Projects

Check out a few of my previous research projects, as well as some projects currently in the pipeline

Publications and Presentations

Selected publications and presentations. Underline indicates mentee

Full CV can be found here

Publications

Altman, K.B., Plate, S., Iverson, J., Britsch, E.R. (in press). Characterizing caregiver input to children with diverse developmental outcomes during pretend play. Autism Research

Iverson, J. M., Schneider J. L., Plate, S., Britsch, E. R. (2024). Reaching while learning to sit: Capturing the kinematics of co-developing skills at home. Developmental Psychobiology, 66(6). 

Plate, S. and Iverson, J. M. (2024). Breakdowns and repairs: Communication initiation and effectiveness in infants with and without an older sibling with ASD. Infant Behavior and Development, 74(2024). 

Iverson, J.M., West, K.L., Schneider, J.L., Plate, S., Northrup, J.B., Britsch, E.R. (2022). Early development in autism: How developmental cascades help us understand the emergence of developmental differences, In Lockman, J.J. & Tamis-LeMonda, C.S. (Eds), Advances in Child Development and Behavior Volume 64: Developmental Cascades. Elsevier.

Yankowitz, L. D., Petrulla, V., Plate, S., Tunc, B., Guthrie, W., Meera, S. S., Tena, K., Pandey, J., Swanson, M. R., Pruett J. R., Cola, M., Russel, A., Marrus, N., Hazlett, H. C., Botteron, K., Constantino, J. N., Dager, S. R., Estes, A., Zwaigenbaum, L., Piven, J., Schultz, R. T., Parish-Morris, J., and the IBIS Network (2022). Infants later diagnosed with autism have lower canonical babbling ratios in the first year of life. Molecular Autism, 13 (28).

Cola, M., Zampella, C. J., Yankowitz, L. D., Plate, S., Petrulla, V., Tena, K., Russell, A., Pandey, J., Schultz, R. T., and Parish-Morris, J. (2022). Conversational adaptation in children and teens with autism: Differences in talkativeness across contexts. Autism Research, 15(6), 1090-1108.

Cola, M., Yankowitz, L. D., Tena, K., Russell, A., Bateman, L., Knox, A., Plate, S., Cubit, L. S., Zampella, C. J., Pandey, J., Schultz, R. T., & Parish-Morris, J. (2022). Friend matters: Sex differences in social language during autism diagnostic interviews. Molecular Autism, 13(1), 5.  

Plate, S., Yankowitz, L., Resorla, L., Swanson, M. R., Meera, S. S., Estes, A., Marrus, N., Cola, M., Petrulla, V., Faggen, A., Pandey, J., Paterson, S., Pruett, J. R. Jr., Hazlett, H., Dager, S., St. John, T., Botteron, K., Zwaigenbaum, L., Piven, J., … Parish-Morris, J. (2021). Infant vocalizing and phenotypic outcomes in autism: Evidence from the first 2 years. Child Development, 00, 1–16.

Song, A., Cola, M., Plate, S., Petrulla, V., Yankowitz, L., Pandey, J., Schultz, R. T., and Parish-Morris, J. (2020). Natural language markers of social phenotype in girls with autism. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 62(8), 949-960.

Cola, M., Plate, S., Yankowitz, L., Petrulla, V., Bateman, L., Zampella, C. J., de Marchena, A., Pandey, J., Schultz, R. T., & Parish-Morris, J. (2020). Sex differences in the first impressions made by girls and boys with autism. Molecular Autism, 11(49), 14.

Boorse, J., Cola, M., Plate, S., Yankowitz, L., Pandey, J., Schultz, R. T., and Parish-Morris, J. (2019). Linguistic markers of autism in girls: Evidence of a “blended phenotype” during storytelling. Molecular Autism, 10(1), 14.

Selected Presentations

Wyetzner, S., Plate, S., & Iverson J. M. (accepted). Caregiver gestures and their impact on infant communication. [Poster presentation]. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Convention, Seattle, WA. 

Plate, S., Schneider, J. L., Diehl, M. D., Cortez, K. B., Britsch, E. R., & Iverson, J. M. (2024, July 8-11). Walk, talk, play: Learning to walk changes how infants communicate and play with objects. In Laudanska, Z. (Chair), Tuning in to the Context: Unraveling the Multifaceted Aspects of Early Vocal Development. [Symposium]. International Congress of Infant Studies, Glasgow, Scotland. 

