News – Laboratory for Communication Science

Professor Brendan Weekes gave a talk entitled “Diffusing the Bilingual Lexicon” at the Research Staff Symposium in the Department of Psychology, University of Cambridge. You can watch the talk here.
The Laboratory for Communication Science, Faculty of Education, University of Hong Kong will be hosting an International Advanced Study Workshop virtually from 23rd to 25th of June 2021, with a special opening session June 15th. The goal of the conference is to analyze gaps in health needs and response capacity for sustainable, quality care of seniors in the Greater Bay Area of China and will focus on action plans to promote healthy ageing from epidemiological, psychological, social care and public health perspectives. It is organised by Professor Brendan Weekes and Dr. Maria Teresa Carthery-Goulart at the University of Hong Kong and will be held ONLINE on the Zoom platform.

Program Information:
The full programme is now freely available to view on
the conference website (https://ipndgba.edu.hku.hk/programme). Registration is free and still open via https://ipndgba.edu.hku.hk/register
Maria has been appointed Scientific Officer with Tobii in Stockholm. Congratulations Maria.
Prof. Brendan Weekes gave a talk on “Bilingual Brains” at Cambridge University Linguistic Society. You can watch the talk here.
Prof. Brendan Weekes and Dr. Maria Shendyapina who has moved to a new academic career in Sweden.
Prof. Brendan Weekes at the Royal Society (London) participating in conference series Breakthrough Science and Technologies: Transforming Our Future for Healthy Aging 2020.
Professor Weekes awarded the Prestigious Fellowship Fellowship in Humanities and Social Sciences from the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong 2020. Please see the award here.
Prof. Brendan Weekes spoke for the 2019 UNESCO Year of Indigenous Languages in several countries.

Brazil

Israel

Japan

Paris

Russia

Zambia

UN, Geneva

LCS at Academy of Aphasia 2019, Macau.

Prof. Brendan Weekes attended the 10th APRU Population Aging Conference, Tokyo, Japan, October 2019. For further information see the conference page (https://www.keio.ac.jp/en/news/2019/Oct/24/48-64039/).
LCS at AmLaP 2019, Moscow, Russia.
A four-session workshop “An Introductory Workshop on Linear Mixed Effects Modelling for Language and Speech Sciences” was organized by our lab, HKU, June-July. The instructors were Dr. Christophe Coupe (Department of Linguistics, HKU), Dr. Cherry Yum (Department of Special Education and Counselling, EdUHK), and Dr. Mohammad Momenian (Division of Speech and Hearing Sciences, HKU).
Professor Weekes had a seminar on “Literacy in Contact: Reading and Writing in Multiliterate Speakers along the Silk Road” at Department of Linguistics, HKU, May 2019.

BNU-HKU Forum, May, 2019.

30 years of Speech and Hearing Sciences at the University of Hong Kong.

Association for Reading and Writing in Asia (ARWA) meeting in Goa, February, 2019.

Professor Weekes had a meeting and invited lecture at University of Hyderabad (Mishra Lab), March, 2019.

Professor Weekes delivered a Keynote Address at the International Conference on Indigenous Languages, Cultures and Societies of India during 21-22 February 2019 at the University of Hyderabad. This was in conjunction with UNESCO declaring 2019 as the Year of Indigenous Languages Opening in Paris on January 28th, 2019.

Testing reading and writing with visually impaired undergraduates at the University of Hyderabad, February, 2019.

Professor Weekes will deliver the Keynote Address at the 19th Annual Conference of the Japan Developmental Dyslexia Association (JDRA) 6-7 July, 2019 in Kumamoto prefecture, Kyushu island https://jdyslexia.com/
Professor Weekes will present a poster at the 3rd Conference of Association for Reading and Writing in Asia, February 28th, Goa.
Assistant/Associate professor job in “Language Neuroscience” at the University of Texas, Health Science Center in Houston. Please see the ad here.
Professor Weekes visited the Institute of Control and Prevention for Chronic Non-Communicable Diseases, Guangdong Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention (GDCDC) and delivered an Invited Lecture on Dementia and Language, December, 2018.

Professor Weekes celebrated Christmas in Beijing with Professor Ruiwang Huang from the Institute for Brain Research and Rehabilitation, South China Normal University, December, 2018.

