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I'm an Assistant Professor at the School of Arts and Humanities of the University of Lisbon and Co-PI of the Laboratory of Psycholinguistics research group of the Center of Linguistics of the University of Lisbon (CLUL). My research program stands at the intersection of psychology, linguistics, and statistical methods. Its main goals are to describe and explain inter- and intra-individual variability in language and cognition. More specifically, I aim to: (a) characterise the similarities and differences that exist between and within groups of individuals (e.g., native and non-native speakers, younger and older adults) in their linguistic and cognitive processing; (b) account for those similarities and differences in terms of participant-level variables, such as chronological age, age of second language acquisition, and usage factors throughout the lifespan; (c) develop computational models of (multilingual) language processing that can provide mechanistic accounts of those similarities and differences. As of February 2025, I have (co-)authored 40 publications (Google Scholar h-index: 19; Scopus h-index: 16).
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Identification

Personal identification

Full name
João Veríssimo

Citation names

  • Veríssimo, João

Author identifiers

Ciência ID
9B1B-5876-C6F6
ORCID iD
0000-0002-1264-3017
Google Scholar ID
F71sWisAAAAJ
Scopus Author Id
26632447600

Email addresses

  • jlverissimo@edu.ulisboa.pt (Professional)

Telephones

Telephone
  • (+351) 217920000 (Professional)

Addresses

  • Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa, Alameda da Universidade, 1600-214, Lisboa, Lisboa, Portugal (Professional)

Websites

Knowledge fields

  • Humanities - Languages and Literatures - Linguistics
  • Social Sciences - Psychology

Languages

Language Speaking Reading Writing Listening Peer-review
Portuguese (Mother tongue)
English Proficiency (C2) Proficiency (C2) Proficiency (C2) Proficiency (C2) Proficiency (C2)
German Elementary (A2) Intermediate (B1) Elementary (A2) Elementary (A2) Elementary (A2)
Education
Degree Classification
2003/10 - 2010/05
Concluded
 Psycholinguistics and Neurolinguistics (Doctor of Philosophy)
University of Essex, United Kingdom
"Stems and rules: A dual-mechanism account of verbal stem formation in Portuguese" (THESIS/DISSERTATION)
2002/10 - 2003/06
Concluded
 Research internship (Especialização pós-licenciatura)
Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal
1997/10 - 2002/09
Concluded
 Psychology (Mestrado integrado)
Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal
Affiliation

Science

Category
Host institution 		Employer
2020/02 - 2020/07 Researcher (Research) Universität Potsdam Department Linguistik, Germany
2018/03 - 2020/01 Researcher (Research) University of Postsdam - Potsdam Research Institute for Multilingualism, Germany
2013/09 - 2017/12 Researcher (Research) University of Postsdam - Potsdam Research Institute for Multilingualism, Germany
2010/06 - 2013/05 Postdoc (Research) Universidade de Lisboa Faculdade de Psicologia, Portugal
Georgetown University, United States

Teaching in Higher Education

Category
Host institution 		Employer
2020/01 - Current Assistant Professor (University Teacher) Universidade de Lisboa Faculdade de Letras, Portugal

Positions / Appointments

Category
Host institution 		Employer
2022/12 - 2024/02 PI of Research Group Center of Linguistics of the University of Lisbon - Laboratory of Psycholinguistics, Portugal
Projects

Grant

Designation Funders
2022/10 - Current AGREE: Agreement in native and second language processing (second phase proposal)
317308350
Invited Scientist Fellow
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft
Ongoing
2022/09 - Current MultiplEYE: Enabling multilingual eye-tracking data collection for human and machine language processing research
CA21131
Secondary Proposer
European Cooperation in Science and Technology
Ongoing
2010/06 - 2013/05 ABORDAGENS SIMBÓLICAS E ASSOCIATIVAS NO ESTUDO DA LINGUAGEM: EFEITOS DE MORFOLOGIA PURA NO LÉXICO MENTAL
29527DFA
 Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia
2003/10 - 2007/09 INFLUÊNCIA SEMÂNTICA NA FLEXÃO DE TEMPO EM INGLÊS
14401DFA
 Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia
Outputs

