Postdoctoral position: Perceptual, cognitive and neural mechanisms of early language acquisition

The Department of Developmental Psychology and Socialization, University of Padua, Italy, is seeking a post doctoral research fellow to join Dr. Judit Gervain’s ERC-funded research group. The post doctoral fellow will be expected to lead an independent line of research within an ERC-funded project that aims to explore how prenatal and early postnatal experience with speech lays the foundations for later language development. Within the framework of this project, the researcher’s main mission will be to develop and lead innovative studies investigating speech perception and language acquisition in young infants, in particular with respect to how prosody bootstraps the learning process.

The successful candidate will hold a PhD in Linguistics, Psychology, Cognitive Science or related disciplines with extensive experience in Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience. The candidate will have a solid background in cognitive neuroscience, lingusitics and language sciences, language acquisition and developmental psychology. The candidate is expected to have considerable expertise with behavioral (e.g. in-lab or online looking time methods) and/or brain imaging methods (e.g. NIRS, EEG) of infant and adult testing, statistical analysis and signal processing.

As the researcher will be working with other project members as well as infants and their families, good relational and organizational skills, punctuality and rigor are required. A good command of English is a must, the knowledge of Italian is not strictly necessary. International experience is a plus.

The salary is 28.445,65 euros / year. The initial duration of the contract is 12 months, and may be renewed.

Applicants must submit their CV, publication list and other relevant documents as described at the link below:
https://www.dpss.unipd.it/bando-di-selezione-il-conferimento-di-n-1-assegno-resp-profssa-gervain-judit-rif-2021assdpss03
(the downloadable documents are in Italian and English)

The application deadline is 1st July 2021, and an on-line interview is scheduled for selected candidates for July 9th.

With any questions, contact Judit Gervain at judit.gervain@unipd.it