Nan Bernstein Ratner

Nan Bernstein Ratner is a Distinguished University Professor in the Department of Hearing and Speech Sciences at the University of Maryland, College Park. She is actively involved in multiple campus units including the Neuroscience and Cognitive Neuroscience (NACS) program where she serves as Director of Graduate Studies, the Language Sciences Center (LSC), the University of Maryland Developmental Sciences Field Committee, and the Bahá'í Chair for World Peace International Advisory Board.

Dr. Bernstein Ratner holds the following educational credentials:

• BA in Child Study, Linguistics from Tufts University (1974)
• MA in Speech-Language Pathology from Temple University (1976)
• Ed.D in Applied Psycholinguistics from Boston University (1982)

Her primary research focuses on fluency development and disorders (particularly stuttering), psycholinguistics, and the role of adult input and interaction in child language development. Bernstein Ratner's work spans both typical speech and language development in infants and children as well as childhood communication disorders including autism, seizure disorders, and late talkers. She is deeply committed to evidence-based practice in communication disorders and the role of information literacy in clinical decision-making. Her research also examines the impact of sports-related concussion on children's language skills and the development of speech and nonspeech predictors of later language development.

Analysis of her recent publications reveals a strong emphasis on stuttering research, language sample analysis methodology, child language development, and the application of computational approaches to speech and language disorders. Her work increasingly incorporates considerations of linguistic diversity and bias-free assessment, particularly for children who speak non-mainstream dialects of American English. There's also a clear trend toward leveraging technology and computational linguistics to enhance clinical practice and research in communication sciences.

Dr. Bernstein Ratner has received numerous prestigious awards for her contributions to the field:

• Fellow of the American Speech, Language and Hearing Association (ASHA)
• Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) (2014)
• Distinguished Researcher award from the International Fluency Association (2006)
• Professional of the Year by the National Stuttering Association (2016)
• Board-recognized Specialist in Child Language Disorders

As an advisor, Dr. Bernstein Ratner has mentored numerous doctoral students who have gone on to successful careers in academia and clinical practice. She has secured significant grant funding from organizations including the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) to support FluencyBank, a project of TalkBank that tracks fluency development across various populations. More recently, she has received NIH TALK initiative funding to examine predictors of recovery from late-talking in early childhood and to study growth in writing skills across diverse student populations. She is currently accepting doctoral students and emphasizes the importance of prior discussions with potential mentees.

Dr. Bernstein Ratner co-manages FluencyBank with Brian MacWhinney of Carnegie-Mellon University. This initiative, jointly funded by the NIDCD and NSF, tracks fluency development in typical children, those who stutter, late-talking children, and children raised bilingually. Her lab website at http://languagefluency.umd.edu/ provides additional information about her research activities and current projects, including the Atypical Disfluency Project and investigations into how autism affects understanding in multitalker environments.