personnel
- Dr. Rory DePaolis, Director
Curent Projects
A Marie Curie Incoming International Fellowship awarded by the European Union currently funds the Director of the SRL. Dr. DePaolis is spending 2005 at the University of Wales, Bangor working with an international team of infant language researchers.
