Alexandra Jesse (PI)
Associate Professor, Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences
Adjunct Faculty, Department of Linguistics & Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences
Faculty Member in the Neuroscience and Behavior Program
Dr. Jesse (she/her) investigates how humans recognize speech from hearing and seeing a speaker. She has received a Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of California, Santa Cruz in 2005. She then worked as a researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, The Netherlands, before joining the UMass faculty in 2010. Dr. Jesse’s work has been supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG), the Dutch Research Council (NWO), the Max Planck Society, and the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Dr. Jesse is an Executive Board member of the Auditory-Visual Speech Association (AVISA).
Current Lab Members
Graduate Researchers
Andy Wen (he/him)
Andy is a Ph.D. student in Cognition and Cognitive Neuroscience. Andy’s work in audiovisual speech perception focuses on understanding how humans integrate auditory and visual cues to process spoken language. He is interested in using deep learning and machine learning techniques to provide new insights to speech perception.
Qing Zhao (she/her)
Qing is a Ph.D. student in Cognition and Cognitive Neuroscience. Her research interests include audio-visual speech perception and conscious processing of speech.
Yun Zou (he/him)
Yun is a Ph.D. student in Cognition and Cognitive Neuroscience. His research interests include Chinese visual character/word recognition, spoken word identification, and auditory-visual speech perception.
Undergraduate Researchers
Margot Asmus (she/her)
Margot is studying Linguistics, French, and Speech, Language and Hearing sciences. She is currently doing her Honors Thesis in the lab using eye-tracking. After graduating, she plans to pursue a career in Speech-Language Pathology.
Abigail DeFrancesco (she/her) [Media Specialist]
Abigail is majoring in Psychology with a minor in Business. After graduating, she plans to pursue a Master’s degree in Psychology.
Evgenia Evdokimenko (she/her)
Evgenia is majoring in Linguistics with a minor in French. After graduating, she plans to pursue a Master’s degree in Speech-Language Pathology.
Lily Faillaci (she/her)
Lily is majoring in Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences with a minor in Education and Psychology. After graduating, she plans to pursue a Master’s degree in Speech-Language Pathology.
Andrea Hester (she/her)
Andrea is majoring in Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences with a minor in Spanish. After graduating, she plans to pursue a Master’s degree is Speech Language Pathology.
Fadila Krieche (she/her)
Fadila is majoring in Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences with a minor in Information Technology. After graduating she plans to pursue a Master’s degree in Speech-Language Pathology.
Sujin Lee (she/her)
Sujin is majoring in Computational Linguistics and minoring in French. After graduation, she plans to pursue a Master’s degree in Linguistics.
Daniel Numa Martin (He/Him)
Daniel is majoring in Linguistics. After graduating he plans to pursue a Master’s degree in Linguistics.
Neve Modlin (she/her) [Lab Manager]
Neve is majoring in Psychology on the Neuroscience track. After graduating, she plans to apply to PA school to become a certified and practicing Physician Assistant.
Jessica Murray (she/her)
Jessica is majoring in Psychology. After graduating, she plans to pursue a Master’s degree.
Amy Nguyen (she her)
Amy is majoring in Psychology on the Neuroscience track and Biochemistry. After graduating, she plans to delve more into research before going into dental school.
Seila Osmanovic (she/her)
Seila is majoring in Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, primarily focusing on medical speech pathology. After graduating, she plans to pursue a Master’s degree in Communication Disorders.
Evan Owens (he/him)
Evan is majoring in Linguistics and Portuguese with a minor in Anthropology. After graduating, he plans to pursue a Ph.D. in Language Documentation and Revitalization.
Nina Peukert (she/her)
Nina is majoring in linguistics. After graduating, she plans to pursue a Master’s degree in Speech-Language Pathology.
Saniya Rajagopal (she/her) [Eye-tracking Lab Manager]
Saniya is majoring in Psychology on the Neuroscience Track. She is also currently pursuing her Master’s degree in Data Analytics and Computational Social Sciences, which she will complete after graduating undergraduate.
Ada Shavo (she/her)
Ada is majoring in Linguistics. After graduating, she plans to pursue a Master’s degree in Sociolinguistics.
Anastasia Tolstoy (she/her)
Anastasia is majoring in Linguistics and Economics. After graduating, she plans to pursue a Master’s degree in Language Acquisition/Education.
Collaborators at other institutions (current and past)
Margriet Groen – Lancaster University, UK
Khalil Iskarous – University of Southern California
Esther Janse – Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands
Elizabeth Johnson – University of Toronto at Mississauga
Dom Massaro – University of California, Santa Cruz
James McQueen – Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition & Behavior, Centre for Cognition, and Behavioral Science Institute, Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands, and Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
Rochelle Newman – University of Maryland, College Park
Dennis Norris – MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, Cambridge, UK
Lynne Nygaard – Emory University, Atlanta
Mike Page – University of Hertfordshire, Hertfordshire, UK
Andrea Weber – University of Tuebingen, Germany
LIPS lab alumni
Undergraduate Research Assistants
Zoya Achildiyev, Ashley Agostinelli, Tess Anicipink, Kelsey Akin, Christopher Baron, Michael Bartoli, Emilee Bates, Ashley Boulanger, Jessica Bowe, Chantel Brennan, Emmaline Brown, Katherine DeVane Brown, Sarah Bryand, Jessica Buell, Bella Cerulle, Renee Clark, Rachel Combs, Jeremy Doiron, Amelia Dyer, Deanna Ferrante, Alexander Fine, Hannah Franz, Kelly Fuller, John Gallagher, Marissa Gallan, Emily Gardner, Olivia Giles, Sarah Hammond, Anarose Hogan, Lauren Hourican, Allison Janineh, Joanna Kalucki, Melissa Karp, Smriti Karwa, Greis Kasofo, Alexander Kinney, Sarah Kneip, Anna Kohlberg, Austin Kopack, Sarah Laakso, Anna Lam, Emma Leahey, Joshua Levin, Alexa Livingstone, Justine Loi, Victoria Lord, Lauren Lyon, Erin McCarthy, Benjamin McLaughlin, Sam Melo, Alexis Melvin, Andre Michalowski, Annika Monkarsh, Thomas Morton, Robert Moura, Grace Murray, Thanh-Ai Nguyen, Bridget North, Timothy Noonan, Charlotte Olson, Amanda Orlando, Rebecca Pacheco, Erica Paille, Bhavya Pant, Sarabeth Parent, Anna Paterson, Bridget Price, Kara Rancourt, Alexander Roll, Paul Saba, Yuhan Shao, Megan Sorel, Christina Steinmann, Megan Stoutenburgh, Gabrielle St. Pierre, Noah Sullivan, Adam Whitmore.
Postbac Researchers
Dominique Simmons, Bernadette Ojukwu
Graduate Student Researchers
Chiung-Yu Chang, Bethany Dickerson, Len Jacobs, David Kajander, Elina Kaplan, Sarah Laakso, Jessica Rhodes, Patrick v.d. Zande