Effects of Orthographic Forms on Second Language Speech Production and Phonological Awareness, With Consideration of Speaker‐Level Predictors

The purpose of this study, which focused on the wordtacoas spoken in Spanish and English, was to explore the word as a unit in second language (L2) speech acquisition. As expected, acoustic measurements revealed that Spanish and English monolinguals' renditions oftacodiffered systematically. It was also shown that the extent to which Spanish/English bilinguals approximated English phonetic norms for any one segment oftacowas correlated with their approximation for the other three segments, and that early learners differentiated Spanish versus Englishtacomore than did late learners. It also appeared that the bilinguals produced /t/ with less English-like voice onset time (VOT) values in Englishtacothan in other English words without a cognate in Spanish. In a perception experiment, listeners were able to identify the native language of Spanish and English monolinguals on the basis of their production oftaco. The listeners heard larger differences between Spanish and Englishtacotokens spoken by early than late learners of English L2. Two additional perception experiments assessed further the phonetic dimensions that listeners use to determine language identity and to gauge bilinguals' speech production accuracy. Listeners assigned to language identification and goodness rating tasks responded to acoustic information distributed over all four segments intaco, although the VOT of the word-initial /t/ appeared to be the single most important phonetic dimension. Taken together, the results of this study suggest that (a) bilinguals' accuracy in producing the various segments of a second language word may be interrelated and (b) in judging L2 speech, listeners respond to phonetic errors distributed over the entire word.

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Using automated acoustic analysis to explore the link between planning and articulation in second language speech production

Language Cognition and Neuroscience ◽

10.1080/23273798.2020.1805118 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 1-16

Author(s):

Matthew Goldrick ◽

Yosi Shrem ◽

Oriana Kilbourn-Ceron ◽

Cristina Baus ◽

Joseph Keshet

Keyword(s):

Second Language ◽

Speech Production ◽

Acoustic Analysis ◽

Second Language Speech Production

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An electromagnetic articulography-based articulatory feedback approach to facilitate second language speech production learning

10.1121/1.4800660 ◽

2013 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Atsuo Suemitsu ◽

Takayuki Ito ◽

Mark Tiede

Keyword(s):

Second Language ◽

Speech Production ◽

Electromagnetic Articulography ◽

Second Language Speech Production

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When alphabets collide: Alphabetic first-language speakers’ approach to speech production in an alphabetic second language

Second language Research ◽

10.1177/0267658310396627 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 27 (3) ◽

pp. 391-417 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Gabriela Vokic

Keyword(s):

Second Language ◽

Phonological Awareness ◽

Speech Production ◽

Native Speakers ◽

First Language ◽

Visual Code ◽

Negative Effects ◽

Distributional Properties ◽

Lexical Items ◽

L2 Speech Production

This study analysed the extent to which literate native speakers of a language with a phonemic alphabetic orthography rely on their first language (L1) orthography during second language (L2) speech production of a language that has a morphophonemic alphabetic orthography. The production of the English flapping rule by 15 adult native speakers of Spanish (NSS) was analysed. Flap production should not be problematic for NSS learning English as L2, since the flap [ ] exists in the Spanish phonemic inventory and it has similar acoustic, articluatory, and distributional properties in English and Spanish. However, this study hypothesizes that access to the flap is blocked by NSS participants’ lack of phonological awareness in English, which is brought about by the participants’ reliance on the Spanish orthographic system, since the graphs used to represent the English flap intervocalically have either different surface realizations in Spanish (such as <t> and <d>) or have no equivalents in the Spanish orthographic system (such as <tt> and <dd>). It was found that NSS relied on the Spanish orthographic system at a statistically significant level, despite both languages having alphabetic orthographies and sharing the same visual code. Less reliance on L1 orthography was observed in frequent L2 lexical items, demonstrating that negative effects of L1 orthography are inversely correlated to familiarity with L2 lexical items and that frequent lexical items promote L2 phonological awareness.

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