Four professors from the Department of Linguistics, Languages, and Cultures at Michigan State University are among the top 2% of scientists in the world, according to Stanford University’s latest World’s Top 2% Scientists list, which identifies scholars who are top-cited in their respective fields.

First released in 2019, the Stanford University World’s Top 2% Scientists list is updated annually, with the seventh and latest version published in Fall 2024, which includes 100,000 scholars from more than 20 fields and 174 subfields, highlighting research contributions for the 2023 calendar year.

The ranking is based on an analysis of citation impact across multiple scientific fields and subfields using data from Scopus, a large multidisciplinary database that indexes scientific journals from the health sciences, life sciences, physical sciences, and social sciences. The ranking considers scholars who have published multiple highly cited papers and evaluates the citation impact of their work using various metrics, taking into account both career-long citation impact and the impact in a single recent year.

Among those on the career-long impact list are Professors Peter De Costa, Shawn Loewen, and Charlene Polio. In addition, Professor Paula Winke was named to the single recent year list.

“I am thrilled to see some of our applied linguistics faculty included in this group of top-cited scholars. Of course, this is just one of many indicators of success, but it is nevertheless an honor to be a highly cited scholar.”

Charlene Polio, Professor and Interim Chair of the Department of Linguistics, Languages, and Cultures

“I am thrilled to see some of our applied linguistics faculty included in this group of top-cited scholars,” said Polio, who is the Interim Chair of the Department of Linguistics, Languages, and Cultures. “Of course, this is just one of many indicators of success, but it is nevertheless an honor to be a highly cited scholar.”

The list is created by Stanford University in collaboration with Elsevier, a Dutch publishing company that specializes in scientific, technical, and medical content and research analytics.  

Peter De Costa

De Costa directs the Master of Arts in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (MATESOL) program and is a core faculty member of the Second Language Studies Ph.D. program and the MATESOL program. He also directs the Language Policy and Practice Lab within the College of Arts & Letters. In addition, De Costa has a joint appointment with the College of Education, where he is a member of the Department of Teacher Education faculty.

De Costa’s primary area of research is the role of identity, ideology, and emotion in applied linguistics. He researches other applied linguistic issues, including World Englishes, Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) and English as a Medium of Instruction (EMI) education, critical classroom discourse analysis, and ethics. He also is the President of the American Association for Applied Linguistics and the co-editor of TESOL Quarterly.

“There is nothing more humbling than to learn that your scholarship is gaining traction among your peers. This recognition by Stanford University inspires me to continue engaging in work that is deeply meaningful to me, as I work in community with like-minded educational linguists,” De Costa said. “My personal reward is knowing that my work helps elevate others.  I am a firm believer in the maxim: ‘A rising tide lifts all boats.’”

Shawn Loewen

Loewen is the Director of the Second Language Studies doctoral program and a core faculty in the Master of Arts in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (MATESOL) program. His research interests include instructed second language acquisition, technology and instructed second language acquisition, second language interaction, and quantitative research methodology.

In addition to publishing in leading Second Language Acquisition journals, he recently published the third edition of his book, Introduction to Instructed Second Language Acquisition. His co-authored textbook entitled, A Practical Guide to Second Language Teaching and Learning, won the 2025 PROSE award for linguistics and languages. He has two additional co-authored books, Key Concepts in Second Language Acquisition and An A-Z of Applied Linguistics Research Methods, as well as a co-edited volume, The Routledge Handbook of Instructed Second Language Acquisition. He has served as the Associate Editor of The Modern Language Journal since 2018.

“I’m very honored to be part of this distinguished group,” Loewen said, “and I’m grateful to my co-researchers and graduate students who have been an integral part of my success.”

Charlene Polio

Polio specializes in the area of second language writing and research methodology. Her most recent publications appear in various journals including Journal of Second Language Writing, Research Methods in Applied Linguistics, and Journal of English for Academic Purposes as well as several edited volumes. She has published two co-authored books, one on research methods for L2 writing with Debra Friedman, and the other on using authentic materials with Eve Zyzik, as well as several edited volumes.

Polio has served on the editorial boards of TESOL Quarterly and the Journal of Second Language Writing. She is the current co-editor of TESOL Quarterly and co-editor of the University of Michigan Press series on myths in language teaching.

“I am grateful for my long career at MSU and the affordances that the university has provided for me to be a productive researcher,” Polio said.  ‘And I am thankful for my co-authors along the way, who have made research more enjoyable.”

Paula Winke

Winke is the inaugural Arts & Letters Professor in the College of Arts & Letters. Her research focuses on the validity and fairness in foreign and second language testing and the ways educators and testing bodies can create language assessments that are fair, reliable, and valid to ensure equitable learning opportunities and fairness in education, employment, immigration, and citizenship.

Winke is on the Editorial Board of the international journal, Language Testing. She currently is on sabbatical at the Universität Innsbruck in Austria, within the Institut für Fachdidaktik (Department of Specialized Instruction), and within the Language Testing Research Group Innsbruck (LTRGI). Most recently, she was one of five international professors invited by the European Association of Language Testing and Assessment and the LTRGI to teach at a Winter School for language testing research that was held in the Austrian Alps at the University of Innsbruck’s Alpine Retreat Center, the Universitätszentrum Obergurgl.

“It is an honor to have one’s work be highly cited,” Winke said. “What it means to me is that we, as applied linguists, are at the right place at the right time. MSU offers an unparalleled opportunity for language research and has an extremely rich community of practice within linguistics, language education, and applied linguistics. We have fun while we produce our research — it’s filled with passion — and I think it shows. Go Green!”

By Kim Popiolek