Amy M. Lieberman
Director, Doctoral Studies
Associate Professor
Dr. Amy Lieberman is an associate professor in the Language & Literacy Education Department. She co-directs the Deaf Center and serves as the director of doctoral studies at BU Wheelock. Her research explores how deaf children acquire American Sign Language (ASL), with a focus in how children learn to perceive language and information through the visual modality.
Dr. Lieberman leads an NIH-funded investigation of word learning and joint attention in deaf and hard-of-hearing children. She studies how early language experience influences language processing in deaf adults and children, as well as experiences of hearing parents learning to sign with their deaf children. Her research employs a range of experimental methods including eye-tracking, naturalistic observation and behavioral methods.
Recent News
Education
PhD, Special Education, University of California, Berkeley and San Francisco State University
MA, Education (Cognition and Development), University of California, Berkeley
BA, Human Biology, Stanford University
Courses
DE 531: Language Acquisition in Deaf Children
DE 352: Capstone--Deaf Studies
RS 750: Advanced Research Seminar
Selected Publications
Gappmayr, P., Caselli, N., & Lieberman, A. M. (2026). Parents align American Sign Language (ASL) input with deaf children’s gaze. Language Acquisition.
Lieberman, A.M. (2025). The visual modality serves “double duty” for sign language learners: A commentary on Karadöller, Sümer and Özyürek. First Language.
Wienholz, A., & Lieberman, A. M. (2025). Tracking effects of age of sign language acquisition and phonology in American Sign Language sentence processing. Memory & Cognition, 1-19.
Fitch, A., Lieberman, A. M., Frank, M. C., Brough, J., Valleau, M., & Arunachalam, S. (2025). Referential transparency of verbs in child-directed input by Japanese and American caregivers. Journal of child language, 52(6), 1367-1382.
Campbell, E. E., Pyers, J., Caselli, N., Lieberman, A., & Borovsky, A. (2025). Perceptual-semantic features of words differentially shape early vocabulary in American Sign Language and English. Applied Psycholinguistics, 46, e27.
Pontecorvo, E., Mitchiner, J., & Lieberman, A. M. (2024). Hearing parents as sign language learners: describing and evaluating the ASL skills of parents learning ASL with their deaf children. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 1-18.
Berger, L., Pyers, J., Lieberman, A.M., & Caselli, N. (2024). Parent ASL skills correlate with child–but not toddler–ASL vocabulary size. Language Acquisition, 31 (12), 85-99.
Selected Presentations
Sander J., Rowland, C., & Lieberman, A.M. (2023, September). Exploring Joint Attention in American Sign Language: The Influence of Sign Familiarity. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, Sydney, Australia.
Higgins, M., Fitch, A., & Lieberman, A.M. (2022, November). Deaf children’s gaze shift during natural interaction in ASL supports efficient referential attention. Paper presented at the 47th Boston University Conference on Language Development, Boston, MA.
Gappmayr, P., & Lieberman, A. M. (2022, November). The alignment of deaf children’s gaze with parent ASL input. Poster presented at the 47th Boston University Conference on Language Development, Boston, MA.
Fitch., A., & Lieberman, A.M. (2022, July). Attention and iconicity in child-directed signing with novel objects. Presented as part of the symposium “The consequences of sign and gesture on attention and cognition” at the International Society for Gesture Studies conference (ISGS9), Chicago, IL.