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Incoming PhD Student, Experimental Psychology

UC San Diego, California, USA

• - Language & Development Lab (PI: David Barner)

MS, Computer Science (Human-Computer Interaction)

Stanford University, California, USA

BS (with Departmental Honors and Distinction), Symbolic Systems (Cognitive Science); BA (with Distinction), Comparative Literature

Stanford University, California, USA

BA (with Distinction), Comparative Literature

Stanford University, California, USA

Researcher, Language & Development Lab

Psychology Department, UC San Diego (PI: David Barner)

• Building Numberbank, a resource that collates and visualizes data from multiple research groups on number acquisition in children (Shiny and R).
• Other projects as my PhD progresses!

Researcher, Language and Cognition Lab

Psychology Department, Stanford University (PI: Michael Frank )

• Conducting honors thesis project under Professor Michael Frank and Alex Carstensen, Ph.D. about cross-cultural and cross-linguistic differences in similarity reasoning.
  • Responsible for every part of the project such as coming up with the hypothesis, doing literature review, designing the experiment, collecting and analyzing data, and reporting results.
  • Communicating with authors of previous works to obtain stimuli and linguistic models.
  • Coordinating with other researchers and native language speakers to translate stimuli to languages of interest (Vietnamese and Mandarin Chinese).
  • As the only native Vietnamese speaker on the project, responsible for self-learning and communicating Vietnamese linguistics, and navigating cultural-specific obstacles for collecting data in Vietnam.
• Investigating the development of using common ground to resolve ambiguous utterances in children aged 3-5 with Professor Mike Frank and Manuel Bohn, Ph.D.
  • Responsible for designing and creating stimuli, coding an interactive experiment on tablets, and running adult pilots.
  • Participating in iterating on hypotheses based on results from adult pilots and collecting data from children at a local museum.

Researcher, Smart Primer Project

Human-Computer Interaction Group, Stanford University (PI: James Landay)

• Collaborating with Professor James Landay to develop self-guided learning applications using narrative, context-aware information, and voice-based agents.
• Responsible for designing and programming interactions between application and user, user interviews, and literature review.

Research Assistant, interActive Language Processing Lab

Linguistics Department, Stanford University (PI: Judith Degen)

• Working with Professor Judith Degen on a computational linguistic project on factors affecting projectivity of embedded content (valence, arousal, at-issueness).
• Responsible for coming up with initial hypotheses based on previous work, designing and coding web experiments, and collecting and analyzing data.

Research Assistant, Memory Lab

Psychology Department, Stanford University (PI: Anthony Wagner)

• Conducting neuroscience research with Professor Anthony Wagner and Kevin Madore, Ph.D. to investigate the effects of attention on encoding and retrieval memory, and elucidate correlations between subject-leveled differences and task-based differences.
• Responsible for running data analysis, including linear mixed-effects models and factor analysis.-
• Exploring logistic regression as an additional form of analysis.
• Trained on conducting FMRI scans.

Research Assistant, Modernist Archives Publishing Project

Center for Spatial and Textual Analysis (CESTA), Stanford University (PI: Alice Staveley)

• Collaborating with Professor Alice Staveley (English Department) to apply statistical methods (linear mixed-effects models, Pearson correlation, etc.) to analyze Virginia Woolf’s order book sales number.
• Made a breakthrough discovery on the potential meaning of a mark used in the order books through these analyses.

Research Assistant & Science Research Program Fellow

Cancer Science Institute, National University of Singapore (PI: Alan Prem Kumar )

• Working on molecular biology research in triple-negative breast cancer with Prof. Alan Prem Kumar and Wanpei Cai, Ph.D, looking at a possible modulator of the Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway, which in turn promotes breast cancer stem cell-like properties.
• Responsible for conducting cell culture, RNA knockdown, Western blots, and reverse transcriptase PCR, to identify the effect of knocking down RNA helicase DP103 on Wnt and β-catenin activity, and identify potential positive feedback loop between increased Wnt/β-catenin activity and DP103 expression.

• Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education (VPUE) Small Research Grant
• Robert Glushko Prize for Excellence in Undergraduate Research in Symbolic Systems (for outstanding honors thesis)
• K. Jon Barwise Award for Distinguished Contributions to the Symbolic Systems Program (for work as Advising Fellows for the Symbolic Systems Program)

• Symbolic Systems Summer Program Research Stipend (for summer research internships)

• Symbolic Systems Summer Program Research Stipend (for summer research internships)
• Introductory Seminars Excellence Award (for best final project), 2019
• Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education (VPUE) Departmental Grant (Linguistics)