Acquisiton of segments and intonation by English learners of Korean.

Abstract

Many studies have demonstrated mutual influences between first (L1) and second (L2) languages. However, while much research examined L1 and L2 pairs that match in the number of contrasts [Flege (1991); MacKay et al. (2001); Harada (2003)], little research has been done on languages with different numbers of laryngeal contrasts in stops. Furthermore, not much research has been done on L1 and L2 influences on learning prosody. This study aims to investigate how English (a stressed‐timed language that has a two‐way stop contrast) learners of Korean acquire Korean (a syllable‐timed language that has a three‐way stop contrast) stops and intonation. Three groups of English learners of Korean (beginning, intermediate, advanced; four participants in each group) will be compared with native Korean speakers with respect to acoustic realizations of stops and intonation. VOT, the duration of vowels adjacent to stops and f0 of vowel onset will be measured for stops. As for intonation, AP‐initial and ‐final tone realizations of English learners of Korean will be compared with those of Korean speakers. It will be shown that duration cues, such as VOT, are acquired earlier than pitch. The implication of the results in Korean education will also be discussed.