Publications

Book chapter
  1. Clahsen, Harald; Veríssimo, João. "Investigating grammatical processing in bilinguals: The case of morphological priming". In Bilingualism, executive function, and beyond: Questions and insights, edited by I. A. Sekerina; L. Spradlin; V. Valian, 117-130. John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2019.
    10.1075/sibil.57.08cla
  2. Clahsen, Harald; Veríssimo, João. "Dual Morphology in the mental lexicon: Experimental evidence from the acquisition and processing of Greek and Portuguese". In Acquisition of Romance Languages, edited by Pedro Guijarro-Fuentes; Maria Juan-Garau, 41-64. De Gruyter, 2016.
    10.1515/9781614513575-004
Conference paper
  1. Veríssimo, João. "Stem-formation processes in Portuguese: A dual-mechanism account". 2005.
    10.13140/2.1.3268.1926
Journal article
  1. Nur Karatas; Oya Özemir; Jarrett T. Lovelett; Bora Demir; Kemal Erkol; João Veríssimo; Gülcan Erçetin; Michael T. Ullman. "Improving second language vocabulary learning and retention by leveraging memory enhancement techniques: A multidomain pedagogical approach". Language Teaching Research (2025): http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/13621688211053525.
    10.1177/13621688211053525
  2. Alex Miklashevsky; Jana Reifegerste; Adolfo M. García; Friedemann Pulvermüller; David A. Balota; João Veríssimo; Michael T. Ullman. "Embodied cognition comes of age: A processing advantage for action words is modulated by aging and the task.". Journal of Experimental Psychology: General (2024): http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/xge0001555.
    10.1037/xge0001555
  3. van Doorn, Johnny; Haaf, Julia M.; Stefan, Angelika M.; Wagenmakers, Eric-Jan; Cox, Gregory Edward; Davis-Stober, Clintin P.; Heathcote, Andrew; et al. "Bayes factors for mixed models: A discussion". Computational Brain & Behavior 6 1 (2023): 140-158. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42113-022-00160-3.
    10.1007/s42113-022-00160-3
  4. Lago, Sol; Stone, Kate; Oltrogge, Elise; Veríssimo, João. "Possessive processing in bilingual comprehension". Language Learning 73 3 (2023): 904-941. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/lang.12556.
    10.1111/lang.12556
  5. Veríssimo, João. Corresponding author: Veríssimo, João. "When fixed and random effects mismatch: Another case of inflation of evidence in non-maximal models". Computational Brain & Behavior 6 1 (2023): 84-101. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42113-022-00152-3.
    10.1007/s42113-022-00152-3
  6. Veríssimo, João; Verhaeghen, Paul; Goldman, Noreen; Weinstein, Maxine; Ullman, Michael T.. Corresponding author: Veríssimo, João. "Evidence that ageing yields improvements as well as declines across attention and executive functions". Nature Human Behaviour 6 1 (2022): 97-110. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-021-01169-7.
    10.1038/s41562-021-01169-7
  7. Ciaccio, Laura Anna; Veríssimo, João. "Investigating variability in morphological processing with Bayesian distributional models". Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 29 6 (2022): 2264-2274. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13423-022-02109-w.
    10.3758/s13423-022-02109-w
  8. Veríssimo, João. Corresponding author: Veríssimo, João. "BLC mini-series: New statistical approaches and research practices for bilingualism research". Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 24 5 (2021): 799-800. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728921000365.
    10.1017/s1366728921000365
  9. Stone, Kate; Veríssimo, João; Schad, Daniel J.; Oltrogge, Elise; Vasishth, Shravan; Lago, Sol. "The interaction of grammatically distinct agreement dependencies in predictive processing". Language, Cognition and Neuroscience 36 9 (2021): 1159-1179. https://doi.org/10.1080/23273798.2021.1921816.
    10.1080/23273798.2021.1921816
  10. Reifegerste, Jana; Veríssimo, João; Rugg, Michael D.; Pullman, Mariel Y.; Babcock, Laura; Glei, Dana A.; Weinstein, Maxine; Goldman, Noreen; Ullman, Michael T.. "Early-life education may help bolster declarative memory in old age, especially for women". Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition 28 2 (2021): 218-252. https://doi.org/10.1080/13825585.2020.1736497.
    10.1080/13825585.2020.1736497
