LISA TABOR CONNOR, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor of Occupational Therapy, Radiology & Neurology
Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis MO

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

Dr. Connor received a doctorate in experimental psychology from Washington University in 1992. She completed postdoctoral training at three institutions: Georgia Institute of Technology in cognitive aging with Drs. Christopher Hertzog and Anderson Smith; Boston University School of Medicine in adult communicative disorders with Drs. Martin Albert and Loraine Obler; and Washington University with Dr. Maurizio Corbetta in functional neuroimaging of aphasia. Before returning to St. Louis, Dr. Connor was assistant director of the Language and the Aging Brain longitudinal study at the Boston VA Medical Center and associate director of the Harold Goodglass Aphasia Research Center. She has co-authored and edited Neurobehavior of Language and Cognition: Studies of Normal Aging and Brain Damage and served on the editorial board of the Journal of Gerontology: Psychological Sciences.

At Washington University, Dr. Connor is the CRRG co-principal investigator of the Clinical Core with Dr. Abdullah Nassief. She is the principal investigator of the CRRG project Evidence-Based Aphasia Therapy for Verbal Production. She directs the Web-based data query project that strives to provide access to CRRG data for investigators at Washington University and other collaborating institutions. Dr. Connor is a key investigator in the Aphasia Recovery Research Team. She teaches Behavioral Neuroscience and Clinical Research Design and Methodology courses in the Program in Occupational Therapy.

RESEARCH SUMMARY

Research in Dr. Connor’s laboratory examines cognitive and neurobiological bases of stroke recovery in people with aphasia. The goal is to understand plasticity of the brain to maximize functional recovery through rehabilitation. People with mild-to-moderate aphasia often have verbal deficits that impede everyday communication and limit participation in activities. Several treatments are available to ameliorate these deficits, but nothing is known about their neurobiological underpinnings and no one has determined how improvements made during treatment translate to communication in everyday life.

Link to Publications

CONTACT INFORMATION

Email:
Phone: (314) 286-1998
Fax: (314) 286-1601

Mailing address:
Program in Occupational Therapy
4444 Forest Park Ave.
Campus Box 8505
St. Louis, MO 63108