Internship report

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European Master’s in Clinical Linguistics

Internship report

March 4

– August 9

, 2019

Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language (BCBL), Spain

Student: Karen Arellano

BCBL daily supervisor: Simona Mancini BCBL supervisor: Manuel Carreiras

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Table of contents

1. Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language (BCBL) ... 3

2. Research activities and outcomes ... 4

3. Additional academic activities ... 5

4. Reflection on the internship: application of prior knowledge and skills ... 7

5. Learning outcomes ... 9

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1. Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language (BCBL)

The BCBL is an interdisciplinary research center that focuses on research in Cognitive Neuroscience of Language with an emphasis in language processing and bilingualism. It is situated in San Sebastian, in the Basque Country, where over 50% of the population is Basque-Spanish bilingual. Thus, researchers at BCBL are not only able to study language processing in both languages but also to take into consideration diverse profiles in the bilingual spectrum in different populations: children with language disorders and typically developed, healthy adults and with acquired language disorders or neurodevelopmental diseases.

Research at BCBL can be divided in three main lines of investigation: 1) language, reading and developmental disorders, 2) multilingualism and second language learning, and 3) neurodegeneration, brain damage and healthy ageing. Related to those lines, ten different research groups with specific aims are established: Neurobiology of Language, Spoken Language, Consciousness, Speech and Bilingualism, Developmental Language Disorders, Language and Memory Control, Parkinson Disease and Neurodegeneration, Statistical learning and Neurolinguistics and Aphasia groups.

It was the general research aims of the center and its location what inspired me to apply for an opportunity to do my internship and master thesis with them. After a few years of teaching English and Spanish as a second language, I became interested in understanding the underlying processes that allow us to acquire a language different than our native one. Therefore, I decided second language acquisition to be the focus of my master thesis.

As one of the main research lines at BCBL is bilingualism and second language learning, I considered that being supervised by experienced researchers in that specific field would be an asset for the resulting work of my experiment; for me to learn more about second language research, and, in general, for my academic development. Furthermore, my thesis required external supervisors who were familiar with Spanish and a location where it would be more likely to find a Spanish speaking control group. Hence, BCBL was a unique opportunity for me to do my internship and master's thesis.

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2. Research activities and outcomes

During my stay at the center, I had two main research activities to perform: my own behavioral experiment and being a research assistant at the laboratory, both of which allowed me to gain hands-on knowledge of what research out of a classroom setting is like.

I developed a grammaticality judgement task online from beginning to end under the supervision of Simona Mancini and Manuel Carreiras. The procedure of how experiments at BCBL are planned and executed was taught to me. I was accompanied throughout the process. I started by writing a request form for the Ethical Committee, in which I provided an extended description of the experiment: aim, hypothesis, methods, and data analysis. For recruiting the control group of my study, a list of participants from the BCBL database was provided for me to invite them to take part in it. Finally, once I had collected the data, I was advised on how to analyze it and report it. On every stage of the process of my thesis, I had the opportunity to request support and feedback, not only from my main supervisors but also to the BCBL community in general: pre-doctoral students, postdocs and staff, who were always open to interact with me and made me part of the environment at the center.

On the other hand, I performed tasks as a research assistant at the laboratory. The BCBL has state-of-the-art equipment, such as behavioral laboratories, eye-tracking, a Baby lab, EEG cabins, MEG and MRI, to do research on language and cognition with different populations. I was considered on the lab schedule every week to learn and assist in EEG and eye-tracking experiments. The protocols to run an experiment with each technique were explained to me by the researcher or research assistant in charge of the specific study in which I was assisting every time.

Furthermore, I helped in the selection process of stimuli for an eye-tracking experiment in Spanish. I was taught how to use the corpus database ESPAL, developed by researchers from the center, in order to control for frequency in the selection of the words. Also, as a native speaker of Spanish, I was asked to select plausible combinations of specific words taking into account syntactic properties as well as other characteristics such as length.

5 By performing these activities under the supervision of experienced researchers in the Neuroscience field, I was able to reinforce theoretical knowledge gained throughout my previous studies and to experience what it is like to be part of such an impressive research center formed by people who are committed to science and linguistics.

