Welcome to the webpage for the
Prosodic Studies Group (GrEP)

The Prosodic Studies Group (GrEp) is part of the Unitat de Recerca en Lingüística (UR-Ling), Department of Translation and Language Sciences at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra

AIM

To understand the role of prosody and co-speech gestures in human communication from a crosslinguistic, developmental, and cognitive perspective. Three important strands of this research include: (a) to incorporate this knowledge into semantic models of language that model the interface areas with other components; (b) to empirically investigate how humans process prosodic and gestural patterns in combination with speech; and (c) to investigate the cognitive and developmental benefits of prosody and gesture in different areas, such as first and second language acquisition, as well as communication training for language impaired and non-impaired populations. The social significance of this research topic is high, as ICT training procedures based on prosodic and gestural awareness can be proven valuable to improve language abilities in populations with neurodevelopmental disorders characterized by impaired language and social interaction.   

APPROACH

We use an interdisciplinary approach (linguistic and psychological) and a combination of methods and techniques such as linguistic and prosodic/gestural analysis, comparative (developmental, cross-linguistic) and experimental methods such as eye-tracking and neuronal analysis techniques in collaboration with other groups.

LOCATION & CONTACTS

Address:
Department of Translation and Language Sciences, Universitat Pompeu Fabra
C\ Roc Boronat, 138, 08018 Barcelona, Spain

Contact: Pilar Prieto
E-mail: pilar.prieto AT upf.edu
Phone : +34 93 542 2311

FUNDING

Our research projects are funded by public sources including:

Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (MICINN)
Agència de Gestió d'Ajuts Universitaris i de Recerca (AGAUR)
Obra Social La Caixa (RECERCAIXA)

JOB ANOUNCEMENTS

FPI 2022 - Call for a research scholarship to carry out the doctoral thesis in Multimodal Language Acquisition and Learning

Description:The research group Group of Prosodic and Gesture Studies and Prosody Lab at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra (Barcelona, Catalonia) announces an opening for a 4-year doctoral support position associated with.the project "Multimodal Communication (MCOM): The integration of prosody and gesture in human communication and in language learning" (PID2021-123823NB-I00), funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation. The goal of the project is to analyze from an experimental perspective how human prosodic and gesture patterns are integrated in language and how they can together help boost language learning.
The scholarship is financed through the Research Personnel Training program (FPI) of the Spanish Ministry of Science at EC-GREP group and will lead to the development of a doctoral thesis in the Department of Translation and Language Sciences at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF). The FPI-2021 scholarships have a duration of up to 4 years and an annual gross salary of approximately € 16,250 for the first and second annuities, € 17,410 for the third and € 21,760 for the fourth. The position includes a monthly stipend, coverage by the Social Security system, and university fees related to doctoral study. The contract also includes the possibility of applying for a grant for a short-term internship in a lab abroad.

Specialty Areas: Linguistics / Bilingual language acquisition / Embodied Cognition / Narrative Intervention.

Application process: If you are interested, please contact Pilar Prieto (see contact information below) as soon as possible, and no later than January 20, 2023. Interested candidates are requested to send a motivation letter, a CV and a sample publication.
Interested parties will have to send their official application through the Spanish Ministry's website, providing the required documentation on the website from 12/01/2023 to 22/01/2023.

Contact information: pilar.prieto@upf.edu

Mailing Address for Applications:
Attn: Pilar Prieto
DTCL/Universitat Pompeu Fabra
Roc Boronat 138
Barcelona Catalunya 08018

RECENT BOOKS

Frota, S. & Prieto, P. (2015). Intonation in Romance. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Prieto, P. & Esteve-Gibert, N. (Eds.) (2018). The Development of Prosody in First Language Acquisition. John Benjamins: Amsterdam.

YOUTUBE CHANNEL

Follow us in Youtube. We will be posting videos from conferences and different materials used in our research. To subscribe just click HERE.

Research

Intonational and gestural meaning in human languages To advance in a prosodic transcription system for the Romance languages.

Developing standards for Prosodic Labeling: The International Prosodic Alphabet (IPrA) To analyze the phonological function and meaning of intonational contrasts.

Audiovisual Prosody To study the relationship between gesture, prosody, and linguistic structures.

Prosody and gesture as bootstrapping mechanisms in language development Prosodic and gestural development and its relationship to the acquisition of meaning.

Cognitive benefits of gesture-speech semantic and temporal integration How are gestures and prosodic structure temporally coordinated?

Cognitive processing of prosody To determine how prosodic strategies can modify the attention and memory levels of the listener.

Prosodic and gestural communication as bootstrapping mechanisms of language development. Testing a new treatment paradigm for ASD and LI developmental disorder To study the beneficial effects of prosody and gestures in general learning tasks, as well as first language and second language acquisition.

Before their first words (RecerCaixa Project 2014) The aim of this project was to assess the extent to which language precursors predict the infant’s later linguistic development.

Scaffolding language: neurobiological responses to gesture-speech integration in native and second language speech This project investigates the potential benefits of gesture-prosody integration in dealing with speech in a second language.