  11. Veríssimo, João. Corresponding author: Veríssimo, João. "Analysis of rating scales: A pervasive problem in bilingualism research and a solution with Bayesian ordinal models". Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 24 5 (2021): 842-848. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728921000316.
    10.1017/s1366728921000316
  12. Marimon, Mireia; Hofmann, Andrea; Veríssimo, João; Männel, Claudia; Friederici, Angela D.; Höhle, Barbara; Wartenburger, Isabell. "Children’s Learning of Non-adjacent Dependencies Using a Web-Based Computer Game Setting". Frontiers in Psychology 12 734877 (2021): https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.734877.
    10.3389/fpsyg.2021.734877
  13. Reifegerste, Jana; Estabrooke, Ivy V.; Russell, Lauren E.; Veríssimo, João; Johari, Karim; Wilmarth, Barbara; Pagan, Fernando L.; Moussa, Charbel; Ullman, Michael T.. "Can sex influence the neurocognition of language? Evidence from Parkinson's disease". Neuropsychologia 148 (2020): 107633. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2020.107633.
    10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2020.107633
  14. Pliatsikas, Christos; Meteyard, Lotte; Veríssimo, João; DeLuca, Vincent; Shattuck, Kyle; Ullman, Michael T.. "The effect of bilingualism on brain development from early childhood to young adulthood". Brain Structure and Function 225 7 (2020): 2131-2152. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00429-020-02115-5.
    10.1007/s00429-020-02115-5
  15. Ruberg, Tobias; Rothweiler, Monika; Veríssimo, João; Clahsen, Harald. "Childhood bilingualism and Specific Language Impairment: A study of the CP-domain in German SLI". Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 23 3 (2020): 668-680. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728919000580.
    10.1017/s1366728919000580
  16. Pañeda, Claudia; Lago, Sol; Vares, Elena; Veríssimo, João; Felser, Claudia. "Island effects in Spanish comprehension". Glossa 5 1 (2020): http://doi.org/10.5334/gjgl.1058.
    10.5334/gjgl.1058
  17. Farhy, Yael; Veríssimo, João. "Semantic effects in morphological priming: The case of Hebrew stems". Language and Speech 62 4 (2019): 737-750. https://doi.org/10.1177/0023830918811863.
    10.1177/0023830918811863
  18. Bosch, Sina; Veríssimo, João; Clahsen, Harald. "Inflectional morphology in bilingual language processing: An age-of-acquisition study". Language Acquisition 26 3 (2019): 339-360. https://doi.org/10.1080/10489223.2019.1570204.
    10.1080/10489223.2019.1570204
  19. Pliatsikas, Christos; Veríssimo, João; Babcock, Laura; Pullman, Mariel Y; Glei, Dana A; Weinstein, Maxine; Goldman, Noreen; Ullman, Michael T. "Working memory in older adults declines with age, but is modulated by sex and education". Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 72 6 (2019): 1308-1327. https://doi.org/10.1177/1747021818791994.
    10.1177/1747021818791994
  20. Wulff, Dirk U.; De Deyne, Simon; Jones, Michael N.; Mata, Rui; The Aging Lexicon Consortium. "New perspectives on the aging lexicon". Trends in Cognitive Sciences 23 8 (2019): 686-698. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2019.05.003.
    10.1016/j.tics.2019.05.003
  21. Jacob, Gunnar; Heyer, Vera; Veríssimo, João. "Aiming at the same target: A masked priming study directly comparing derivation and inflection in the second language". International Journal of Bilingualism 22 6 (2018): 619-637. http://doi.org/10.1177/1367006916688333.
    10.1177/1367006916688333
  22. Veríssimo, João. Corresponding author: Veríssimo, João. "Sensitive periods in both L1 and L2: Some conceptual and methodological suggestions". Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 21 5 (2018): 932-933. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728918000275.
    10.1017/s1366728918000275
  23. Farhy, Yael; Veríssimo, João; Clahsen, Harald. Corresponding author: Veríssimo, João. "Do late bilinguals access pure morphology during word recognition? A masked-priming study on Hebrew as a second language". Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 21 5 (2018): 945-951. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728918000032.
    10.1017/s1366728918000032
  24. Veríssimo, João; Heyer, Vera; Jacob, Gunnar; Clahsen, Harald. Corresponding author: Veríssimo, João. "Selective effects of age of acquisition on morphological priming: Evidence for a sensitive period". Language Acquisition 25 3 (2018): 315-326. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10489223.2017.1346104.
    10.1080/10489223.2017.1346104
  25. Farhy, Yael; Veríssimo, João; Clahsen, Harald. Corresponding author: Veríssimo, João. "Universal and particular in morphological processing: Evidence from Hebrew". Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 71 5 (2018): 1125-1133. http://doi.org/10.1080/17470218.2017.1310917.
    10.1080/17470218.2017.1310917
  26. Jessen, Anna; Veríssimo, João; Clahsen, Harald. "Variability and consistency in late bilinguals’ morphology". The Mental Lexicon 13 2 (2018): 186-214. https://doi.org/10.1075/ml.18002.jes.
    10.1075/ml.18002.jes
  27. Veríssimo, João. "Extending a Gradient Symbolic approach to the native versus non-native contrast: The case of plurals in compounds". Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 19 5 (2016): 900-902. http://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728916000134.
    10.1017/s1366728916000134
  28. Clahsen, Harald; Veríssimo, João. "Investigating grammatical processing in bilinguals: The case of morphological priming". Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism 6 5 (2016): 685-698. http://doi.org/10.1075/lab.15039.cla.
    10.1075/lab.15039.cla
  29. Veríssimo, João; Clahsen, Harald. Corresponding author: Veríssimo, João. "Variables and similarity in linguistic generalization: Evidence from inflectional classes in Portuguese". Journal of Memory and Language 76 (2014): 61-79. http://doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2014.06.001.
    10.1016/j.jml.2014.06.001
  30. Hedenius, Martina; Persson, Jonas; Tremblay, Antoine; Adi-Japha, Esther; Veríssimo, João; Dye, Cristina D.; Alm, Per; et al. "Grammar predicts procedural learning and consolidation deficits in children with Specific Language Impairment". Research in Developmental Disabilities 32 6 (2011): 2362-2375. http://doi.org/10.1016/j.ridd.2011.07.026.
    10.1016/j.ridd.2011.07.026
  31. Veríssimo, João; Clahsen, Harald. "Morphological priming by itself: A study of Portuguese conjugations". Cognition 112 1 (2009): 187-194. http://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2009.04.003.
    10.1016/j.cognition.2009.04.003
  32. Schmitt, David P.; Allik, Jüri; McCrae, Robert R.; Benet-Martínez, Verónica; International Sexuality Description Project. "The geographic distribution of Big Five personality traits: Patterns and profiles of human self-description across 56 nations". Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology 38 2 (2007): 173-212. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022022106297299.
    10.1177/0022022106297299
  33. Schmitt, David P.; International Sexuality Description Project. "Patterns and universals of adult romantic attachment across 62 cultural regions: Are Models of Self and of Other pancultural constructs?". Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology 35 4 (2004): 367-402. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022022104266105.
    10.1177/0022022104266105
  34. Schmitt, David P.; International Sexuality Description Project. "Patterns and universals of mate poaching across 53 nations: The effects of sex, culture, and personality on romantically attracting another person's partner". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 86 4 (2004): 560-584. http://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.86.4.560.
    10.1037/0022-3514.86.4.560
  35. Schmitt, David P.; International Sexuality Description Project. "Are men universally more dismissing than women? Gender differences in romantic attachment across 62 cultural regions". Personal Relationships 10 3 (2003): 307-331. https://doi.org/10.1111/1475-6811.00052.
    10.1111/1475-6811.00052
  36. Schmitt, David P.; International Sexuality Description Project. "Universal sex differences in the desire for sexual variety: Tests from 52 nations, 6 continents, and 13 islands". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 85 1 (2003): 85-104. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.85.1.85.
    10.1037/0022-3514.85.1.85
Thesis / Dissertation
  1. Veríssimo, João. "Stems and rules: A dual-mechanism account of verbal stem formation in Portuguese". PhD, University of Essex, 2010. http://dx.doi.org/10.13140/2.1.3202.6563.
    10.13140/2.1.3202.6563
Activities

