Erika Nurmsoo

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Eye gaze | Drawing | Testimony | Question-asking

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	pdf version available [here] Curriculum Vitae December 9, 2009
	Research Interests
	Language acquisition, with special focus on word learning and its connection with theory of mind and preschoolers' source monitoring abilities. Theory of mind and its development. Children's comprehension of partial knowledge and ambiguous input. Understanding and use of symbols, including in drawing and pretence.
	Current Position
	Postdoctoral Research Associate
		University of Bristol Department of Experimental Psychology January 2008 to present

	Previous Positions
	Associate Lecturer
		Open University part time position January 2009 to October 2009
	Postdoctoral Research Fellow
		University of Warwick, Department of Psychology February 2006 to January 2008
	Education
	2000 - 2006: Yale University, New Haven CT
		Ph.D., Psychology: 2006 Preschoolers' Sensitivity to Speaker Knowledge When Learning Words Director: Paul Bloom M. Phil, Psychology: 2006 Cues to Reference Director: Paul Bloom M.S., Psychology: 2002 Fast Mapping of Observable and Unobservable Facts Director: Paul Bloom
	1997 - 2000: University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ
		M.A., Psychology: 2000 The Role of Prior Word Exposure on the Disambiguation Effect in Children’s Word Learning Directors: LouAnn Gerken and Merrill Garrett
	1993 – 1997: McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada
		B.A. & Sc. (Psychology and Arts & Science): 1997, Summa cum laude Director: Laurel Trainor
	Awards and Funding

	2008: EPS Vacation studentship, for work with Emma Brown 2008: EPS Grindley Travel Grant 2007: EPS Grindley Travel Grant 2006 – 2007: Named research fellow; E.J. Robinson, P.I. ESRC Learning from others: Identifying unreliable individuals vs. unreliable assertions 2004 – 2005: Yale University Dissertation Fellowship 2004: Conference Travel Award, Yale Graduate Student Assembly 2000 – 2002: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Post-Graduate Scholarship 1998 – 2000: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Post-Graduate Scholarship
	Teaching Experience
	Instructor
	Child Development
		January 2009, Open University
	Introduction to Psychology
		Summer, 2005, Yale University Co-instructor with Dr. Gregory Walton
	Introduction to Cognitive Development
		Summer, 2000, University of Arizona

	Teaching Fellow
		Language Abilities in Animals, with Dr. Stephen Anderson (Autumn 2005)
		Personality Psychology, with Dr. Mark Brackett (Spring 2004)
		Introduction to Psychology, with Dr. Nelson Donegan (Spring 2003) and Dr. Peter Salovey (Spring 2002)
		Introduction to Cognitive Psychology, with Dr. Brian Scholl (Autumn 2002)
		Research Methods in Cognitive Psychology, with Dr. Christy Marschuetz (Autumn 2001)
		Individuals and Society, with Dr. Paul Bloom (Autumn 1998)

	Undergraduate Supervision
	Bristol Cognitive Development Centre
		Sarah Farndon (2008), Lucie Kanfiszer (2008), Sarah Bronk (2008 – 2009), Kate Cooper (2009 – 2010), Tara Webb (2009 – 2010)
	Yale Language and Cognition Lab
		Imane El Andaloussi (2004), Lindsay Eisenberg (2004), Stephanie Hanson (2004), Alison Kadesh (2004-2005), Cristina Novoa (2004 – 2005), Jamie Podell (2005), Elizabeth Rawson (2004 – 2005)
	Invited Talks
	Workshop on Pragmatic Development, Lyon France, April 2009
	Department of Psychology, University of Lancaster, Lancaster UK, January 2009
	Department of Psychology, University of Birmingham, Birmingham UK, August 2007
	Department of Psychology, University of Birmingham, Birmingham UK, June 2006

