Improving understanding with language
MIT senior Olivia Honeycutt investigates how the ways we communicate can shape our views of the world. MIT senior Olivia Honeycutt studies the brain and linguistics to explore how cognition, education, language, language learning, education, policy, and the ways we communicate can shape our views of the world. Credits : Photo: Hanley Valentin Previous image Next image When she was a child, MIT senior Olivia Honeycutt would spend summers on her grandparents' farm in rural Alabama outside Birmingham.
Key Takeaways
- The practical and cultural differences between farm and city life became more pronounced by comparison.
"Life and the way we lived it slowed down on the farm," she says.
- Honeycutt's interest in language and the ways it can shape how we think and live grew alongside lifelong investments in math and science.
She learned French from her relationships with Haitian family friends, and American Sign Language because of another friend's deaf sibling.
- Operating in these areas creates research opportunities in disciplines as diverse as neurology, large language models (LLMs), psychology, and public policy.
"There's fascinating work underway in neurolinguistics," Honeycutt notes, "along with trying to better understand the differences between neural networks, AI, and how each processes information."
- Her affinity for math and English, alongside a desire to pursue the kind of computer science work that "centered people," increased the likelihood that she could continue in her preferred areas of investigation with the support of the Institute's faculty and other students.
She found class 9.59J (Laboratory in Psycholinguistics), taught by professor of brain and cognitive sciences Ted Gibson , to be especially enlightening.
- Honeycutt lauds the freedom MIT's focus on interdisciplinary study provides.
MIT senior Olivia Honeycutt studies the brain and linguistics to explore how cognition, education, language, language learning, education, policy, and the ways we communicate can shape our views of the world. MIT senior Olivia Honeycutt investigates how the ways we communicate can shape our views of the world. Credits : Photo: Hanley Valentin Previous image Next image When she was a child, MIT senior Olivia Honeycutt would spend summers on her grandparents' farm in rural Alabama outside Birmingham.
These days, Honeycutt, a double major in computation and cognition and linguistics , still finds herself moving between several worlds that are simultaneously connected and distinctly different. Her research interests lie at the intersection of human thinking and awareness, language learning and acquisition, technology, and social group interaction and impact. Honeycutt's interest in language and the ways it can shape how we think and live grew alongside lifelong investments in math and science.
She learned French from her relationships with Haitian family friends, and American Sign Language because of another friend's deaf sibling. She was fascinated with how speakers from those groups communicated and how the brain can reorganize itself when confronted with a lack of auditory input. "There are so many things that are different about sign language and spoken language," she says.
For more details please read the original article at MIT News AI.
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