Research

* Our lab is located in Cherry Hall, room 220 *

At the Language & Cognition lab, we are interested in what language can reveal beyond the meaning of words. We study language using a neuro-cognitive and a social-phenomenological lens.

One line of work is how emotion is expressed, perceived, and managed via language, especially going beyond the level of single words. This means asking questions such as: what can our language reveal about how we feel, how can what we say impact the feelings of others, and how can we use language as a tool to build and grow relationships? 

A second line of work is characterizing and understanding real-life language behavior. For this, we leverage large text datasets or recordings of naturalistic speech to uncover the hidden details of language behavior beyond the lab. For example, we are interested in the details of naturalistic swearing, how much time we spent in conversations on a day-to-day basis, or how mental health is reflected in language.

Active projects

Here is a (non-exhaustive) list of currently ongoing projects in the lab in various stages.

  • Does aging well mean being well?

    June 18, 2026

    This project uses topic modelling of older adults' verbal responses to the question "what does aging well mean to you?" to understand how their understanding of aging well might reflect their...

  • Psychology of Self-talk

    June 18, 2026

    How, when, and why do people self-talk? This project uses archival data of naturalistic sound recordings of people's daily life to assess self-talk (meaning talking while alone). 

    Status: data...