Sharice Clough CV

Currently a researcher at the Max Plank Institute for Psycholinguistics in the Netherlands and an adjunct assistant professor in CSD at Iowa, Sharice Clough’s research focuses on how adults with neurogenic communication disorders (e.g., traumatic brain injury, dementia, amnesia, aphasia) process and use language in rich communication contexts. Whereas assessment and treatment of communication difficulties in the clinic often focus on isolated skills in decontextualized environments, real-life communication is multimodal, interactive, and situated in rich contexts. The goal of her research program is to bring these features into the lab to increase the ecological validity and sensitivity of current assessment and treatment approaches. Some of the main themes of her research program include 1) examining how listeners process and integrate multiple social cues (e.g., speech, gesture, eye gaze, facial expression) during language processing, 2) investigating how speakers flexibly adapt communication for the needs of their listeners across multiple modalities and social demands, and 3) identifying the functions of gesture for supporting communication and cognition in individuals with brain injury. This research aims to better understand the cognitive and neural mechanisms that support multimodal communication and improve outcomes for individuals with brain injury.