Alumni
The PhD in Educational Neuroscience (PEN) Program opened its doors to the first class of Ph.D. students in Fall 2013. The ground-breaking program is thrilled to recognize the students who have graduated and/or successfully defended their dissertation and are on the way to graduation.
Dr. Adam Stone
Alumnus, PEN
Dissertation: “Neural Systems for Infant Sensitivity to Rhythmic-Temporal Patterning"
Graduation: 2017
Current Position: Senior Analytics Engineer at Netlify
Dr. Stone (Dr. Laura-Ann Petitto, Advisor) is the inaugural graduate of the Ph.D. in Educational Neuroscience (PEN) program.
Dr. Stone's study explored the neural mechanisms that make possible an infant’s ability to find salient phonetic-syllabic units in the incoming language stream. This ability allows the child to distinguish between linguistic and non-linguistic input and to segment linguistic input into its constituent phonetic units. This ability is essential for all language learning, whether signed or spoken.
Dr. Stone worked in Dr. Petitto’s Brain and Language Laboratory for Neuroimaging (BL2).
While in PEN, Dr. Stone served on two prestigious grant-funded research projects: The W. M. Keck Foundation (Petitto, PI; “Seeing the Rhythmic Temporal Beats of Human Language”) and NSF INSPIRE (Petitto, PI; “The RAVE Revolution for Children with Minimal Language Experience”, IIS-1547178).
- Age of sign-speech bilingual language exposure and syntactic processing in deaf individuals with cochlear implants using functional near infrared spectroscopy
Petitto, L.A., Stone, A., Andriola, D., & Langdon, C. (2016, accepted). Age of sign-speech bilingual language exposure and syntactic processing in deaf individuals with cochlear implants using functional near infrared spectroscopy. Poster submitted for consideration at the Society for Neuroscience, Chicago, IL. (Stone true first author here.) - Common sign errors by young children acquiring a sign language
Stone, A. (2014, April). Common sign errors by young children acquiring a sign language. [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5SBeCW27dM - Detecting the rhythmic temporal patterning of language: Infants’ neural, physiological, and behavioral sensitivity
(3/5) Stone, A., Manini, B., Kartheiser, G., Malzkuhn, M., Langdon, C., Merla, A., & Petitto, L.A. (April, 2017). Detecting the rhythmic temporal patterning of language: Infants’ neural, physiological, and behavioral sensitivity. In L.A. Petitto (Chair), Discoveries about infant language learning and “readiness to learn” from integrated fNIRS, thermal IR, robot, and avatar sciences. Symposium conducted at Society for Research on Child Development, Austin, TX. - Evidence of maturational processes in linguistic brain (fNIRS) and psychological emotional (Thermal IR) responses in hearing infants to signing virtual humans
Manini, B., Kartheiser, G., Stone, A., Merla, A., & Petitto, L.A. (November, 2017). Evidence of maturational processes in linguistic brain (fNIRS) and psychological emotional (Thermal IR) responses in hearing infants to signing virtual humans. Poster Presentation at Society for Neuroscience, Washington, DC. View Poster. - Fingerspelling as a Gateway into Reading Fluency in Deaf Bilinguals
Stone, A., Kartheiser, G., Hauser, P.C., Petitto, L.A., & Allen, T.E., (2015). Fingerspelling as a Gateway into Reading Fluency in Deaf Bilinguals. PLoS ONE 10(10):e0139610. - Infants’ sensitivity to visual rhythmic-temporal patterning of language: An integrated fNIRS neuroimaging, thermal infrared imaging, and eye tracking investigation
Stone, A., Manini, B., Kartheiser, G., Langdon, C., Merla, A., & Petitto, L.A. (2016, San Diego). Infants’ sensitivity to visual rhythmic-temporal patterning of language: An integrated fNIRS neuroimaging, thermal infrared imaging, and eye tracking investigation. Poster presented at the meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, San Diego, CA. - Measuring visuospatial memory span in signers: Differences in the manual and computerized Corsi block tapping tests
Kartheiser, G., Stone, A., Petitto, L.A., & Allen, T. (January, 2016). Measuring visuospatial memory span in signers: Differences in the manual and computerized Corsi block tapping tests. 12th Theoretical Issues in Sign Language Research (TISLR), Melbourne, Australia. - Perceptual sensitivity to sonority in visual language: Native signers & naïve infants
Stone, A., Bosworth, R., & Petitto, L.A. (January, 2016). Perceptual sensitivity to sonority in visual language: Native signers & naïve infants. 12th Theoretical Issues in Sign Language Research (TISLR), Melbourne, Australia. - Physiological and behavioral correlates of babies’ social engagement with robot and virtual human artificial intelligence agents
(5/5) Manini, B., Tsui, K., Stone, A., Scassellati, B., Traum, D., Merla, A., & Petitto, L.A. (April, 2017). Physiological and behavioral correlates of babies’ social engagement with robot and virtual human artificial intelligence agents. In L.A. Petitto (Chair), Discoveries about infant language learning and “readiness to learn” from integrated fNIRS, thermal IR, robot, and avatar sciences. Symposium conducted at Society for Research on Child Development, Austin, TX. - Psycholinguistics: Milestones in. In P. Boudreault and G. Gertz (Eds.), The Deaf Studies Encyclopedia
Herzig, M., Clark, D., Baker, S., & Simms, L. (September 2015). Psycholinguistics: Milestones in. In P. Boudreault and G. Gertz (Eds.), The Deaf Studies Encyclopedia. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, Inc. - Sonority in Lexicalized Fingerspelling: Perception Studies With Infants and Adults
Stone, A., Bosworth, R., Petitto, L.A. (refereed abstract). (Submitted April 15, 2016 for January 2017.) Sonority in Lexicalized Fingerspelling: Perception Studies With Infants and Adults. Linguistics Society of America. Austin, Texas. - Sonority in lexicalized fingerspelling: Perception studies with infants and adults. In D. Brentari (Chair), The phonology of sign language fingerspelling: Beyond handshape sequences
Stone, A., Bosworth, R., & Petitto, L.A. (January, 2017). Sonority in lexicalized fingerspelling: Perception studies with infants and adults. In D. Brentari (Chair), The phonology of sign language fingerspelling: Beyond handshape sequences. Symposium conducted at the meeting of the Linguistics Society of America, Austin, TX. - Visual sign phonology: Insights into human reading and language from a natural soundless phonology
Petitto, L.A., Langdon, C., Stone, A., Andriola, D., Kartheiser, G., & Cochran, C. (2016). Visual sign phonology: Insights into human reading and language from a natural soundless phonology. WIREs Cognitive Science. - Visual sonority modulates infants’ attraction to sign language
Stone, A., Petitto, L.A., & Bosworth, R. (2017). Visual sonority modulates infants’ attraction to sign language. Language Learning and Development, 1-19. - “Teaching language to deaf infants with a robot and a virtual human.” Proceeding of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems pp.553; 1–553:13
Scassellati, B., Brawer, J., Tsui, K., Nasihati Gilani, S., Malzkuhn, M., Manini, B., Stone, A., Kartheiser, G., Merla, A., Shapiro, A., Traum, D., & Petitto. L.A. (2018). “Teaching language to deaf infants with a robot and a virtual human.” Proceeding of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems pp.553; 1–553:13. New York, N.Y., USA: ACM. ISBN 123-4567-24- 567/08/06.