Acquisition of English Tense-lax Vowels by Chinese EFL Learners from Different Dialectal Regions

Abstract

The present study investigates the acquisition of English tense-lax vowels by Chinese EFL learners from different dialectal regions. In line with Speech Learning Model, we aim to answer if Chinese learners could distinguish tense and lax vowels at spectral level and how their dialects and Mandarin would affect their production of English tense vowels. Acoustic features, e.g., F1&F2, of ten American native English speakers and ten EFL learners from each of the Beijing, Changsha and Ningbo dialectal regions are compared to explore the similarities and differences. The results show that the Chinese learners from different dialectal regions perform differently on the distinction of tense-lax vowels. Beijing learners could discriminate /a/-/Λ/, /i/-/I/ by tongue front-backness but fail to discriminate /u/-/℧/. Changsha learners could discriminate /i/-/I/ and //-/℧/ but not /a/-/Λ/. However, Ningbo learners discriminate three pairs of vowels quite well. Furthermore, the learners’ dialect and standard Mandarin interact in their production of English vowels.