Analysing the relationship between L2 production and different stages of L2 processing: Eye-tracking and acoustic evidence for a novel contrast

Abstract

This study analyses the relationship between native English speakers’ perception and production of the novel French /y/–/u/ contrast. Acoustic data were extracted from the learners’ production of French minimal pairs contrasting these French vowels and compared with their processing of the same items in a Visual World eye-tracking task. Results reveal that the vowel most acoustically similar to the learners’ native English /u/ vowel, French /y/, is both easier to identify at early processing stages and more acoustically similar to a native French control group in production, indicating a perception-production relationship. Furthermore, analyses of individual variation reveal that the learners who process both /y/ and /u/ more successfully at later processing stages are also more likely to mark a greater distinction between these phonemes in production. Together, these results indicate a relationship between L2 processing and L2 production at multiple levels. Implications for current L2 speech models are discussed.