Inge-Marie Eigsti

Inge-Marie Eigsti, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor
Department of Psychology
University of Connecticut

406 Babbidge Road, Unit 1020
Storrs, CTÂ 06269-1020

Office: (860) 486-6021, Bousfield 146
Lab: (860) 486-0195, Bousfield 263
Fax: (860) 486-7620
Email: inge-marie.eigsti@uconn.edu

Last Revised: June 2007

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Research interests

My research addresses a fundamental issue in human cognition: how constraints imposed by brain development and core neurocognitive processes impact on more complex aspects of cognition and learning, with an emphasis on language acquisition. As a scientist, I am intrigued by the interaction of language acquisition and brain development. As a clinician, I am motivated by the prospect of understanding the puzzles presented by atypical development and its consequences, and what implications this might have for intervention. Although most research on language acquisition and neurocognitive processes is based on typically developing learners, the study of perturbations in development can often lead to a deeper understanding of the mechanisms of growth and change. I use several converging approaches to study these issues, including behavioral paradigms and structural and functional imaging in both atypical and normal populations.

My past work has involved behavioral studies of language development in autism and maltreatment, and language creation in typical adults.

Current projects include

Studies of Autism:

Neurological mechanisms underlying joint attention in autism
Implicit learning mechanisms in autism and their relation to language acquisition and processing
Neural circuitry of prosody in autism (in collaboration with Rhea Paul)
Hyperlexia in autism (in collaboration with Elena Grigorenko, Ken Pugh, Jim Magnuson, Einar Mencl, et al.)

To participate in or learn more about this research, please call (860) 486-6021.

Studies of International Adoption: Children adopted by families in Connecticut from international institutions vary tremendously in the quality of care prior to their adoption into loving families. In collaboration with Carol Weitzman of the Yale International Adoption Clinic, we are studying several aspects of development in these children, including those who are "on track" and those who continue to have difficulties. Measures include:

Intensive analysis of language develoment in this group of late learners of English, including both tandarized clinical assessments and narrative skills; in collaboration with Seth Pollak and Julia Evans.
Assessment of learning and memory skills
Assessment of social-emotional development.

To participate in or learn more about this study, please call (860) 486-6021.

Studies of Cognitive Control:

Predicting cognitive control from preschool to late adolescence and young adulthood, in collaboration with BJ Casey and Walter Mischel (a longitudinal study of cognitive control from ages 4 to 22 years). No longer collecting data.

Current and Recent Students

Jillian DeGroot Schuh (2005). MA Thesis: Narrative skills in international adoption: Effects of age and English exposure.
Ashley DeMarchena (2006). MA topic: Mutual exclusivity / categorization in autism.
Jessica Bean (2007).

Background

2004-current: Assistant Professor of Psychology, University of Connecticut.
December 2005: Eleanor Eigsti Magnuson (see a photo ).
December 2005: Connecticut License to practice psychology.
2001 - 2004, Research Fellowship in pediatric fMRI at The Sackler Institutes for Developmental Psychobiology at Columbia University and Weill Medical College of Cornell University. Mentors: BJ Casey and Bill Fifer.
December 2002: NYS License to practice psychology.
November 2002: Lucia Eigsti Magnuson (see a photo ); already she's contributing to science .
July - August 3, 2001, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. Neurobiology of developmental disabilities.
September, 2001, University of Rochester.Â Dual Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology and Brain and Cognitive Sciences

        Dissertation: Word learning and memory functions in young children with autism (download a pdf ).
        Committee: Loisa Bennetto, Elissa Newport, Dante Cicchetti, and Richard Aslin.
        See some of the "eigles" stimuli from this project, and just how much fun it is testing children!
        Sample Trial A: An "anonymous" child performing the count-mass noun task .
        Administering the working memory (A not B) task.

