She earned her BA in Linguistics from Boston University and her PhD in Linguistics with a specialization in Cognitive Science from Northwestern University. After completing her PhD, she served as a postdoctoral researcher at the Basque Center on Cognition, Brain, and Language and Michigan State University before moving to Oregon. Her research primarily focuses on phonetics, laboratory phonology, and psycholinguistics, with special attention to issues in second language acquisition. She has published in a number of journals and currently serves as the Linguistics editor for WIREs Cognitive Science. She also serves as chair of the Committee on the Status of Women in Linguistics. She enjoys teaching a range of courses at the UO, but especially loves teaching general education courses. Her two favorite things to talk about are how much she loves baseball and hockey and how much she loves her job.