The modification of speech perception and production in second-language learning.

Abstract

Seventy-two native Spanish speaking children enrolled in programs to teach English as a second language and 24 monolingual English children were tested in speech perception and production tasks with the purpose of determining whether or not there is learning at the phonetic level during second-language acquisition. Performance with the phonetic feature voicing was studied by means of measuring changes in the perception and production of the acoustic property voice onset time. Variables of interest across Spanish-speaking subjects were degree of exposure to English and age. Age was the only group variable for the English-speaking subjects. Results with the Spanish-speaking children showed significant changes in both perception and production of voicing towards the English monolingual pattern. Age had a significant effect in production, but not in perception. It was concluded that learning at the phonetic level does occur during second-language acquisition.