There are two opportunities for involvement in Dr. Gary Raney's Language Research Lab:
1) I am looking for students who are interested in gaining research experience related to how people process language and read texts. My graduate students and I study issues such as the following: (a) how is figurative language comprehended? For example, do you create meaning for familiar metaphors, such as “my lawyer is a shark” in the same way as for unfamiliar metaphors, such as “life is a pencil”? (b) How is memory for language organized? For example, after reading a news article, do you store the exact words you read, do you store a paraphrased version in your own words, or do you not focus on words and store only the general meaning? (c) Do monolinguals and bilinguals process language in different ways? For example, when bilinguals read a text, do they think about the text in both languages? And when bilinguals talk to a group of other bilinguals, how do they switch between languages so easily without losing track of the meaning of the conversation? (d) How does what you read or hear in one situation influence your ability to understand something in a second situation? For example, if you listen to a song on your iPod and then read a text that uses some of the same words as the song, will this help you understand the words in the text or make the text more difficult to understand?
You can be involved in all stages of the research process, including conducting experiments, coding data, data analysis, and literature searches. You need to be available at least 6 hours per week (daytime hours) and you may volunteer or participate for credit (e.g., for your Honors activity). If you are interested in participating in the research on bilingualism, you must be a highly proficient speaker of Spanish (preferably native Spanish). There are no language requirements to participate in the other research projects. You do not need to be a Psychology major to work in my lab, but you must be interested in how people comprehend language.
Working in a research lab is a great way to gain experience and skills that enhance your opportunity to attend graduate school and possibly develop a capstone project. Recent and current capstone projects explore topics such as whether being bilingual influences mathematical problem solving, how different types of instruction influence vocabulary learning, whether the degree of hemispheric lateralization of language is similar for speakers of English and Gujarati, and whether the amount learned from a text is similar when the text is read to you or you read it yourself.
2) One component of Dr. Raney's research program on language processing involves measuring people’s eye movements as they read. I am looking for students who have well-developed programming skills to help me write programs to analyze the eye movement data. Preference will be given to individuals who can program in common languages such as Basic and C (or a derivative such as C++), or are skilled with Excel macros. You need to be available at least 6 hours per week (daytime hours). You may participate for credit (e.g., for your Honors activity) or volunteer, and you need to be available at least 6 hours per week (daytime hours). The work could lead to a capstone project. This is not a paid position. Working in a research lab is a great way to gain experience and skills that enhance your opportunity to attend graduate school.
Contact information.
If you are interested in working in Dr. Raney’s language lab, please contact me via email at geraney@uic.edu. More information about my research is available on my web site (www.uic.edu/~geraney). You can download an application from Dr. Raney’s web site (www.uic.edu/~geraney/helpwanted.htm) or send an application via the UIC Undergraduate Research Experience web site (http://www.uic.edu/uic/research/undergraduate/index.shtml).