3. Additional academic activities

The BCBL has a wide range of activities in which all the members are encouraged to participate. From formal lab meetings to events organized around the city, the center is committed to promoting the projects in which it is involved. It has a pretty close relationship and commits with the citizens of the city. The activities that took place during the months of my internship were the following:

Lab meetings

Every week, a meeting where all members of the center are invited to attend is held in order to hear oral presentations by staff scientists, discuss Human Resources issues and introduce new members. The presentations consist of advances at any stage in the development of research projects, such as project proposals, new data collected, preliminary results, or outcomes of completed projects. When held to converse about HR-related issues, all members of the BCBL community were able to share opinions and feedback in order to improve the working environment for everyone.

Neurolinguistics and Aphasia research group meetings

The BCBL has a variety of research groups. As an intern supervised by Simona Mancini, Neurolinguistics and Aphasia group leader, I attended their meetings. The purpose was to discuss research articles proposed by the members of the group and that even when all of us were carrying out different experiments; such articles would help us all. It was also space where we were able to rehearse our presentations and receive feedback in order to improve it.

Project presentations

This meeting is scheduled for PhD candidates, post-doctoral and guests researchers to present the progress of their research. BCBL members attending these presentations are

6 able to hear what their co-workers are working on, learn about different methodologies and approaches, and provide feedback and suggestions.

External speakers and conferences

The BCBL has strong collaborative relationships with different research and academic institutions that have common interests. Therefore, talks and conferences by researchers from international institutions were held often and all BCBL members were invited to attend. For instance, I was able to attend a symposium on Language and speech organized by BCBL and researchers from Maastricht University. Speakers from both institutions presented related work on the field promoting valuable discussions about their research outcomes and new directions.

Master and PhD dissertations

A Master and PhD program in Cognitive Neuroscience of Language are run at BCBL in collaboration with the University of the Basque Country. Sporadically, thesis dissertations take place at the center or at the university, and they are open for anyone at BCBL to attend. It was vital for me to be present at a couple of these presentations in order to get a glimpse of how dissertations of my academic level and higher function at other institutions, as well as to learn more about topics related to experimental linguistics using different paradigms.

Language sessions

Students and staff at BCBL come from everywhere around the world. Pre-doctoral students organized language classes in order to have the opportunity of learning each other's languages. French, Spanish, Basque and Italian sessions were incorporated once a week, and they were open to all people at the center. I had the opportunity to take classes of another Romance language for the first time (Italian) and experience from my own perspective how my native language helped me understanding more easily some aspects of what I was learning. Moreover, by attending the Basque lessons, I could get a little bit of knowledge about a language entirely different from the ones I speak and the culture in which I was immersed.

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Deaf awareness training

A 90-minute course of a basic introduction to communicating with deaf people was offered to the BCBL community. The course included basic sign language and fingerspelling, and guidelines about communication strategies.

Pint of science

This is the name of an international event, and it happens at the same time at different cities around the world. For three days, scientific presentations from various research centers are held at bars. The main objective of this is to bring, in conventional terms and a comfortable setting, some of the discoveries that scientific organizations have obtained and to explain the research to which they are committed to. Pre-doctoral students from BCBL presented broad topics that covered most of the research that takes place in the center. For instance, the attendees to the event had the opportunity to get an idea of how we acquire our native language, why Neuroscience is essential in education, what makes the human brain different compared to machines, how the brain is studied by looking at its oscillations and how bilingualism influences in particular brain abilities.

Overall, I had the opportunity to witness how the BCBL community work together in order to have a wide range of events for them to interact with each other, share their work, thoughts and critiques in a professional and comfortable environment. Throughout my stay at the center, I was always invited to participate in all the academic and non-academic events organized. Attending such events, made me feel part of the community and enriched my research internship experience more than I could have expected from the beginning.

4. Reflection on the internship: application of prior knowledge and skills

Prior to my internship, I acquired theoretical knowledge on the procedures to follow in order to propose, plan, design and carry out an experiment in psycho- and neurolinguistics. During the first semester of my Master studies, there were three specific courses that I can consider the most important and the basis of my training in doing research in experimental linguistics. Namely, the Propedeutics course in methodology, the

8 Experimental Linguistics Laboratory course and the Introductory Statistics class. Later, interactive courses in general topics in Neurolinguistics and Psycholinguistics, as well as more specific ones, such as First and Second Language acquisition, Developmental Language Disorders, Aphasiology, etc., encouraged me to approach research papers critically and inspired me to be more interested in finding “research gaps” and commit to one for my master thesis. However, the theoretical and practical application of such knowledge widely differs and it was more challenging than I expected.

