PIRE II

Week five was kind of boring. I honestly don’t know what to write about. I did found a Krispy Crime store near our place. I’m thinking maybe for week six I should go out more, not just to work but also check out more places before we return.

What an incredible week! There has been much excitement recently, as we have been continuing to recruit participants and explore the island. We are still having a hard time finding students on campus that we can recruit, since not many people take summer classes, but...

In the last few days of my mom's visit, they took us to La Parguera bioluminescent bay in Lajas, where the water contains microorganisms that glow when agitated. It was so dark in the lagoon you could see the stars, which already made for an impressive experience to...

Each week I fall more in love with this island. It is easy to understand why we were sent to San Juan to study bilingual code switching, as seemingly everyone here is bilingual (and very friendly). With each new person I meet, I learn something new about the culture,...

It seems like all that rain was leading up to a week of Excessive Heat Warnings. The high temps have risen from the mid-80s through 90 °F to the low 90s. I've been staying inside during the day as much as possible, and Cat's been enjoying the beach during this...

This week felt like an interesting week. Although, we are having some struggles recruiting participants, I was able to schedule for three individuals. However, my last person scheduled never showed up or emailed back saying they could not make it, which was a bit...

Oh how the time flies! Three weeks have gone by incredibly quickly, and with each passing day I fall more in love with this beautiful island and become more eager to explore everything it has to offer. This week was a bit slower with participants, with some...

Honestly, not much happened during week 3. I feel like I'm on autopilot now. Unlike the first two weeks, I feel more comfortable with both life and work here. Things seem to flow naturally. Life is great when it's steady, but at the same time, excitement is also...

We conducted our first four sessions this week! We've also had three cancelations, but two out of three have already rescheduled. I was also relieved to learn that summer classes will start up soon, so students will be back on campus and we'll be able to recruit again...

This week was a bit calmer and quieter than our first week in Puerto Rico. I focused more in recruitment and putting up flyers. One thing I could not stop thinking about when walking around campus putting up flyers, is how quiet and peaceful the campus feels. A funny...

During the second week, I finally had my first participant. There was a mix feeling of excitement and nervousness. To ensure a smooth experience, I arrived at the lab hours before the scheduled time. Unfortunately, I did run into some technological difficulties, but...

Our second week in San Juan has brought lots of laughs and a few challenges. After spending the entirety of our first week recruiting participants, we took this week to contact and schedule their sessions, but this proved to be more difficult than we had anticipated....

Our first dyads of participants are scheduled for this week! I'm very excited to begin conducting sessions, but I'm reminding myself that we'll have to continue recruiting in order to accrue enough participants to make meaningful data comparisons. On Saturday, we went...

¡Hola de San Juan! After months of preparation, we have at last arrived in the sunny and beautiful capital of Puerto Rico and have had quite an exciting first week. After saying goodbye to my friends and family last Sunday, we departed from State College as the sun...

On our first day on campus, we printed out our flyers and started pinning them to bulletin boards around campus. As we put them up, I worried that they wouldn't get much attention on the busy cork boards, especially as we hadn't printed in color. We noticed a lot of...

First week in Puerto Rico was filled with lots of memories and new experiences. Starting with the day we travelled in two planes, up to Mother's Day which I luckily got to spend with my mother. The university was bigger than I expected, enough to get lost while...

This week marked my last week in Puerto Rico. I had such an amazing end to my trip. I was able to test on about 10 participants during the week. The majority of the experiments went well. During one, the eye tracker shut down. I believe this happened because the eye...

This week was full of fast changes. Last weekend, I was talking to my parents about my lack of participants. They offered to reach out to a few friends they know from Puerto Rico to see if they could offer any assistance. The response that we got back from our friends...

After 8 weeks, my PIRE trip has come to an end. I am writing this final blog from my home in New Hampshire, where it is cold and raining in July (quite different from the hot and humid weather of Puerto Rico). My final week, while filled with beaches and good food,...

This week was a particularly crazy week in my life. On Monday, it was my birthday. Caden and I were able to celebrate by going to the beach and eating yummy food. I had a great time and was really thankful for the opportunity to celebrate my birthday abroad this year....

This week, I have tested a few more participants but it has been slowing down quite a bit. Students were having finals this week, so I believe they may have been overwhelmed with work and not available to participate. I have only one participant scheduled so far for...

