Current Lab Members

Fall 2024

Elizabeth Johnson

Lab Director

Dr. Johnson received her undergraduate degree from the University of Rochester where she majored in Brain & Cognitive Sciences and completed a Take Five program in Developmental Biology & Evolution. She then went on to earn her PhD in Psychological & Brain Sciences at the Johns Hopkins University. During her final year as a PhD student, Dr. Johnson spent two semesters at the Speech Group at MIT. Dr. Johnson then accepted a postdoctoral position at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics. Dr. Johnson is now a Canada Research Chair in Spoken Language Acquisition and Professor of Psychology at UTM. She is also Director of the University of Toronto's Tri-Campus Graduate Program in Psychology. The main goal of her research program is to understand how young children acquire their native language.

Postdoctoral Fellow

Holly Bradley

Language(s) spoken: English (native), Mandarin (intermediate)

Research Interests: neural processes underlying language development, speech perception, relationship between language and cognitive development, grammatical development

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PhD Candidate (Year 5)

Madeleine Yu

Language(s) spoken: English (native)

Research Interests: Multilingual effects on language acquisition and perception, speaker recognition, music and language processing, auditory-visual speech processing.

PhD Candidate (Year 1)

Jade Fok

Language(s) spoken: English, Cantonese (native), Mandarin (fluent)

Research Interests: Language acquisition in early childhood bilingualism, neural processes underlying language development

Research Lab Coordinator

Lisa Hotson

Language(s) spoken: English (native)

Research Experience: Research assistant in Dr. Laurel Trainor's Auditory Development Lab and Dr. Sandra Trehub's Music Development Lab

Research Assistant

Sophia MacKeigan

Language(s) spoken: English (fluent)

Education: Psychology Specialist, UTM

Year of Graduation: 2024

Indepedent Research Project Student

Cassie Yang

Language(s) spoken: Mandarin, English

Education: Animal Physiology, UTSG

Expected Year of Graduation: 2025

Indepedent Research Project Student

Noemi Caponi

Language(s) spoken: Italian & Japanese (native), English & French (fluent)

Education: Psychology Specialist, linguistics minor

Expected Year of Graduation: 2026

Research Opportunity Student

Alexandra Maracz

Language(s) spoken: Polish (native), English (native), French (learning)

Education: Psychology Specialist, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2026

Research Opportunity Student

Wardah Abbasi

Language(s) spoken: English and Urdu

Education: Psychology Specialist, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2025

Research Opportunity Student

Maya Vasilijevi

Language(s) spoken: English (native), French (basic), Serbian (learning)

Education: Forensic Psychology Specialist, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2026

Research Opportunity Student

Gabriella Di Maio

Language(s) spoken: English, Patois (native), Italian (leaning)

Education: Psychology and Biology, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2026

Research Opportunity Student

Liza Zolototrubova

Language(s) spoken: Russian (native), English (fluent)

Education: CCIT & Psychology, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2025

Research Opportunity Student

Yeldana Baibolova

Language(s) spoken: Kazakh & Russian (native), English (fluent), French (learning)

Education: Psychology Specialist, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2025

Work Study Student

Fiona Hanasavha

Language(s) spoken: English (native), Farsi (fluent), French (proficient)

Education: Psychology and Biology for Health Sciences

Expected Year of Graduation: 2025

Work Study Student

Ismail Amir

Language(s) spoken: English (native), Urdu (fluent), Hindi (fluent)

Education: BScN Nursing, U of T

Expected Year of Graduation: 2027

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Work Study Student

Grace Fontaine

Language(s) spoken: English

Education: Health Sciences & Psychology, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2025

Volunteer

Shahad Badr

Language(s) spoken: English & Arabic (native)

Education: Psychology & Linguistics, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2025

PhD Candidate (Year 5)

Priscilla Fung

Language(s) spoken: English (fluent)

Research Interests: Language acquisition in early childhood bilingualism, relationship between bilingualism and cognitive development

PhD Candidate (Year 3)

Emily Shroads

Language(s) spoken: English (native), Spanish & Malayalam (learning)

Research Interests: early word learning, accent adaptation, experiential effects in language acquisition, individual differences

PhD Candidate (Outside Project Student)

Anna Liu

Language(s) spoken: English & Mandarin (native)

Research Interests: How bilingualism and other diverse linguistic environments influence our perception and development.

Research Assistant

Josie Davies

Language(s) spoken: English (native), Spanish (learning)

Research Experience: Mitacs Globalinks Research Intern, Lab Manager in Dr. Amy Finn's Learning and Neural Development Lab

Honours Thesis Student

Wardah Nadeem

Language(s) spoken: English & Urdu (native), French (fluent)

Education: Neuroscience Specialist, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2025

Indepedent Research Project Student

Crystal Zhang

Language(s) spoken: Mandarin (native), English (fluent), Sichuanese

Education: Psychology & Criminology, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2025

Knowledge Translation and Work Study Student

Ana Beatriz de Faria Porto

Language(s) spoken: Portuguese (native), English (fluent), Spanish & French (learning)

Education: Psychology & Linguistics, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2025

Research Opportunity Student

Alayna Puli

Language(s) spoken: English (native), Telugu (fluent)

Education: Psychology Specialist, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2026

Research Opportunity Student

Mikaela Santos

Language(s) spoken: English (fluent), Tagalog (learning)

Education: Psychology, Forensics, & Biology, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2027

Research Opportunity Student

Natasha Nwajiaku

Language(s) spoken: English (native), Igbo (intermediate)

Education: Psychology, Criminology, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2026

Research Opportunity Student

Holly Chan

Language(s) spoken: Cantonese (native), English & Mandarin (fluent), Korean (intermediate), Italian (learning)

Education: Forensic Psychology Specialist, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2026

Research Opportunity Student

Maneeha Tauheed

Language(s) spoken: Urdu (native), English (fluent)

Education: Health Sciences, Psychology & Chemistry

Expected Year of Graduation: 2025

Research Opportunity Student

Sama Al-Shammari

Language(s) spoken: Arabic (native), English (fluent), German (learning)

Education: Forensic Psychology & Biology, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2027

Work Study Student

Christopher Khalaf

Language(s) spoken: English, French, Arabic (fluent)

Education: Biotechnology Specialist, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2026

Work Study Student

Faith Young

Language(s) spoken: English (native), French & Cantonese (learning)

Education: Psychology & Biology, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2025

Work Study Student

Dua Khan

Language(s) spoken: English & Urdu (fluent), French (learning)

Education: Health Sciences and Psychology, UTM

Expected Year of Graduation: 2026