This week’s Friday feature is Nairan Ramirez – Esparza! She is one of our PIs and newest member of the UConn KIDS Steering Committee!
Dr. Ramírez-Esparza has a Ph.D. in Social Psychology from the University of Texas at Austin. Currently, she is an Associate Professor at the Psychological Science Department in UConn. She is also the director of the Language and Behavior Cultural Lab (LAB-C-lab). Dr. Ramírez-Esparza was born and raised in Mexico. While doing her undergraduate studies inPuebla, Mexico, she had the opportunity to travel to the U.S. as an exchange student. This experience led her to realize that she wanted to pursue a PhD in Social Psychology and that the best place to achieve this goal was in an academic institution in the U.S. When she started her PhD at the University of Texas at Austin, she had the opportunity to interact for the first time with a great number of people who identified as bilingual and bicultural. For example, her conversations with Mexican-American students in both English and Spanish led her to realize that bilingual individuals switched their personalities as they alternated between their languages. Since then, she has done studies trying to understand the intriguing minds of bilinguals. Her favorite activity is to travel with my family. She enjoys walking around a city, visit museums, attend events, concerts and eat at restaurants. She specially love Mexican, Asian and Peruvian food.
