Katie Tetzloff

Assistant Professor

Ph.D. 2022, University Massachusetts  Amherst

Personal Website: ktetzloff.wordpress.com 

Katerina's research spans the fields of phonology and speech language pathology. In phonology, she investigates cross-linguistic interactions in bilingual phonological systems, with a particular interest in heritage speakers of Spanish in the U.S. She uses experimental methods to examine how bilinguals navigate competing phonological constraints, and she aims to model these patterns using both theoretical and computational approaches. She is also interested in using fMRI to investigate the neural underpinnings of bilingual phonological representations and processing. In speech language pathology, her work centers on how listeners perceive and adapt to speech degraded by motor speech disorders, such as dysarthria and apraxia of speech. Rather than focusing solely on the speaker with the speech disorder, her research emphasizes the role of the listener, investigating how perceptual learning can be used to improve intelligibility of the disordered speech. By shifting part of the communicative burden from the speaker to the listener, this work aims to improve real-world communication outcomes for individuals with motor speech disorders.