First, all previous courses required me to read numerous scientific papers and evaluate their methodology approaches in order to find their assets and limitations. To a certain extent, it was easy to identify, for example, the reduced number of variables, items or participants in “this paper”, or the outnumbered ones in “that paper”. It was until I created my own and helped to generate a list of stimuli that I experienced from my own perspective the difficulties that come along during this process - for instance, controlling for multiple factors that could influence the participants’ responses, like frequency, length and plausibility-. Moreover, the challenges that researchers have to face when implementing their experiments are not usually found in their papers. In my case, in order to recruit participants with the profile that I needed, I ran a study online. From the beginning, I had the impression that an online experiment was going to require less time to collect data since the individuals are not interviewed in person one by one. I had to overcome other obstacles, such as constant technical issues with the platform supporting the experiment, or finding a way to compensate participants without having to deal with data confidentiality.

Second, as mentioned before, I had taken two introductory courses to statistical data before the internship. During these classes, I was taught procedures of how to analyze sets of data provided by the professors, and how to navigate and utilize the R software for descriptive and statistical analysis. Although, it was helpful for me to be already familiar with R, analyzing real-life data turned out to be more challenging without the guidance of a professor in front of me. However, the experience of my supervisors and their openness to advise me how to correctly manage and inspect the data collected for my master thesis was a significative lesson that I gained during this period.

9 Finally, as a student at the University of Groningen (UG), I had the opportunity to assist a senior master student on an EEG experiment. Specifically, I would assist in putting gel in the electrodes and once the experiment had finished, cleaning the cap. However, the protocols to be followed vary from one institution to another, especially protocols at a research center much equipped. Thus, as an intern at the BCBL laboratory, I could make use of what I learned at UG, but more importantly, I gained more knowledge since every step from beginning to end of an experiment where taught to me and I was able to observe many experiments and assist the researchers to whom I was assigned.

I believe that by applying in practice what I learned throughout the graduate university courses enriched my academic and professional development quite positively and inspired me to consider staying in the path of doing research in experimental linguistics.

5. Learning outcomes

The research internship that I did at BCBL from March to August 2019 represents one of the academic and professional activities that have provided me with more knowledge and valuable experience throughout my career in experimental linguistics. I was able to apply previous knowledge and to gain experience of what it is like to be immersed in a research center.

Having the opportunity to demonstrate and apply the knowledge gained during the previous semesters of the EMCL program allowed me to reinforce it but most importantly, to improve it due to being working independently, rather than as a student in a classroom. I was able to plan, design and run my own behavioral experiment independently, and to collect data and analyze it. I learned to overcome the difficulties of maintaining the experiment available at an online website and to effectively communicate not only with the participants - who would approach me to solve their doubts or problems when running the experiment- but also with my supervisors to keep them updated about the progress of the study and to ask for advice. Moreover, by designing such a project, I gained more specific knowledge about dealing with grammaticality judgement tasks and second language acquisition.

10 Since the researchers at BCBL come from different disciplines, the research to which I was exposed during this period of time at the lab meetings and project presentations, was widely diverse that it encouraged me to learn more about different methodological approaches in experimental linguistics and cognition, as well as to broaden my perspective of research in general. All the additional academy activities allowed me not only to interact with researchers at different points of their careers but also, with the administrative staff that supports such institutions to keep running smoothly. Therefore, the environment in which I was immersed for the past months provided me with even more knowledge than the one that I was expecting.

In conclusion, I consider that my internship at BCBL was a great milestone in my academic career because I had the opportunity to learn and improve as an initial researcher. Furthermore, I accomplished the expected learning outcomes demonstrating to be able to develop my own study and to work in a research environment with professionals from different disciplines and amount of experience in the field.

6. Acknowledgements

This internship report is the result of a partnership with people whom I would like to express my gratitude for their significantly valuable time, guidance and support during my stay at BCBL. Thanks to Manuel Carreiras (BCBL director) for considering and accepting me to be part of the BCBL community. Also for being open to advise and interact with me whenever I needed it.

My biggest and most sincere gratitude is to Simona Mancini (Neurolinguistics and Aphasia group leader) for guiding me through all these months. My smooth and enjoyable stay at BCBL would not have been possible without her valuable suggestions, advice and time spent with me.

Finally, I would also like to thank all the staff at BCBL: pre-doctoral, post-doctoral and staff researchers, research assistants and administrative staff, all of whom were always welcoming and willing to share their support, knowledge and opinions.