Paula Orzechowska

Paula Orzechowska is a University Professor at the Faculty of English, Adam Mickiewicz University (UAM) in Poznań, Poland. She is affiliated with the Department of English Linguistics and has held international academic positions, including at the University of Potsdam, Germany. Her research integrates theoretical and experimental approaches to phonology, with a focus on morphonotactics, contrastive phonotactics, and neuro- and psycholinguistic methods.

Her educational background includes a B.A. and M.A. in English (2003, 2004), a Ph.D. in English Linguistics (2009), and a D.Litt. (2020), all from Poznań. She has been awarded fellowships from the Humboldt Foundation and the Kosciuszko Foundation, and has conducted research at institutions in Germany, the USA, and Austria.

Her research interests span phonology, morphonotactics, phonological acquisition, and experimental linguistics. She employs EEG, ultrasound imaging, and behavioral experiments to study phonological processing and learnability across languages such as English, Polish, German, and Russian. Her work bridges formal linguistic theory with cognitive and neural mechanisms of language.

The most recent articles reflect a strong trend in experimental phonology, combining theoretical frameworks with empirical data from neuroimaging and psycholinguistic tasks. Topics include stress patterns, consonant cluster processing, feature-based phonotactics, and cross-linguistic comparisons, particularly between Slavic and Germanic languages.

Scientific awards include:

• Rector of UAM reward for outstanding research results (2018)
• Award for best conference poster, Lublin (2016)

She has supervised academic programs such as the M.A. program 'Language, Mind, Technology' and served as Acting Head of the Neuroscience of Language Laboratory (2019–2021). She has received multiple research grants from the National Science Centre (Poland), Austrian Science Fund, DFG, and DAAD. Her service includes peer reviewing for major journals and organizing international conferences such as the 21st International Congress of Linguists (2024).

She is actively involved in laboratory research, particularly through the Neuroscience of Language Laboratory at UAM, and collaborates with international teams on projects involving phonological processing, brain plasticity, and language acquisition.