2000 - 2001: Internship in Child and Adolescent Psychology; University of Rochester Medical Center, Department of Psychiatry.
1993 - 1995, ATR (Advanced Telecommunications Research Lab) in Kyoto, Japan
June, 1993. The University of Chicago
January, 1991. Kokusai Kaiwa Gakuin, Tokyo, Japan. (Look for the neural correlates of Japanese in my brain ).

Honors and Awards

University of Connecticut Faculty Research Foundation Large Grant, "International Adoption: Effects of institutionalization on learning mechanisms and early development," 1/07 - 12/07.
NIMH R01, "Language Functioning in Optimal Outcome Children with a History of Autism" (co-I; Deb Fein, PI), 7/2006-6/2011).
NIMH P01, "Autism and Related Disorders: Development and Outcome" - Project 3, "Studies of Social Communication in Speakers with Autism Spectrum Disorders" (Investigator; Rhea Paul, PI).
University of Connecticut Faculty Research Foundation Large Grant, "Syntactic development and learning processes in autism spectrum disorders," 1/1/05 - 12/31/05.
NIMH Small Business Grant R03, "CaseIQ-ASD: Ratings Scale Toolkit for ASD Clinical Research,"2003- 2004.
National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression (NARSAD) Young Investigator Award, "Joint attention and core attentional mechanisms in autism spectrum disorders," 2003-2005.
Sackler Institute Small Grant, 2002.
NIMH Dissertation Research Grant in Developmental Psychopathology,
"Word learning and memory functions in children with autism" R03, 1999.
Language Learning Small Grant, 2000.
Society for a Science of Clinical Psychology (SSCP) Dissertation Grant, 1999.

Publications

Eigsti, IM, Bennetto, L, Dadlani, MB. (In press). Beyond pragmatics: Morphosyntactic development in autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders. (download a pdf).
Eigsti, IM, Zayas, V, Mischel, W, Shoda, Y, Ayduk, O, Dadlani, MB, Davidson, MC, Aber, JL, Casey, BJ. (2006). Predicting cognitive control from preschool to late adolescence and young adulthood. Psychological Science, 17, 478-84 (download a pdf).
Durston, S, Tottenham, NT, Thomas, KM, Davidson, MC, Eigsti, IM, Yang, Y, Ulug, AM, & Casey, BJ. (2003). Differential Patterns of Striatal Activation in Young Children with and without ADHD. Biological Psychiatry, 53 (10), 871-878.
Eigsti, IM & Cicchetti, D (2004). The impact of child maltreatment on expressive syntax at 60 months. Developmental Science, 7, 88-102. (download a pdf).
Eigsti, IM & Shapiro, T (2003). A systems neuroscience approach to autism: Biological, cognitive and clinical perspectives. Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities Review, 9 (3), 205-215. (download a pdf).
Hudson, C.L. & Eigsti, I.M. (2003). Lexical competency, the overt expression of grammatical structure, and contrasts between pidgins and creoles. Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages.
Vatikiotis-Bateson E, Eigsti IM, Yano S, & Munhall KG (1998). Eye movement of perceivers during audiovisual speech perception. Perception and Psychophysics, 60 (6), 926-940.
McCullough KE, Pedelty L, & Eigsti IM. (1995). A few things gesture can tell us about language breakdown and neurological syndromes. Brain and Cognition 28 (1) 110.

Invited Presentations

Yale University, Department of Psychology
National Students of Speech, Language, Hearing Association, Boston University
University of California - Berkeley, Department of Psychology
University of Denver, Department of Psychology
Penn State University, Department of Psychology
McGill University, Department of Educational and Counselling Psychology
Queen's University, Department of Psychology
Brooklyn College, Department of Psychology
University of Connecticut, Department of Psychology
University of Madison-Wisconsin. Department of Psychology, Department of Communication Disorders
Barnard College, Department of Psychology
ATR Human Information Sciences Laboratory. Kyoto, Japan
Columbia University, Department of Psychology
New York University, Department of Psychology