About
I'm a fourth year student in the Linguistics PhD program at the University of California, San Diego. I'm interested in how work in psychology and cognitive science can help shape our understanding of this unique capacity that humans have to understand the infinite meanings (semantics) that we can convey with language. More specifically, my research involves the interactions of the linguistic subfield of semantics with two other subfields, pragmatics and syntax, especially in American Sign Language (ASL).
My recent research has included work on sentence structures in ASL (especially clausal question-answer pairs), experiments on scalar implicatures computed by deaf late first-language learners of ASL, and the development of number concepts in typically developing preschool-age children.
My advisors are Ivano Caponigro, a semanticist, and Rachel Mayberry, a specialist in development and sign language. I am also involved in David Barner's Language and Development laboratory in the Psychology department. Before coming to UCSD, I earned my BA at the University of Pennsylvania, majoring in mathematics and linguistics.