I cannot believe I am ending off my seventh week in Puerto Rico! It has been such an amazing experience so far, and I cannot wait to finish off my experience with more memories and experiments. I have had a very busy week in terms of running sessions with participants...

Wow! I cannot believe it has already been six weeks in Puerto Rico. This week was filled with quite a few ups and downs. We were able to travel to El Yunque, which is a national rainforest in Puerto Rico. With waterfalls, natural swimming areas, and gorgeous views, we...

This week has been rather hectic! So many fun and exciting things have happened. I currently have tested my experiment on five participants and have two more scheduled for next week. I am hoping that I will hear back from a few other people I have emailed about...

I can’t believe it has already been five whole weeks here! For a large portion of the beginning of our visit, we struggled to find participants and were also held back with a COVID exposure. Once we got back to campus and the summer session had started up, we went...

This week was a blur of activity in both my research work and exploring. Our team in San Juan has been having a hard time recruiting participants and getting the word out. To help spur further engagement, our group went around to the summer classes that started this...

Well... this week there is not much to report. I got COVID and tested positive on Monday. Luckily my roomies Caden and Maria Rebecca didn't get it! Unfortunately, my symptoms were severe and I have been pretty much unable to get out of bed this week. I am starting to...

Our Puerto Rico team had a few setbacks this week, starting with Memorial Day. I was about to schedule my second participant but unfortunately had to reschedule to the next week since the gates were locked during the holiday! I am hopeful that I can run this...

My second week here in Puerto Rico is wrapping up. Last weekend was full of activities. One of my roommates, Caden and I went to a women's rights march in Old San Juan. It was thrilling to see the parallels between these social justice movements in these two distinct...

I made it to Puerto Rico! Today marks my fifth day here. I have really been enjoying my time living here with Amanda and Caden. They have been able to help me navigate the train station and introduce me to a few of their favorite restaurants and destinations in town....

I am so happy to announce that I have successfully run my first participant! Everything went smoothly and as expected, and I could not have had a more perfect start to my experiment. The participant told me they would also be willing to distribute my flyer to their...

Week three in San Juan has been a blur but in the best way possible. Since recruitment has been so slow, we have had lots more time to explore. This week, we took Maria Rebecca to our spots that we love like Condado Beach, Old San Juan, and our favorite restaurants. I...

Now that we have fully set up our equipment, tested our entire experiments, and distributed our recruitment flyers, we have been in a stage of limbo as we wait for people to pour into our surveys. So far we have not scheduled anyone for a session, even though we have...

This week, we went to the beach a few times, went out to eat a few times, watched a Puerto Rican movie, and got to eat lots of authentic food. Week two in Puerto Rico has been nice, but we are struggling to find participants. First, we need people to fill out the LHQ....

Good morning, everyone! This Sunday I will be disembarking for my journey to Puerto Rico at 6 a.m. The past two weeks have been a fury of preparations for my sisters wedding and my PIRE trip. While testing my equipment a few weeks ago, I discovered that the audio...

Week one in San Juan, Puerto Rico has been fantastic thus far. Caden and I landed on Tuesday and met with Rosa our lab supervisor. We ate the classic Puerto Rican dish made out of plantains, Mofongo, and then went grocery shopping after settling into our Airbnb. By...

The past five days have felt like an entire month already! The moment Amanda and I stepped out of the airport in San Juan, we were greeted with open arms by Professor Guzzardo Tamargo, a previous student of Dr. Dussias! She took us to the grocery store, showed us how...

In addition to the research, the PIRE experience is also exactly that, an experience. Traveling to new places, meeting new people, and doing new things. Puerto Rico is a gorgeous island with beautiful beaches, tropical rainforests, and cities full of history and...

It is hard to believe how fast these summer weeks went by. We have learned an incredible amount about the process behind the research and engaging in flexible opportunities. The end of our official PIRE experience leads us to the beginning of a new semester of school....

So this week will be a double feature, including updates for two weeks. The amount of participants I have tested has steadily grown and I get so excited seeing all the data I have to analyze. Although I am still nowhere near reaching my goal (I'm hoping to test at...

This week we decided to splice the a and e items so that they will be identical in the trials (except for the onset vowel).  We also piloted the 4IAX task with our partner lab in Spain and got some preliminary data so that we can make the appropriate changes to the...

I can’t believe it’s our last “official” week of PIRE. On the bright side, we recently received news that we will be able to continue collecting data into the fall. Thank goodness! I am so thankful to be able to continue running this study and see how much data I can...