Jarek got is PhD at the Department of Psychology, University of Edinburgh. He also worked as a part-time Lecturer at Napier University, as a Teaching Assistant at the University of Edinburgh, and as a Research Assistant in several projects concerning language and memory (see my CV here). For his PhD, he investigated the role of imitation in language. In one set of experiments, he tested (and found some evidence for) the hypothesis that imitation is involved in linguistic prediction. In another set, Jarek investigated the idea that imitating one's conversational partner is beneficial for the social interaction with this partner. Lately, Jarek also started a project looking at linguistic imitation in psychotherapy. Occasionally, he might also pursue a question that is not directly related to language – Jarek is currently engaged in a project exploring the interplay between prediction and temporal adaptation in joint action, and in the past he contributed to a developmental research looking at memory.

In the lab, Jarek is responsible for large-scale experiments investigating statistical learning. Using the magic of Python, he mines real languages to identify their features that might be critical for learning. He then runs experiments to test whether adults use these features when mastering new lexicons. To this end, he develops artificial languages and manipulate the saliency of their learning-critical features.