Drew Weatherhead

Drew Weatherhead is an Assistant Professor (part-time) in the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience at Dalhousie University, affiliated with the Faculty of Science. His research focuses on early language acquisition, sociolinguistic development, and how infants and children process accented speech and speaker characteristics such as race.

Education:

• COGS-P-BCH, Queen’s University
• PhD, University of Waterloo
• Postdoctoral Fellow (PDF), University of British Columbia

Research Interests:
Dr. Weatherhead investigates mechanisms of language acquisition in infants and young children, using methods like eye-tracking and fNIRS. His lab explores how social factors (e.g., race, accent) influence linguistic perception and learning. Key areas include sociolinguistic variation, race-based expectations in word learning, and bilingualism.

Publications:
His work emphasizes the intersection of social cognition and language development, with recent studies on accent processing, speaker race, and contextual influences on word generalization. Outputs span journals like Developmental Science, Cognition, and Journal of Experimental Psychology.

Advising & Labs:
Dr. Weatherhead is currently not accepting new Clinical PhD, Honours, or Directed Research students (2026-2027). He leads the Cognition and Language Learning Research Group, focusing on experimental methods to decode early language mechanisms.