Two 3yr postdoc positions testing gesture-speech synchrony

We're looking for two smart and motivated postdocs to join the Speech Perception in Audiovisual Communication lab (SPEAC; https://hrbosker.github.io) at the Donders Institute, Radboud University, Nijmegen, The Netherlands.

Keywords: multimodal prosody, audiovisual speech perception, gesture-speech synchrony, motion-tracking, MEG

>>> PD1

https://www.ru.nl/en/working-at/job-opportunities/postdoctoral-researcher-testing-cross-linguistic-gesture-speech-alignment-with-motion-tracking-at-donders-centre-for-cognition

You will test both the production and perception of gesture-speech alignment in nine different languages, including free-stress, fixed-stress, and lexical tone languages. The production strand uses motion-tracking of 2D videos in Mediapipe and acoustic analyses in Praat to quantify gesture-speech alignment on a millisecond timescale. The perception strand involves running psychoacoustic tests with audiovisual stimuli manipulated to vary in the synchrony between hands and spoken prosody. Combining production and perception data will reveal how language-specific variability in gesture-speech alignment shapes the language-specific use of gestural timing in speech perception.

>>> PD2

https://www.ru.nl/en/working-at/job-opportunities/postdoctoral-researcher-testing-audiovisual-gesture-speech-integration-in-meg

You will use rapid invisible frequency tagging (RIFT) in MEG to pinpoint the neurobiological mechanisms underlying gesture-speech integration. Specifically, you will test how simple up-and-down beat gestures influence lexical stress perception in real time, using the 'manual McGurk effect' (Bosker & Peeters, 2021, Proc Roy Soc B). Furthermore, you will compare typical behavioural and neural signatures of gesture-speech integration to those in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) who are known to demonstrate impairments in prosody processing and audiovisual integration. Finally, you will run a large-scale correlational study testing whether the participants' own gestural timing behaviour is linked to their use of gestural timing in audiovisual speech perception.

3 year contract; employment for 0.8 FTE. Gross monthly salary: min €3,974 - max €5,439 (based on 38-hour working week; scale 11). Apply by December 1, 2022. Preferred starting date: March 1, 2023.

Contact: Hans Rutger Bosker, HansRutger.Bosker@donders.ru.nl

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Nigel Ward, Professor of Computer Science, University of Texas at El Paso

CCSB 3.0408,  +1-915-747-6827

nigel@utep.edu    https://www.cs.utep.edu/nigel/