PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Valerie Hazan

Valerie Hazan is a speech scientist whose work on noisy communication links speech-production models with hearing technologies. Her child-speech research led to the ESRC-funded kidLUCID corpus, and she examined speech masking across the lifespan at UCL. She served as an ISCA Distinguished Lecturer in 2016–2017 and became an ISCA Fellow in 2019. After more than 40 continuous years at UCL, she took early retirement in January 2021; in May 2024, she coauthored a study on age, hearing loss, noise, gaze and co-speech gesture. As of October 2026, she is Emeritus Professor of Speech Sciences in UCL's Department of Speech, Hearing and Phonetic Sciences.

Timeline

  1. By 2004

    Head of Phonetics and Linguistics

    By 2004, she heads UCL's Department of Phonetics and Linguistics and serves as the contact for two permanent lectureships there.

  2. 2011–2014

    The kidLUCID child-speech corpus

    From 2011 to 2014, she works with Michèle Pettinato on an ESRC-funded study of how children adapt speech in difficult listening conditions. kidLUCID records speech from 96 children aged 9–14 in paired picture tasks. The corpus helps expand speech-production models, including Lindblom's Hyper-Hypo model, and its findings are relevant to hearing technologies.

  3. 2016–2017

    An ISCA Distinguished Lectureship

    ISCA names her a Distinguished Lecturer for 2016–2017 and offers lecture tours to host institutions on request.

  4. June 2017–May 2020

    Speech masking across the lifespan

    From June 2017 to May 2020, she is principal investigator of an ESRC project on how other voices and environmental noise affect speech communication across ages 8–85. The project uses communicative tasks and measures acoustic-phonetic features of spontaneous speech across the lifespan.

  5. 2019

    An ISCA Fellowship

    In 2019, ISCA names her a Fellow for contributions to speech perception and production.

  6. January 2021

    Early retirement from UCL

    In January 2021, she takes early retirement after more than 40 continuous years at UCL, first as a PhD student and then as an academic.

  7. May 2024

    Gaze and gesture in noise

    In May 2024, she coauthors a study with Jeesun Kim, Outi Tuomainen and Chris Davis on the effects of age, hearing loss and noise on partner-directed gaze and co-speech hand gestures. Older adults with normal hearing look and gesture less than younger adults when their conversational partner hears babble noise.

  8. As of October 2026

    Emeritus Professor at UCL

    As of October 2026, she is Emeritus Professor of Speech Sciences in UCL's Department of Speech, Hearing and Phonetic Sciences, part of the Division of Psychology and Language Sciences.

Career

  1. University College LondonAcademic

Education

  1. University College LondonPhD student

From the biography.

  1. The median h-index is 48 at universities and 14 at frontier AI labsIncludes University College London. The median h-index is 48 at universities and 14 at frontier AI labs. We compare publishing careers, recent citations, dual appointments and job moves across 2,420 university researchers and 308 frontier-lab researchers.
  2. 20% of people at companies who shape AI also hold a university role, led by Google and Stanford UniversityIncludes University College London. We estimate that 539 of the 6,766 people with a known current organization (8%) hold both a university role and a company role, including 20% of people at companies and 13% of people at universities.
  3. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology trained or employed 44 of the 187 AI major-prize winners, more than any other universityIncludes University College London. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology trained or employed 44 of the 187 AI major-prize winners, more than any other university. We compare doctorate and 5+ year employment links, career timing and current workplaces for 187 major-prize and 1,111 best-paper winners.
  4. Of 943 people shaping AI who worked at Google, 446 work there nowIncludes University College London. Our estimates of where the 943 people shaping AI who worked at Google and Google DeepMind work now: 446 at Google and 452 across 278 other organizations.

Sources and credits

Photo: We have no published photo of Valerie Hazan yet. Send us a free-licensed photo.

  1. LINGUIST List 15.1161: Phonetics: Two Lectureships, U College London linguistlist.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  2. kidLUCID: London UCL Children's clear speech in interaction database reshare.ukdataservice.ac.uk. Checked 21 October 2026.
  3. Overview – Valerie Hazan valeriehazan.com. Checked 21 October 2026.
  4. ISCApad #223: ISCA News services.isca-speech.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  5. Speech masking effects in speech communication across the lifespan – Valerie Hazan valeriehazan.com. Checked 21 October 2026.
  6. ISCApad #250: ISCA News services.isca-speech.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  7. Life after academia… – Valerie Hazan valeriehazan.com. Checked 21 October 2026.
  8. Partner-directed gaze and co-speech hand gestures: effects of age, hearing loss and noise frontiersin.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  9. Valerie Hazan – Valerie Hazan's personal site valeriehazan.com. Checked 21 October 2026.