Jennifer Chesters

Research Summary

I completed a Psychology MA at St Andrews University, where I developed an interest in the neural basis of communication. I went on to take the Speech and Language Sciences MSc course at UCL. I have worked as a Speech and Language Therapist in Learning Disability, Forensic Mental Health and Dysfluency services.

I joined the Speech and Brain Research Group in January 2011, as a Research Assistant on Riikka Möttönen’s MRC funded project investigating sensorimotor interactions for speech communication. I went on to complete my DPhil, funded by an MRC Clinical Research Training Fellowship. My project, which was supervised by Kate Watkins and Riikka Möttönen, investigated the use of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) to promote speech fluency. We completed the first randomised controlled trial of tDCS with adults who stutter, which showed increased fluency for up to 6 weeks following a combination of tDCS and fluency-enhancing behavioural techniques. The trial has recently been published in Brain, a journal of neurology, and is available open access (please click on the link on the right of this page).

Since my DPhil, I am continuing to pursue my interest in understanding how our brains are organised to produce speech, and the application of this knowledge to improving speech and language interventions. I work as a Postdoctoral Research Associate on a new MRC funded project, led by Kate Watkins. Along with Dr Charlotte Wiltshire and Dr Gabe Cler, we are investigating the neural basis of stuttering using a range of brain imaging and stimulation techniques. This project includes the INSTEP trial of tDCS in developmental stuttering. We have finished recruiting for this study now, and we plan to share our results soon. Please click on the INSTEP link if you'd like to learn more about it. If you have any questions about our work, we'd love to hear from you. 

Speech Production

Developmental Stuttering (Stammering)