Ekaterini Klepousniotou

I am an Associate Professor at City ULE, University of York Europe Campus and the Director of the MA in Clinical Neuropsychology and MSc in Cognitive Neuropsychology.

I am also an Associate Professor (Visiting) in Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuropsychology at the School of Psychology, University of Leeds, UK, where I held a tenured position from 2007 to 2023.

I have held Associate Professor positions (Visiting) at Carnegie Mellon University, Georgetown University, and Texas A&M University in Qatar. I have also held honorary contracts with The Wolfson Centre for Applied Health Research, Bradford Royal Infirmary and the Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust (Paediatric Neuropsychology) in the UK.

I am member of national and international professional societies (e.g., Academy of Aphasia; Experimental Psychology Society EPS; Society for the Neurobiology of Language-SNL; Society for Neuroscience-SfN), grant reviewer for funding agencies in the US, Canada, UK, and Europe, regular reviewer for international journals, and sit on the Bioethics Committee of Alzheimer Hellas.

• Introduction to Psychology I
• Introduction to Psychology II
• Social Psychology (Psychology & Humanities)
• Fundamentals in Neuropsychology
• Neuropsychology of Memory and Dementias

I am a cognitive neuroscientist working on language processing. My research interests lie in the
area of meaning access and representation patterns, as well as language localization. I work
with older neurotypical and language-impaired populations (patients with acquired left or right
hemisphere damage and patients with neurodegenerative disorders), young healthy adults as
well as children with neurotypical and atypical language development (monolingual and
bilingual). My research involves behavioural measures and neuroimaging methodologies (fMRI,
EEG, tDCS) to investigate the following:

• Lexical ambiguity processing
• Figurative language processing
• Neural bases of language processing
• Temporal dynamics of language processing
• Cognitive bases of neurological communication disorders
• Cognitive deficits subsequent to acquired left- and right hemisphere brain damage (stroke)
• Cognitive deficits subsequent to neurodegenerative disorders (e.g., Alzheimer’s, MCI)
• Cognitive processes in ageing
• Typical and atypical language development
• Bilingualism, SES and academic attainment

This line of research aims to provide converging evidence about the neural dynamics and cognitive processes underlying language and support rehabilitation practices, education and policy.

Klepousniotou, E. (forthcoming). Psycholinguistic Evidence for Theories of Metaphor and Metonymy. Annual Review of Linguistics.

Klepousniotou, E. & Frisson, S. (in press). Experimental Methods in Lexical Semantics: II. Neurophysiological. In Geeraerts, G. & Glynn, D. (Eds.), Cambridge Handbook of Lexical Semantics. 

Frisson, S. & Klepousniotou, E. (in press). Experimental Methods in Lexical Semantics: I. Psycholinguistic. In Geeraerts, G. & Glynn, D. (Eds.), Cambridge Handbook of Lexical Semantics. 

Klepousniotou, E. (2025). Processing of various forms of lexical ambiguity. Reference Module in Social Sciences. Elsevier. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-323-95504-1.01109-1

Davies, C., Porretta, V., Koleva, K. & Klepousniotou, E. (2022). Speaker-specific cues influence semantic disambiguation. Journal of Psycholinguistic Research, 51, 933-955. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10936-022-09852-0

Maciejewski, G. & Klepousniotou, E. (2020). Disambiguating the Ambiguity Disadvantage Effect: Behavioral and Electrophysiological Evidence for Semantic Competition. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 46, 1682-1700. https://doi.org/10.1037/xlm0000842

Maciejewski, G., Rodd, J.M., Mon-Williams, M. & Klepousniotou, E. (2020). The cost of learning new meanings for familiar words. Language, Cognition and Neuroscience, 35, 188-210. https://doi.org/10.1080/23273798.2019.1642500

Koleva, K., Mon-Williams, M. & Klepousniotou, E. (2019). Right hemisphere involvement for pun processing – Effects of idiom decomposition. Journal of Neurolinguistics, 51, 165-183. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jneuroling.2019.02.002

Craddock, M., Klepousniotou, E., el-Deredy, W., Poliakoff, E. & Lloyd, D. (2019). Transcranial alternating current stimulation at 10 Hz modulates response bias in the Somatic Signal Detection Task. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 135, 106-112. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2018.12.001

Craddock, M., Poliakoff, E., El-Deredy, W., Klepousniotou, E. & Lloyd, D.M. (2017). Pre-stimulus alpha oscillations over somatosensory cortex predict tactile misperceptions. Neuropsychologia, 96, 9-18. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2016.12.030

Tompkins, C.A., Klepousniotou, E., & Scott, A.G. (2017). Nature and assessment of right hemisphere disorders. In Papathanasiou, I., Coppens, P., Potagas, C. (Eds.), Aphasia and related neurogenic communication disorders, 2nd Edition, pp. 353-398. Burlington, MA: Jones and Bartlett.

Maciejewski, G. & Klepousniotou, E. (2016). Relative Meaning Frequencies for 100 Homonyms: British eDom Norms. Journal of Open Psychology Data, 4: e6. http://dx.doi.org/10.5334/jopd.28

De Cat, C., Klepousniotou, E., & Baayen, R.H. (2015). Representational deficit or processing effect? An electrophysiological study of noun-noun compound processing by very advanced L2 speakers of English. Frontiers in Psychology, Vol. 6, Article 77, 1-17. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00077

MacGregor, L.J., Bouwsema, J., & Klepousniotou, E. (2015) Sustained meaning activation for polysemous but not homonymous words: Evidence from EEG. Neuropsychologia, 68, 126-138. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2015.01.008

Klepousniotou E., Gracco V.L., & Pike G.B. (2014). Pathways to lexical ambiguity: fMRI evidence for bilateral fronto-parietal involvement in language processing. Brain and Language, 131, 56-64. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bandl.2013.06.002

Klepousniotou, E., Pike, G. B., Steinhauer, K., & Gracco, V. (2012). Not all ambiguous words are created equal: an EEG investigation of homonymy and polysemy. Brain and Language, 123(1), 11–21. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bandl.2012.06.007

Taler, V., Klepousniotou, E., & Phillips, N.A. (2009). Comprehension of lexical ambiguity in healthy aging, mild cognitive impairment, and mild Alzheimer’s disease. Neuropsychologia, 47(5),1332-1343. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2009.01.028

Klepousniotou, E., Titone, D., & Romero, C. (2008). Making sense of word senses: The comprehension of polysemy depends on sense overlap. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 34(6), 1534-1543. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0013012

Klepousniotou, E. (2007). Reconciling linguistics and psycholinguistics: On the psychological reality of linguistic polysemy. In M. Rakova, G. Petho, & C. Rakosi, The Cognitive Basis of Polysemy, pp. 17-46. Peter Lang Verlag, Frankfurt.

Klepousniotou, E., & Baum, S. R. (2005a). Unilateral brain damage effects on processing homonymous and polysemous words. Brain and Language, 93(3), 308-326. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bandl.2004.10.011

Klepousniotou, E. & Baum S.R. (2005b). Processing homonymy and polysemy: Effects of sentential context and time-course following unilateral brain damage. Brain and Language, 95, 365-382. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bandl.2005.03.001

Klepousniotou, E. (2002). The processing of lexical ambiguity: Homonymy and polysemy in the mental lexicon. Brain and Language, 81(1), 205-223. https://doi.org/10.1006/brln.2001.2518