Prof. Brendan Weekes visited Dr Ling Wang at the Institute for Brain Research and Rehabilitation, South China Normal University, December, 2018

“Farewell” Dim Sum for Distinguished Visiting Professor Marslen-Wilson and “welcome” to Professor Lorraine Tyler (Sin Wai-Kin Distinguished Visiting Professor in the Humanities and LCS, University of Hong Kong).

Cindy presented her research in the LCS, November 2018
David presented his confirmation materials in the LCS, November, 2018

Phil presented his research on CSL in Hong Kong in the LCS, November, 2018
Distinguished Visiting Prof William Marslen-Wilson, University of Cambridge and University of Hong Kong, visited LCS on November, 2018. During the visit, he gave two outstanding research presentations with details:

Congratulations Keerthi for successfully completing your PhD. The respected examiners were Prof. Judith Kroll from UC, Riverside, Prof. Gigi Luk from Harvard, and Prof. Akaysha Tang from Hong Kong University.

Happy Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful night with our distinguished guests from Cambridge and Hong Kong.

Prof. Brendan Weekes visited the China Centre for Disease Control, November, 2018.

Prof. Brendan Weekes visited the Graduate School of Education, Peking University, November, 2018.

Professor Brendan Weekes gave a talk on “Dementia and Language” at Division of Elderly Health, National Chinese Center for Non-communicable Diseases, November, 2018.

Keerthi was given the best presentation award in International Symposium on Bilingualism and Cognition at the Birla Institute of Technology & Science Pilani – KK Birla Campus, Goa, India, November 1-3, 2018. Congratulation Keerthi.
Maria attended IBRO-APRC School on Neural Plasticity in Health and Disease at the Department of Physiology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Ansari Nagar, New Delhi, India, from 21st October to 4th November 2018. She gave a presentation on “Cognitive Deficits and Neural Changes in Stroke: A Structural MRI Study” too.

LCS presented three posters at the Academy of Ahasia, 21-23 October, Montreal and had a pastrami feast with LCS colleagues.

Professor Stephen Bradforth, Divisional Dean for Natural Sciences and Mathematics at USC visited LCS from October 12-28, 2018 when he delivered a series of talks and workshops on Education for STEM.

Maria gave a talk on “stroke rehabilitation” at Monash University, Australia.

Professor Brendan Weekes will be giving a keynote speech at the International Symposium on Bilingualism and Cognition at the Birla Institute of Technology & Science Pilani – KK Birla Campus, Goa, India, November 1-3, 2018. Please visit the symposium website for further information.
Professor Brendan Weekes will be giving a keynote speech at The Fifth Annual Conference of the Association for Cognitive Science at the Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati, India, October, 10-12, 2018. Please visit the symposium website for further information.
Professor Professor Weekes spoke at Petitto’s Brain and Language Lab for Neuroimaging (BL2) on “The Bilingual Brain” on October 18, 2018.

Farewell Dinner for Visiting Professor Archangeli and colleagues from Linguistics.

Laboratory for Communication Science (LCS) organized a seminar where new researchers who had recently joined HKU presented their works to other new colleagues, September 21, 2018. The details of the seminar were as follows:
Professor Akaysha Tang: Tracking brain functional network activity with EEG during natural reading and natural speech production.

Dr Guang Ouyang: Single-trial (single-event) event-related potential estimation using RIDE.

Dr Rui Sun: EEG-based neural feedback for rehabilitation
Dr Jonathon Yip: Articulatory Phonetics

Dr Christophe Coupé: Linguistic Diversity

Dr Jonathan Havenhill: Sound Systems

Dr Mohammad Momenian: Light Verb Constructions

Professor Diana Archangeli, University of Arizona, will be visiting our lab from September 15 – 29, 2018.
During the visit, she will give two seminars with details as follows:
Seminar 1
Title:   Adult Grammar from a Child’s Perspective
Date:    September 19, 2018 (Wednesday)
Time:   12:45 – 14:00
Venue: Room 802, Meng Wah Complex, HKU
Please register at: https://hkuems1.hku.hk/hkuems/ec_regform.aspx?guest=Y&ueid=59574

Seminar 2 (co-organised with School of Humanities)

Title: Concrete Analysis of Abstract Segments: Absolute Neutralization in an Emergent Grammar

Date:    September 20, 2018 (Thursday)
Time:   15:30 – 16:30
Venue: Room 4.04, Run Run Shaw Tower, HKU
Mohammad held a workshop on “Linear Mixed Effects (LME) Models“ at University of Tehran, September 2018, Iran.

