Master's Theses

CLASS OF 2023

Melina Markotjohn
Title: Post-Auricular Orientation of Auditory Attention in Sound Field versus Virtual Sound Space
NSGS, NSERC, MITACS, Research NS Scotia Scholar Award
Supervisor: Steve Aiken

Sarah Ripley
Title: Coding-In-Noise Deficits After Exposure to Noise Mimicking Real-Life Parameters
Supervisor: Jian Wang

CLASS OF 2021

Keara Boyce
Title: Can You See What I Mean? The Effects of Iconic Gestures on Early Word Learning
Killam Pre-Doctoral Scholarship; SSHRC; NSGS
Supervisor: Elizabeth Kay-Raining Bird

Juliana McLaren
Title: Have You Heard About Hearing Loss, Hearing Aid Use, And Cognitive Decline? Relationships, Mechanisms, and a Proposed Investigation Using Event-Related Potentials
CIHR; Canadian Federation of University Women (CFUW) Memorial Fellowship
Supervisor:  Steven Aiken

CLASS OF 2020

Talia Kowalchuk
Title: What Trans’ Folks Talk About When They Talk About Voice: Learning About Voice Feminization on Reddit
Supervisor: Michael Kiefte

Parnell Davis MacNevin
Title: Development of an Optimized Method for the Clinical Assessment of Binaural Function
NSHRF Scotia Scholar Award + Nova Scotia Graduate Scholarship; CIHR Award
Supervisor: Steven Aiken

GRADUATED 2018

Lisa Beck 
Title: "Investigating Skilled Reading in School-Aged Children: An EEG Study"
NS Graduate Scholarship
Supervisors: Steven Aiken and Aaron Newman

Peter Cahill 
Title: “Exploring the Complex Syntax of School-Aged Children: The Effects of Age, Discourse and Bilingualism”
Killam, SSHRC & NS Graduate Scholarship
Supervisor: Patricia Cleave

Eleanor Campbell 
Title: "Verb Fast Mapping and Imitation in Children with Down Syndrome"
NS Graduate Scholarship
Supervisor: Elizabeth Kay-Raining Bird

Sarah Martin 
Title: “Bilingual Outcomes for a Child with Down Syndrome in the Early French Immersion Program”
NSHRF Scotia Scholar Award and NS Graduate Scholarship
Supervisor: Elizabeth Kay-Raining Bird

Kegan Stephen 
Title: “Changes in Cochlear Function and Synaptic Protein Expression in Noise Induced Cochlear Synaptopathy”
CIHR Scholarship and NS Graduate Scholarshis
Supervisor: Jian Wang 

GRADUATED 2015

Allison MacEacheron 
Title: "Periodicity envelope encoding: Evidence for two sites of introduction”
Supervisor: Steven Aiken

Caroline Jamison 
Title: “Preliminary investigation of the utility of the N400 for passively estimating speech hearing ability in noise"
Supervisors: Steven Aiken and Lauren Petley

GRADUATED 2014

Nathanael Crawford 
Title: “Neuronal adaptation and formant transition direction in vowels: An MMN study”
Supervisor: Steven Aiken

Jennifer Finbow 
Title: “Comparison of Baha and CROS hearing aid in single-sided deafness”
NSHRF Scholarship
Supervisor: Rachel Caissie

Lara Georgis
Title: “Effects of spectral distortion on speech intelligibility”
Supervisor: Steven Aiken

Bonita Squires
Title: “Language, literacy and classroom participation of students who are deaf or hard-of-hearing in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick”
CIHR and NSHRF Scholarships
Supervisor: Elizabeth Kay-Raining Bird

GRADUATED 2013

Kathleen Chiddenton 
Title: “Examining listeners' ability to perceive vowel-inherent spectral changes”
SSHRC Scholarship
Supervisor: Michael Kiefte

Andree-Anne Morrissey 
Title: "The Relationship between leisure activity participation, language, and literacy in adults with Down Syndrome"
SSHRC Scholarship
Supervisor: Elizabeth Kay-Raining Bird

GRADUATED 2012

Jessica Andrus 
Title: "The perception and neural representation of individual harmonies in a vowel sound: A behavioural and auditory brainstem evoked response study"
NSERC and NSHRF Scholarships
Supervisors: Steven Aiken and Michael Kiefte

Courtney Cain Porter 
Title: "Voice quality and gender identification: Acoustic and perceptual analysis"
Supervisor: Michael Kiefte

Jennifer Mulle 
Title: "In search of an electrophysiological correlate to between-channel modulation gap detection"
Supervisor: Steven Aiken

GRADUATED 2011