Professor
Phone: (713) 743-2892
E-mail: fbunta@uh.edu
Office: Melcher Life Sciences M243A
Curriculum Vitae
Faculty Video

Education

• Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Bilingual Language Laboratory and the Eleanor M. Saffran Center for Cognitive Neuroscience, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA
• Ph.D., Speech and Hearing Science, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ
• M.A., English Linguistics, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ
• B.Ed., Teaching English as a Second Language, Lajos Kossuth University (currently University of Debrecen), Debrecen, Hungary

Teaching

• Speech Science (COMD 3385)
• Phonetics (COMD 2338)

Research Interests

The core of Dr. Bunta's research is the study of bilingual and cross-linguistic phonological acquisition. There are multiple on-going projects that investigate various aspects of phonological acquisition and representation cross-linguistically and in bilingual speakers, ranging from the phonological patterns of Spanish-English bilingual children with hearing loss who use cochlear implants and their peers with normal hearing (funded by the NIH/NIDCD) to exploring factors related to the identification of reading and language disorders in Spanish-speaking English language learners (funded by the IES in collaboration with Drs. David Francis, Kristi Santi, and Raul Rojas).

For more information, view Dr. Bunta’s research page.

Research Grants

(past 5 years)

• 2023-2025 Cochlear Corporation, Health Disparities in Access to Quality Hearing, Speech and Language Care for Children with Sensorineural Hearing Loss Who Use Cochlear Implants, Role: Co-Principal Investigator
• 2020-2024   National Institutes of Health/National Institute of Deafness and Communication Disorders (NIH/NIDCD), 1R01DC017683, Image-Guided Cochlear Implant Programming: Pediatric Speech, Language, and Literacy, Role: Consultant 

Selected Publications

(for a full list of publications, see curriculum vitae)

• Bunta, F., Fürész-Mayernik, M., Bóna, J., Navracsics, J., Bátyi, Sz., & Parapatics, A. (2024). Speech and language assessment of multilingual children in Hungary. In Elena Babatsouli (Ed.), Multilingual acquisition and learning: An ecosystemic view to diversity, Chapter 10 (pp. 272-294). John Benjamins.
• Benitez-Barrera, C., Reiss, L., Majid, M.*, Chau, T., Wilson, J., Figueroa Rico, E., Bunta, F., Raphael, R., & de Diego-Lázaro, B. (2023). Caregiver experiences with oral bilingualism in children who are deaf or hard of hearing in the U.S.: Impact on child language proficiency. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 54(1), 224-240. doi: 10.1044/2022_LSHSS-22-00095
  
• Bunta, F., & Castilla-Earls, A. P. (2022). Home language maintenance in bilingual children with cochlear implants and normal hearing. Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics, 36(4-5), 436-455. doi: 10.1080/02699206.2021.1990412
• Gibson, M. A., Bunta, F., Johnson, C., & Huárriz, M.* (2022). The production of English syllable-level timing patterns by bilingual English- and Spanish-speaking children with cochlear implants and their peers with normal hearing. Journal of Phonetics, 95, 1-16. doi: 10.1016/j.wocn.2022.101194
• Bunta, F., Douglas, M., Dickson, H., Cantu, A., Wickesberg, J., & Gifford, R. H., (2016). Dual language versus English only support for bilingual children with hearing loss who use cochlear implants and hearing aids. International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders, 51(4), 460-472. doi: 10.1111/1460-6984.12223 * student co-author

Professional Activities

• National Science Foundation and American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, Grant Reviewer
• Beszédkutatás (2014-present) and Hungarian Journal of Applied Linguistics (2022-present) Editorial Board member
• ASHA’s Mentoring Academic-Research Careers (MARC), PROmoting the next GENeration of Researchers (PROGENY)