Gabe and Maria had a drink with Stalin in Melbourne, September, 2018.
Professor Brendan Weekes presented a talk on “Bilingualism and the Brain” at King’s College, August 2018, UK.

Professor Brendan Weekes and Cindy had a visit to Brunel University, August 2018, UK.

David presented a poster titled “The Needle and the Damage Done: Expressing and Managing Pain in EEG Experiments” at ICCA, July 2018, UK.

Keerthi presented a poster titled “Language Distance Drives Adaptive Effects in the Anterior Cingulate Cortex in Bilinguals” at OHBM Annual Meeting, 17-21 June 2018, Singapore.

Professor Weekes hosted a symposium on “Reading Across Scripts” at SSSR in Brighton, July 2018 and caught up with his old “boss” Pennie Ingram at Sussex.

Professor Weekes worked at the Evelina London Children’s Hospital (St Thomas’s) and learned how to scan neonate brains.

Congratulations! Faculty of Education at the University of Hong Kong ranked number 6 (QS) globally.
Professor Brendan Weekes has been appointed Professorial Fellow at Melbourne Graduate School of Education (QS ranked number 5).
Visit from Professor Vincent Clark (Mind Research Network, University of New Mexico).

Visit by Professor Weekes to the University of Queensland (Neuropsychology Center, Robinson Lab).

Visit by Professor Weekes to IBM China (in Beijing).
Congratulations to Cindy, our year 4 undergraduate at the lab! She was awarded the prestigious HKU Undergraduate Research Fellowship Programme to conduct part of her research during summer 2018 at the Centre for Speech, Language, and the Brain, University of Cambridge.

Prof. Brendan Weekes gave a talk on “Education and Neuroscience” at the Graduate School of Education, Peking University, supported by KC Wong Foundation (June, 2018).

Prof. Brendan Weekes gave a talk on “Neuroscience for Education” at Faculty of Education, University of Kathmandu (May, 2018). Watch the video here.
Keynote by Professor Brendan Weekes at Neuroscience Society of Nepal, IBRO, Kathmandu (May, 2018).

Dr. Rosa Kwok from Coventry University talked about “Digging into your data: Why Linear Mixed Effect Modelling may help you get a higher score on your final year project” in a workshop organized by our lab on 23 May 2018. Watch the videos here (Part 1, Part 2).
Congratulations to Yoyo, Tommy, and Kyle for successfully completing their studies and presenting their interesting works at the Annual Dissertation Presentation Day, 18 May 2018.

Invited Speaker, School of Psychology (McKague Lab), Melbourne (March, 2018).
Invited Speaker, Faculty of Education e-learning Innovator Seminar on Flipped Class.
Maria presented a poster titled “Cognitive Profile of Cerebrovascular Disease: From Small Vessel Disease to Chronic Stroke” at 41st Annual Brain Impairment Conference, 3-5 May 2018, Adelaide, Australia.
Brendan and Keerthi presented a poster titled “Language Distance Drives Adaptive Effects in the Anterior Cingulate Cortex ” at 45th Annual Conference of the Australasian Society for Experimental Psychology, 4-7 April 2018, Tamania, Austrailia.

New paper titled “Developing a Cantonese Version of Birmingham Cognitive Screen for Stroke Survivors in Hong Kong” was published in Communication Disorders Quarterly.
New paper titled “Bilingualism and healthy aging: Aging effects and neural maintenance” was published in Neuropsychologia.
New paper titled “Preliminary validation study of the Russian Birmingham Cognitive Screen” was published in Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology.
Professor Weekes was an Invited Speaker, School of Psychology (McKague Lab), Melbourne (March, 2018).
Professor Weekes was an Invited Speaker, Faculty of Education e-learning Innovator Seminar on Flipped Class.
Professor Weekes was an Invited Speaker, Language and Cognitive Neuroscience (Wang Lab, PolyU, Hong Kong) (February, 2018).
Professor Weekes was an Invited Speaker, Research on Language Policy and Practice, HKU (February, 2018).
Professor Weekes was an Invited Speaker, Learning and the Brain at Fairmont, San Francisco (February, 2018).
Professor Weekes was an Invited Speaker, Memory and Aging Center (Gorno-Tempini Lab MAC), UCSF (February, 2018).
Professor Weekes was an Invited Speaker, Brain-LENS Neuroimaging Lab (Hoeft Lab), UCSF (February, 2018).
Professor Weekes was an Invited Speaker, Global Convergence in Science of Learning, National Science Foundation, (February, 2018).