Professor Allyson Page focuses her program of research on advancing our understanding of speech intelligibility, psychosocial outcomes, and communicative participation in adults with degenerative neurological diseases such as Parkinson’s disease (PD) and oromandibular dystonia (OMD), as well as in adults with velopharyngeal dysfunction (VPD). Using both quantitative and qualitative methodologies, her work is grounded in multidimensional and patient-centred approaches that seek to capture the complex relationships that influence communication outcomes.

The theoretical foundation for her research is informed by the World Health Organization’s International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) framework, which emphasizes the dynamic interactions among impairments, activities, participation, and contextual factors. This framework guides her investigation into how speech impairments affect everyday communication and quality of life, and how environmental and personal factors can act as barriers or facilitators to communicative participation.

A central focus of her research focuses on dysarthria, a motor speech disorder. The majority of her work examines two primary types: (1) hypokinetic dysarthria associated with Parkinson’s disease, which represents one of the most common adult-onset dysarthrias, and (2) hyperkinetic dysarthria associated with oromandibular dystonia, an under-investigated yet theoretically important disorder that broadens our understanding of dysarthric speech production. More recently, she has extended her research program to include adults with velopharyngeal dysfunction (VPD), further contributing to the study of disordered speech production and communicative participation across diverse clinical populations.

Across all lines of inquiry, her research seeks to advance understanding and elucidate the relationships among speech production, psychosocial functioning, and communicative participation. Through this integration, her work contributes to a more comprehensive understanding of neurologically and structurally based speech disorders. It also informs holistic, patient-centred approaches to assessment and intervention that prioritizes the lived experiences and communication needs of individuals with dysarthria and velopharyngeal dysfunction.