Monika Molnar, PhD

McGill University

Background:
Dr. Molnar received her Ph.D. from the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders at McGill University. Her doctoral dissertation focused on the neural and behavioral correlates of monolingual and bilingual speech processing. At McGill, she also conducted research on how bilingual and monolingual learning contexts affect typical language development in preverbal infants exposed to English and/or French. Previous to joining the Department of Speech-Language Pathology at the University of Toronto, she completed her postdoctoral training at the Basque Center on Cognition, Brain, & Language (BCBL) in Spain. Here, her research focused on behavioral, cognitive, and neural adaptation to different language learning contexts, in addition to how environmental contextual cues interact with bilingual development.

Professional Interest:
Dr. Molnar’s teaching and research interests extends to diverse populations, encompassing both neurotypical and neurodivergent individuals from monolingual and bilingual/multilingual backgrounds, across the lifespan. She investigates how spoken language processing intertwines with various facets of cognition, as reflected by behavioral and neuro-physiological measures (including EEG, heart-rate, eye movements). Specifically, she investigates how cognitive factors, like attention or inhibition, modulate spoken language processing. She also examines the extent to which spoken language processing abilities contribute to cognitive outcomes, such as reading (e.g., word decoding). The mission of her research is to create equity in clinical care, by contributing to the development of theories and clinical assessment paradigms that are suitable for all children – irrespective of their cultural or linguistic backgrounds. Her lab is committed to advancing knowledge within the principles of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) and Open Science.