	Professional Activities

	Ad Hoc reviewer for the Economic and Social Research Council and for journals including Child Development, Cognition, Cognitive Development, Developmental Psychology, Developmental Science, Emotion, Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance
	Journal Publications and Book Chapters
	Robinson, E. J., Butterfill, S. A., & Nurmsoo, E. (invited resubmission). Gaining knowledge via other minds: Children’s flexible use of others as sources of information. Unpublished Manuscript. Nurmsoo, E., Robinson, E. J., & Butterfill, S. A. (accepted). Are children gullible? Manuscript accepted for publication. Gerken, L. A., Wilson, R., Gómez, R. L., & Nurmsoo, E. (2009). The relation between morpho-syntactic analogies and syntactic categories. In J. Blevins & J. Blevins (eds.). Analogy in grammar: Form and acquisition. Oxford University Press, Oxford. Nurmsoo, E., & Robinson, E. J. (2009). Children's Trust in Previously Inaccurate Informants Who Were Well- or Poorly- Informed: When Past Errors Can Be Excused. Child Development, 80, 23-27. Nurmsoo, E., & Robinson, E. J. (2009). Identifying unreliable informants: Do children excuse past inaccuracy? Developmental Science, 41-47. Robinson, E. J. & Nurmsoo, E. (2009). When do children learn from unreliable speakers? Cognitive Development, 24, 16-22. Nurmsoo, E., & Bloom, P. (2008). Preschoolers’ perspective-taking in word learning: Do they blindly follow eye gaze? Psychological Science, 19, 211-215. Robinson, E. J., Haig, S. N., & Nurmsoo, E. (2008). Children’s working understanding of knowledge sources: Confidence in knowledge gained from testimony. Cognitive Development, 23, 105-118. Nurmsoo, E. (2006). Preschoolers attend to a speaker’s knowledge when learning adjectives. Proceedings of the 30th Boston University Conference on Language Development. Boston, MA: Cascadilla Press. Bloom, P. & Nurmsoo;, E. (2002). Word learning. In L. Nadel (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Cognitive Science, London: Macmillan.
	Conference Presentations
	Nurmsoo, E. (August 2009). Children's monitoring of gaze in referential contexts. Paper presented at the European Society for Philosophy and Psychology, Budapest, Hungary. Nurmsoo, E., Einav, S., & Hood, B. M. (April 2009). Tracking fears and preferences: Typically developing children's monitoring of gaze in static and dynamic scenes. Paper presented at the Society for Research in Child Development Meeting, Denver, CO. Nurmsoo, E., Einav, S., & Hood, B. M. (April 2009). Best friends: Children's sensitivity to social information in gaze. Poster presented at the Society for Research in Child Development Meeting, Denver, CO. Nurmsoo, E., Allen, M. & Freeman, N. (April 2009). Can a balloon be a lollipop? Four-year-olds use representational flexibility when understanding pictures. Poster presented at the Society for Research in Child Development Meeting, Denver, CO. Nurmsoo, E., Einav, S., & Hood, B. M. (September 2008). Best friends: Children's Sensitivity to Social Information in Gaze. Poster presented at the workshop Theory of Mind: Celebrating 30 years, Nottingham UK, September 11-12. Nurmsoo, E., Robinson, E. J., & Butterfill, S. (June 2008). Extracting knowledge from other minds. Paper presented at the European Society for Philosophy and Psychology, Utrecht, June 25-27. Nurmsoo, E., & Robinson, E. J. (January 2008). Children's inferences about the reliability of informants: When do they excuse past errors? Paper presented at the Experimental Psychology Society London Meeting, Jan 3-4. Nurmsoo, E., & Robinson, E. J. (August 2007). Learning from others: Understanding speaker inaccuracy. Paper presented at the British Psychological Society 2007 Developmental Section Conference. Nurmsoo, E., & Robinson, E. J. (July 2007). Learning from others: Children's understanding of speaker inaccuracy. Paper presented at the 15th Annual Meeting of the European Society for Philosophy and Psychology, Geneva. Nurmsoo, E., & Scholl, B. J. (July 2007). Word learning and unlearning: Preschoolers revise the meanings of newly learned words. Poster presented at the 15th Annual Meeting of the European Society for Philosophy and Psychology, Geneva. Nurmsoo, E., & Robinson, E. J. (July 2007) Learning from others: Identifying unreliable individuals vs. unreliable assertions. Poster presented at the Experimental Psychology Society Edinburgh Meeting. Nurmsoo, E., & Robinson, E. J. (March 2007). Learning from others: Identifying unreliable individuals vs. unreliable assertions. Poster presented at the Society for Research in Child Development Meeting, Boston, MA. Nurmsoo, E., & Bloom, P. (November 2005). Do preschoolers attend to a speaker's knowledge when learning words? Poster presented at the Boston University Conference on Language Development, Boston, Massachusetts. Nurmsoo, E. (June 2005). Preschoolers reason about the artist's mental representations when naming a drawing. Poster presented at the Annual Meeting of the Jean Piaget Society, Vancouver, Canada. Nurmsoo, E., & Bloom, P. (April 2005). Preschoolers' use of a speaker's perceptual knowledge when learning words. Poster presented at the Society for Research in Child Development Meeting, Atlanta, Georgia. Gerken, L.A., Nurmsoo, E., & Gomez, R.L. (April 1999). The role of meaning and form in the formation of syntactic categories. Paper presented at the Society for Research in Child Development, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Zamuner, T., Nurmsoo, E., Jurkowitz, L., & McKee, C. (April 1999). Mutual exclusivity effects in adjective acquisition. Poster presented at the biennial meeting of the Society for Research in Child Development. Albuquerque, NM. Nurmsoo, E., & Trainor, L. J. (April, 1998). Changes between 6 and 8 months in the segmentation of tone patterns. Poster presented at the 11th Biennial International Conference on Infant Studies, Atlanta, Georgia.