Center for Perception and Communication in Children
Current Projects
CPCC Project Leads benefit from the combined research experience of more senior research faculty at BTNRH who serve as Core Directors and Internal Mentors. Investigators also benefit from the unique patient resources and translational research environment at BTNRH. We are in the process of expanding the research program to include work on development language disorders and cognitive functioning in children who are typically developing.
Principle Investigator: Gabrielle Merchant, Au.D., Ph.D.
Our current work is focused on improving the differential diagnosis of ear infections and middle-ear fluid (otitis media). Otitis media is one of the most common childhood diseases, but there is little consensus with respect to treatment options, which include watch-and-wait approaches, antibiotic use, and surgical placement of pressure equalization (PE) tubes. Currently, there is no evidence-based method to determine which treatment option is most appropriate for a given patient. The goal of this project is to develop methods to differentiate variations in otitis media in order to guide treatment decisions. Differentiating cases of otitis media that require treatment from those that do not would represent a substantial advance in terms of public health. Our findings have the potential to influence the understanding and therapeutic management of childhood hearing loss related to otitis media.
This project is funded by a NIH Centers for Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE) grant (NIH-NIGMS / 5P20GM109023-04).
Principle Investigator: Kaylah Lalonde, Ph.D.
Visual speech helps in many ways. It helps us to know when to listen, fills in missing auditory speech information, and helps to separate speech from similar competing sounds. We are studying how well children at various ages can use visual speech in these different ways. Experiments examine how sensitive children are to different audiovisual cues and how much these different mechanisms contribute to individual differences in children's audiovisual speech enhancement.
This project is funded by a NIH Centers for Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE) grant (NIH-NIGMS / 5P20GM109023-04).
Principle Investigator: Angela AuBuchon, Ph.D.
Working memory is important for making sense of language. We can only hear or read words one-at-a-time. Therefore, we must hold onto the words—and their order—while simultaneously creating meaning and thinking about our own response. Children with hearing loss must especially rely on working memory. Because the auditory signal they get is sometimes ambiguous, children with hearing loss often problem-solve to work out the meaning of what they hear.
Principle Investigator: Hope Sparks Lancaster, Ph.D.
The overall goal of the Etiologies of Language and Literacy Laboratory is to understand how our genes and environment influence language and literacy development so that we can help develop early identification methods for children at risk of language and literacy disorders.