Supervision

Thesis Title
Role 		Degree Subject (Type)
Institution / Organization
2025/01 - Current Exploring grammatical constraints in Large Language Models
Supervisor of David Silva
 Cognitive Science (Master)
Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal
2024/01 - Current Artificial language learning of morphological rules in children with developmental language disorders
Supervisor of Catarina Barbosa
 Linguistics (Master)
Universidade de Lisboa Faculdade de Letras, Portugal
2023/02 - Current Boundedness and telicity marking in the acquisition of German as a first, second, and heritage language
Co-supervisor of Duarte Oliveira
 Linguistics (PhD)
Universidade do Minho, Portugal
2023/01 - Current Language comprehension across the lifespan: Examining the effects of ageing on morphosyntactic processing at the word and sentence levels
Supervisor of Jéssica Gomes
 Linguistics (PhD)
Universidade de Lisboa Faculdade de Letras, Portugal
2022/09 - Current The perception-production link in prosodic cue use for disambiguation: Exploring the role of individual (in)-variability
Co-supervisor of Andrea Hofmann
 Linguistics (PhD)
Universität Potsdam, Germany
2022/09/01 - 2024/07/31 Semantic activation of embedded words
Supervisor of Laura Redondo
 Linguistics (Master)
Universidade de Lisboa Faculdade de Letras, Portugal
2020 - 2023 Proper names and common nouns dissociation: Exploring differences in linguistic processing and memory retrieval
Co-supervisor of Khaoula Ennahli
 Cognitive Science (Master)
Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal
2020 - 2021 Morphological processing in dominant second-language German speakers after early migration: A masked priming experiment
Supervisor of Judith Pritzkau
 Linguistics (Degree)
Universität Potsdam, Germany
2020 - 2021 The influence of task context on processing inflected and derived words
Supervisor of Lea Harz
 Linguistics (Degree)
Universität Potsdam, Germany
2020 - 2021 ‘Learn me if you can’: Children’s learning of non-adjacent dependencies using a web-based computer-game-setting
Co-supervisor of Andrea Hofmann
 Linguistics (Master)
Universität Potsdam, Germany
2019 - 2020 Gender agreement in mixed Greek-German nominal phrases: A study with heritage speakers
Co-supervisor of Fenia Karkaletsou
 Linguistics (Master)
Universität Potsdam, Germany
2014 - 2020 Universals and particulars in morphology: Processing and generalization in native and non-native speakers in Hebrew
Co-supervisor of Yael Farhy
 Linguistics (PhD)
Universität Potsdam, Germany
2015 - 2017 The timing of Semitic word recognition: An experimental study of Hebrew verbs
Co-supervisor of Natalie Uziel
 Linguistics (Master)
Universität Potsdam, Germany
Distinctions

Award

2024 University of Lisbon / CGD Scientifc Prize
Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal