My trip to Norway this summer was full of the unexpected. On May 17th, my plane landed in Norway, but not in my destination city of Bergen -- the city where I was going to conduct my research.  Instead, my flight had been rerouted to Stavanger, a five-hour bus ride, two ferries, and a few tunnels south of Bergen.  The Bergen airport had been closed due to a personnel strike.  Most people considered this detour unpleasant after a long day of traveling, but I loved it!  I was able to see a beautiful part of Norway only an hour after landing, and the ferry rides were absolutely breathtaking. 

Bergen in a small city surrounded by seven mountains, and it is green as far as the eye can see.  I had been warned that Bergen would be rainy and cold and I should expect Seattle-like weather.  However, I was pleasantly surprised as I spent my first three weeks rain free with the exception of one day.  The weather was beautiful and perfect for evening hiking.  As the sun didn't set until around 11pm, there was plenty of time for outdoor activities.  I spent the evenings hiking, playing sports, and swimming in the Norwegian Sea with friends.

I had hoped to meet many people in my dorm over the summer, but most of the students had left for summer holiday!  However, I did become friends with Stephie, a German girl who lived down the hall. She was conducting research in the biology department on tourist fishing.  Many times over the summer, I traveled with Stephie to surrounding islands where she was conducting her research.  As she talked to the tourist fishermen, I enjoyed the scenery, as well as lounged by the water with a good book.  Although I had expected to meet many people, I ended up making one truly good friend.

I conducted my research at the University of Bergen with the help of my Norwegian mentor Dr. Arve Asborjsen. I was using a synthetic language to determine how a person's native language affects the way s/he learns a new language.  Two weeks into my stay Dr. Elena Plante, my mentor from the University of Arizona, arrived for a lecture.  I had piloted my experiment on five subjects.  After looking through the data, we decided that the results were ambiguous, and it would be best to change the paradigm.  For three full days I worked on changing the program. 

After weeks of collecting data and analyzing results, it was interesting to see the effects.  Although the data were not what we expected, we did discover that people show a preference to aspects of a novel language that are most similar to their own language.

This summer I learned that like life, research rarely turns out the way you planned it.  However, most of the time things end up better than expected and the results are more unique.

Allison Schneider, UBRPer in Dr. Elena Plante's lab, Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences