Monica Wagner

Dr. Wagner is an Associate Professor in the department, Communication Sciences and Disorders, with a joint appointment in Psychology. She has received an M. A. in Speech-Language Pathology from Queens College of the City University of New York (CUNY) and an M. Phil. and Ph.D. in Speech-Language-Hearing Sciences from The Graduate Center (CUNY). Dr. Wagner is certified by the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) and licensed by New York State to practice as a Speech-Language Pathologist and to provide clinical services within the public schools.

Dr. Wagner’s behavioral and electrophysiology research in adults and children aims to uncover brain mechanisms that allow spoken words to be recognized within the auditory cortex for comprehension. She examines auditory evoked potentials (AEPs), which are time-locked and phase-locked to the speech stimuli, and using time-frequency analysis, examines brain oscillations, which reflect neural ensembles firing at different rhythms (e.g., theta, beta, and low-gamma frequency bands). Dr. Wagner’s AEP research has demonstrated that even though spoken words may be heard differently by second language learners of English, the acoustic (physical) characteristics of the spoken words are detected similarly, irrespective of native-language experience, at early cortical stages of processing. More recently, Dr. Wagner’s work has uncovered that language-specific processing of phonological sequences (cortical level processing of native-language speech sound sequences) within words occurs within the low-gamma frequency band. This research finding supports the view that linguistic units of speech (phrases, syllables, and phonemes) are registered simultaneously in auditory cortex, but at different oscillatory frequencies (excitation and inhibition of neural ensembles occurring at different rates). Currently, Dr. Wagner is acquiring behavioral data and electroencephalograms (EEGs) in response to speech in adolescents with atypical patterns of language learning (i.e., Developmental Language Disorder, Dyslexia and Auditory Processing Disorder). The ultimate goal of this work will be to determine whether individuals with atypical patterns of language learning show language-specific neural processing of speech, which is necessary for fast paced language comprehension. Graduate and undergraduate students from departments throughout the University participate in Dr. Wagner’s research examining the neurobiology of speech and language.