Collimore, A. N., Schneider, J. L., Plate, S., Maffei, M. F., & Iverson, J. M. (2024, July 8-11). Trade-offs between learning to walk and learning to talk: A new perspective on developmental cascades. [Poster presentation]. International Congress of Infant Studies, Glasgow, Scotland. 

Morka, A., Plate, S., & Iverson J. M. (2024, April 10). Impact of locomotion on the relationship between object exploration and gesturing in infants. [Poster presentation]. University of Pittsburgh Psychology Undergraduate Research Fair, Pittsburgh, PA.

Plate, S. & Iverson, J. M. (2024, March 14-16). The state of natural language sampling in autism research: A scoping review. [Poster presentation]. Meeting on Language in Autism, Durham, NC. 

Plate, S., Yankowitz, L., Petrulla, V., Cola, M., Guthrie, W., Tunç, B., Pandey, J., Swanson, M., Meera, S. S., Estes, A., Marrus, N., Paterson, S., Pruett, J. R., Hazlett, H., Dager, J., Constantino, J., St. John, T., Botteron, K., Zwaigenbaum, L., Piven, J., Schultz, R., Parish-Morris, J., & the IBIS Network. (2024, March 14-16). Early natural language profiles are related to school-age outcomes in younger siblings of autistic children. [Poster presentation]. Meeting on Language in Autism, Durham, NC. 

Britsch, E., Westcott, S., Plate, S., & Iverson, J. M. (2024, March 14-16). Wh-questions elicit more complex responses than other questions in the younger siblings of children with autism. [Poster presentation]. Meeting on Language in Autism, Durham, NC. 

Plate, S. & Iverson, J. M. (2023, June 1-3). Communication initiations and breakdowns in infants with elevated likelihood for ASD. [Poster presentation]. The Symposium on Research in Child Language Disorders, Madison, WI.

Yankowitz, L. D., Talovic, M., Todorov, A., Kishino, T., Davis, S., Hawks, Z., Eggebrecht, A. T., Elison, J., Schultz, R. T., Parish-Morris, J., Tunc, B., Plate, S., Petrulla, V., Pandey, J., Guthrie, W., Meera, S. S., Russel, A., Hauptmann, A., Ikhlas, A., de Paiva, S., Davis, J., Styner, M., Gerig, G., Hazlett, H., Botteron, K., McKinstry, R. C., Evans, A. C., Dager, S. R., Estes, A. M., Zwaigenbaum, L., Piven, J., Pruett, J. R., Swanson, M., & Marrus, N. (2023, May 3-6). Infant resting state functional connectivity networks associated with language development in a sample at high and low familial likelihood of ASD. [Oral presentation]. International Society for Autism Research Annual Meeting, Austin, Stockholm, Sweden.

Altman, K., Plate, S., Britsch, E. R., & Iverson, J. M. (2023, March 23-25). Characterizing caregiver input to children with diverse developmental outcomes during pretend play. [Poster presentation]. Society for Research in Child Development Biennial Meeting, Salt Lake City, UT.

Wescott, S., Plate, S., Britsch, E. R., & Iverson, J. M. (2023, March 23-25). Wh-Question answering in children with elevated likelihood for ASD and language delay. [Poster presentation]. Society for Research in Child Development Biennial Meeting, Salt Lake City, UT.

Schneider, J. L., Plate, S., Britsch, E. R., Trout, J., Cortez, K., Diehl, M., Cole, W., Hoch, J., Hospodar, C., Adolph, K., & Iverson, J. M. (2023, March 23-25). Everyday walking: A multi-method approach to measuring the development of infant walking skill at home. [Oral presentation]. Society for Research in Child Development Biennial Meeting, Salt Lake City, UT.

Kistler, M., Schneider, J. L., Plate, S., Britsch, E. R., Iverson, J. M. (2023, March 23-25). Reaching for speech: Language input to infants during the transition to independent reaching. [Poster presentation]. Society for Research in Child Development Biennial Meeting, Salt Lake City, UT.

Cola, M., Song, A., Yankowitz, L., Petrulla, V., Plate, S., Russell, A., Knox, A., Hauptmann, A., Pelella, M. R., Covello, M, Pandey, J., Schultz, R. T., Parish-Morris, J. (2023, March 9-11). Sex differences in the social focus of autistic children’s spontaneous conversations. [Oral presentation]. Meeting on Language in Autism, Durham, NC.

