Weijie Xu, fourth-year UCI language science grad student, is the recipient of the UCI School of Social Sciences Outstanding Scholarship award. The faculty-nominated award recognizes an outstanding graduate student for high intellectual scholarship and achievement. With several published papers on psycholinguistics, with a focus on human sentence processing, Xu certainly fits the bill. Below, the grad student who earned his bachelor’s from Shanghai International Studies University in China and his master’s at the University of Chicago shares what’s inspired his academic pursuits.

What made you decide to pursue language science as a field, and specifically as a Ph.D. at UCI? What interests you most about your work?

I have always been fascinated by language and the human mind, and the department of Language Science at UCI is one of the perfect places to study their intersection. The department stands out across this country for its interdisciplinary approach. The research here brings together linguistics, cognitive science, and computer science, offering a vibrant environment that is not commonly found in those more traditional linguistics departments.

Tell us about your research. What problem will your findings help solve?

My research area is psycholinguistics, with a focus on human sentence processing. The specific topic of my dissertation project is working memory efficiency in sentence processing. One of the most impressive human abilities is our seemingly effortless use of language. Within just milliseconds, our brain can extract information from the utterances we hear, many of which are highly complex, featuring sophisticated linguistic structures. What makes this ability even more impressive is the fact that our working memory capacity is notoriously limited. That is, we often struggle to instantly memorize a sequence of more than 7 digits, yet most of us are able to handle a complex sentence that we hear only briefly before it disappears in the air almost in the blink of an eye. My research program, therefore, aims to understand how our psychological system achieves this, or more specifically, how our limited working memory capacity is efficiently used to support our language use.

Where can your work be found if someone wanted to learn more about your research?

My personal website is https://weijiexu-charlie.github.io/. And you can also find the list of my work on my Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=UrPCWf8AAAAJ&hl=en.

Who have been your faculty mentors while here, and what impact have they had on your graduate career?

My advisor is Richard Futrell. Richard is a very knowledgeable scholar with deep insights into our field. Richard takes an interdisciplinary approach to studying language, which has greatly influenced my own research. In fact, when I first took a linguistic seminar during my master program, the paper that I proposed to read for the class was actually one of Richard’s, even though at that time I had no idea psycholinguistics would become the focus of my career. As an advisor, Richard is very supportive, and never showing impatience, no matter how basic my questions may seem. He always encourages me to explore different topics, and has always been supportive throughout my academic journey.

When do you plan to complete your Ph.D.? What are your plans thereafter?

I plan to graduate next year (2026). I’m now preparing myself for faculty positions in academia.

Any unique life experiences that have guided your educational journey? Give us some background.

Language has consistently been the focus of almost my entire academic life. I went to a foreign language middle school, a foreign language high school, and my alma mater is a university specializing in language studies. Now, I’m still studying language!