Zuzanna Fuchs

About

Zuzanna Fuchs is an Associate Professor of Linguistics at the University of Southern California and the director of the USC PoMMLab (Psycholinguistics of Mono- and Multilingualism Lab). Her research focuses on noun categorization systems, including grammatical gender, animacy, and noun classes. She employs formal and psycholinguistic methods to understand how noun category information is represented in the grammar, stored in the mental lexicon, and accessed during real-time processing of agreement. Her work targets both monolingual and bilingual speakers, especially heritage speakers, of languages with noun categorization systems. Her current research on noun classes in Lubukusu (a Bantu language) is funded by NSF Award #2438489, with co-investigators from USC and Moi University. In addition to her research, she serves as an Associate Editor for Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism. Fuchs has been involved in various upcoming talks and has published recent work on topics such as gender processing in language, contributing to insights in psycholinguistics and language sciences. Her engagement with the academic community extends to media appearances and features, including interviews and profiles in various outlets, highlighting her role as a prominent researcher in her field.

Research topics

• Computer Science
• Natural Language Processing
• Linguistics
• Psychology
• Artificial Intelligence
• Cognitive psychology
• History
• Philosophy
• Pedagogy
• Mathematics

Selected publications

• The locus of parametric variation in Bantu gender and nominal derivation

  Linguistic Variation · 2021 · 102 citations

  1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract In this paper, we capture the crosslinguistic variation in Bantu nominal structure in a unified analysis of gender on n ( Kramer 2014 , 2015 ). We demonstrate that this analysis accounts for the morphosyntactic properties of basic nouns as well as locative and diminutive derivations. Moreover, it allows us to capture intra- and inter-language morphosyntactic variation by reference to just three parameters – one strictly morphological and two structural. The presence of one or two n head…

  PublisherDOI

• Eyetracking evidence for heritage speakers’ access to abstract syntactic agreement features in real-time processing

  Frontiers in Psychology · 2022 · 23 citations

  1st authorCorresponding

  This paper presents the results of an eyetracking study that uses the Visual World Paradigm to determine whether heritage speakers of Polish can use grammatical gender cues to facilitate lexical retrieval of the subsequent noun during real time processing. Previous work has investigated this question for heritage speakers of Spanish with gender cues located on definite articles, which are highly frequent in Spanish; the results are therefore consistent both with a grammatical account, wherein he…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Facilitative Processing of Grammatical Gender in Heritage Speakers with Two Gender Systems

  Heritage Language Journal · 2024-07-19 · 5 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract This study investigates facilitative processing of grammatical gender in heritage Spanish speakers whose dominant language is German, using eye-tracking in the Visual World Paradigm. Bilinguals with two gender systems are known to have an integrated mental lexicon with shared gender features that are co-activated during language processing and can result in interference. The present study shows that, despite observed effects of gender congruency with German, heritage speakers were able…

  PublisherDOI

• Processing of grammatical gender agreement morphemes in Polish: evidence from the Visual World Paradigm

  Morphology · 2023-10-13 · 5 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract This paper presents a psycholinguistic study of the processing of grammatical gender agreement morphemes in Polish, which has three gender categories (masculine, feminine, neuter), as well as what language-internal factors impact this processing. Results from an eye-tracking study using the Visual World Paradigm show that, during real-time language comprehension, adult monolingual speakers of Polish use cues from gender agreement on a prenominal adjective to anticipate the upcoming noun…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Anticipatory processing of cataphora is constrained by binding principles in L2 English

  Bilingualism Language and Cognition · 2024-03-22 · 3 citations

  article

  Abstract Language processing studies show that native speakers anticipate linguistic elements before their occurrence. However, it is debated to what extent second language (L2) learners do the same. To address this question, this study examines the processing of cataphora by Chinese-speaking L2 English learners. Additionally, we query whether L2 learners’ expectations of upcoming antecedents are modulated by first language (L1) influence and constrained by Principle B of the Binding Theory (Cho…

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Maria Polinsky

  12 shared

• Gregory Scontras

  University of California, Irvine

  8 shared

• Scontras. Gregory

  IIT@Harvard

  6 shared

• Jenneke van der Wal

  Leiden University

  2 shared

• María Luisa Parra

  1 shared

• Rajiv Rao

  University of Wisconsin–Madison

  1 shared

• María Polinsky

  1 shared

• Wenqi Zeng

  University of Iowa

  1 shared

Labs

• PoMMLabPI

  Students

Awards & honors

• NSF Award #2438489

Similar researchers at University of Southern California

• Louis Goldsteinh-45
• Dani Byrdh-39
• Jason Zevinh-36