Yankowitz, L.D., Petrulla, V., Meera, S.S., Plate, S., Pandey, J., Swanson, M., Pruett Jr., J., Cola, M., Edwards, M., Moshiro, L., Laver, A., Bourneuf, C., Jaung, T., Tunc, B., Guthrie, W, Wang, L.A.L., Marrus, N., Hazlett, H.C., Botteron, K., Constantino, J.N., Dager, S.R., Estes, A., Zwaigenbaum, L., Piven, J., Schultz, R. T., Parish-Morris, J., and the IBIS Network. (2023, March 9-11). Canonical babbling differences in infants at high- and low-risk for ASD at 6 and 12 months [Oral presentation]. Meeting on Language in Autism, Durham, NC.

Plate, S., Schneider, J. L., Britsch, E. R., & Iverson, J. M. (2023, March 2-4). Moving gestures: How locomotion shapes infant gestures to caregivers. [Oral presentation]. Eastern Psychological Association, Boston, MA.

Schneider, J. L., Leezenbaum, N. B. Plate, S., Britsch, E. R., Iverson, J, M., & Northrup, J. B. (2023, March 2-4) Don’t just sit there, say something! The relationship between independent sitting and infant vocal development. [Oral presentation]. Eastern Psychological Association, Boston, MA.

Plate, S., Roemer, E. J., Schneider, J. L., & Iverson, J. M. (2022, July 7-10). Infant gestures and caregiver responses across the transition from crawling to walking. [Poster presentation]. International Congress on Infant Studies, Ottawa, Canada.

Yankowitz, L., Schultz, R. T., Peterson, S., Tunc, B., Petrulla, V., Plate, S., Pandey, J., Swanson, M., Guthrie, W., Marrus, N., Meera, S. S., Styner, M., Hazlett, H., Botteron, K., Dager, S., Estes, A., Zwaigenbaum, L., Parish-Morris, J., & Pruett, J. (2022, May 11-14). Vocalization behavior and intrinsic functional connectivity between language regions in infants at high and low risk for autism. [Oral presentation]. International Society for Autism Research Annual Meeting, Austin, TX. 

Plate, S., Petrulla, V., Yankowitz, L., Cola, M., Guthrie, W., Tunç, B., Pandey, J., Swanson, M., Meera, S. S., Estes, A., Marrus, N., Paterson, S., Pruett, J., Hazlett, H., Dager, S., Constantino, J., St. John, T., Botteron, K., Zwaigenbaum, L., Piven, J., Schultz, R., Parish-Morris, J. & the IBIS Network. (2021, April). Early vocalization trajectories are associated with ASD diagnosis in high-risk infants [Poster presentation]. Society for Research in Child Development Biennial Meeting, Virtual.

Plate, S. and Iverson, J. M. (2020, July 6-9). Utilizing parent report vs. naturalistic language sampling to identify infants at risk for communication delays [Poster presentation cancelled]. International Congress on Infant Studies, Glasgow, Scotland.

Plate, S., Petrulla, V., Yankowitz, L., Cola, M., Yacoub, N., Ede, N., Ya, C., Bennett, A., Guthrie, W., Tunç, B., Pandey, J., Swanson, M., Meera, S. S., Estes, A., Marrus, N., Patterson, S., Pruett, J. R., Hazlett, H., Dager, S., St. John, T., Botteron, K., Zwaigenbaum, L., Piven, J., Schultz, R., Parish-Morris, J., and the IBIS Network (2020, June 3). Early vocalization trajectories predict which high-risk infants develop ASD [Poster session cancelled]. International Society for Autism Research Annual Meeting, Seattle, WA.

Plate, S., Sariyanidi, E., Cola, M., Zampella,C. J., Yankowitz, L. D., Riiff, A., Petrulla, V., Tunc, B., Herrington, J. D., Bartley, K., Kim, E. S., de Marchena, A., Pandey, J., Schultz, R.T. & Parish-Morris, J. (2019, May 1-4). Do predictors in machine learning classification of ASD differ for children vs. adolescents? [Poster presentation]. International Society for Autism Research Annual Meeting, Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

Cola, M., Plate, S., Bateman, L., Riiff, A., Petrulla, V., Zampella, C. J., Yankowitz, L. D., Tunc, B., Herrington, J. D., Bartley, K., Sariyanidi, E., Kim, E. S., de Marchena, A., Pandey, J., Schultz, R.T. & Parish-Morris, J. (2019, May 1-4). Naive thin-slice impressions reveal evidence of the female camouflage effect in ASD [Oral presentation]. International Society for Autism Research Annual Meeting, Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

