Perception of Canadian French word‐final vowels in lexical and morphosyntactic minimal pairs by English learners of French.

Abstract

The present study investigated perception of Canadian French word‐final vowels in various phonetic contexts by English‐dominant bilinguals living in Montreal. In a modified identification task, listeners selected responses that rhymed with the target words; production of each response corresponded to a target vowel (e.g., response “ai” is pronounced /e/). Target words included real and nonsense words contrasting in word‐final /i e ε a o u y o// and morphosyntactic verb minimal pairs contrasting in word‐final /e‐ε/ (e.g., first‐person singular future “parlerai” versus conditional “parlerais”) embedded in carrier sentences. Of interest were the perception patterns of /e/ and /ε/. Both are phontactically allowed word‐final in Canadian French, but not in English. Also, previous studies suggest that /y/ and /u/ could have context‐dependent perceptual patterns for English listeners. Results showed that bilingual listeners performed well overall and were at ceiling for control vowels. Most mistakes were /e‐ε/ confusions, though participants were above chance, with highly proficient French bilinguals making fewer errors. /y/ and /u/ were accurately identified across contexts, suggesting that /y/ and /u/ perception was not particularly difficult in this study. Reaction time differences, mouse tracking patterns, and effects of real versus nonsense words will also be discussed. [Work supported by NIH F31DC008075.]