English-to-Chinese negative phonetic transfer by speech recognition technology

Abstract

Phonetic transfer refers to the phenomenon that one’s L1 sound system can influence one’s L2 phonetics. Previous studies have investigated phonetic transfer in the area of articulation, but L1’s effects on L2 pronunciation measured by speech recognition technology have been under-researched. The purpose of the research is to address this issue by focusing on a sample of 151 US university students’ Chinese learning. Speech recognition technology (HDecode tool from HTKv3.4.1) was applied to measure and evaluate participants’ English and Chinese pronunciation. Based on the quantitative data, it’s examined whether participants has applied phonetic transfer to Chinese learning and what factors might influence the results of phonetic transfer. The results show that English-to-Chinese phonetic transfer occurs both positively and negatively. The extent of positive transfer is limited to a condition when English syllables and Chinese Pinyin have the same or similar sounds. However, the extent of negative transfer is significant when English syllables and Chinese Pinyin have different structures and sounds. Furthermore, the study investigates what types of Chinese Pinyin might cause English-to-Chinese negative transfer.