Yankowitz, L. D., Plate, S., Parish-Morris, J., Gregory, S., Park, N., Song, A., Wang, L. A., Marrus, N., Swanson, M., Meera, S. S., Pandey, J., Chappell, J. C., Flake, L., St. John, T., Hazlett, H. C., Botteron, K., Constantino, J. N., Dager, S. R., Zwaigenbaum, L., Piven, J. & Schultz, R. T. (2019, May 1-4). 2-year-olds with autism spectrum disorder direct a smaller proportion of vocalizations toward others [Poster presentation]. International Society for Autism Research Annual Meeting, Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

Plate, S., Yankowitz, L., Emedom-Nnamdi, P., Bateman, L., Cola, M., Faggen, A., Maldarelli, J., Pandey, J., Schultz, R.T., Parish-Morris, J. & the IBIS Network (2018, November 15-17). Undifferentiated distress signals in infants later diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder [Oral presentation]. American Speech-Language Hearing Association Convention, Boston, MA.

Plate, S., Libster, N., Brown, J., Faggen, A., Slomowitz, R., Wood, J., Maldarelli, J., Pandey, J., Schultz, R. T., Parish-Morris, J. & the IBIS Network (2018, May 9-12). Vocal-gesture profiling at age 2: Diminished gesturing is associated with greater distress in toddlers with ASD? [Poster presentation]. International Society for Autism Research Annual Meeting, Rotterdam, Netherlands.  

Libster, N., Brown, J., Plate, S., Faggen, A., Maldarelli, J., Pandey, J., Schultz, R. T., Parish-Morris, J. & the IBIS Network (2018, May 9-12). High-dimensional gesture coding for use in prospective gene-brain-behavior studies of ASD [Oral presentation]. International Society for Autism Research Annual Meeting, Rotterdam, Netherlands.

Faggen, A., Plate, S., Brown, J., Libster, N., Slomowitz, R., Wood, J., Maldarelli, J., Pandey, J., Schultz, R. T., Parish-Morris, J. & the IBIS Network (2018, May 9-12). Preliminary report: Predicting expressive language abilities at age 2 from fine-grained infant vocalization codes at 12 months [Oral presentation]. International Society for Autism Research Annual Meeting, Rotterdam, Netherlands.

Plate, S., Parish-Morris, J., Migliaccio, J., Bateman, L., Wood, J., Slomowitz, R., Maldarelli, J., Patterson, S., Pandey, J., Marrus, N., Estes, A., Hazlett, H., Zwaigenbaum, L., Botteron, K., Dager, S., Piven, J., Schultz, R. T. & the IBIS Network (2017, May 10-13). Positive and negative affective vocalizations in 2-year-olds with ASD [Poster presentation]. International Society for Autism Research Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA.

Teaching

Instructor of Record

Observational Methods for Developmental Science, University of Pittsburgh, Spring 2024

Developmental Psychology, University of Pittsburgh, Summer 2022

Invited Lecture

“Autism as a Spectrum: The Development of Autistic Identity," Adolescence, Spring 20204

“Autism as a Spectrum”, Child Psychopathology, University of Pittsburgh, Fall 2023

Graduate Teaching Assistant

Developmental Psychology, University of Pittsburgh, August 2019- April 2020

Undergraduate Teaching Assistant

Teaching Assistant for Introductory Psychology, Bryn Mawr College, September 2015- May 2017

Clinical Practice

Experience

PEERS for children and adolescents with autism and other social challenges

Regulating Together for children with autism and other emotion regulation challenges

RUBI Parent Training

Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) for adult and pediatric anxiety, depression, and ADHD

Coping Cat for pediatric anxiety

MATCH for pediatric anxiety and depression

Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) for OCD

Cognitive Processing Therapy for PTSD

Neuropsychiatric Assessment

Autism Spectrum Disorder Assessment (ADOS-2)

Completed Trainings

ADOS-2 Introductory/Clinical Training (October, 2023)

• Three day virtual training on administration and scoring of ADOS-2

Cognitive Processing Therapy (September, 2023)

• Three hour training on CPT for PTSD

ADOS-2 Research/Advanced Training (October, 2022)

• Three day in-person training  on administration and scoring of ADOS-2. In the process of becoming research reliable