L2 Phonology Research Articles

ACQUISITION OF L2 PHONOLOGY – SPANISH MEETS CROATIAN

The phoneme is conceived as a mental image that is stored in our mind and then represented by sounds in speech and graphemes in writing for phonologically based alphabets. The acquisition of L2 phonology includes two very important skills – reading and writing. The information stored in the mind of a speaker interferes with new information produced by the L2 (Robinson, Ellis 2008; Nathan, 2008). What is similar or equal in the target language to one's native language is, while unknown, incorporated one way or another into an existing model, based on prototypicality (Pompeian, 2004, Moreno Fernandez, 2010). The process of teaching the sounds, letters and alphabet to foreign students is much shorter than for native speakers because to a foreign student must be given a tool for writing as soon as possible as they have to write what they are learning and memorize new language units (Celce-Murcia, Brinton, Goodwin, 1996). This paper discusses one type of difficulties Spanish learners of Croatian as L2 face when they are introduced to phonology through letters which represent Croatian sounds in order to display the influence of their preexisting phonological concepts. The subjects are ten students from Spain and Latin America. Their task was to read a group of words containing sounds that were predictably hard for them, minimal pairs and a short text.

Instruction Type and Online Tasks in the Acquisition of L2 Phonology: Preliminary Findings

This study examines which type of instruction (explicit/implicit) yields target-like second language (L2) phonology. With the incorporation of speech perception exercises outside the classroom and explicit instruction in class, the production of target-like L2 phones is expected. Participants were students of ‘Intermediate Spanish Conversation’ at Penn State University. Tasks targeting coda [l] were completed by all subject groups. Comparative analysis of phonetic data from experimental groups receiving both explicit instruction and online perceptual input shows significant increase in target-like production of less velarized [l] in their L2 Spanish, apart from more accurate discrimination between L1 and L2 sounds.

An L1 grammar-driven model of loanword adaptation

The present study proposes an L1 grammar-driven loanword-adaptation model with three intermediate steps — L1 perception, L1 lexical representations and L1 phonology — between L2 acoustic output and L1 output by examining how the distinctive features, syllable structure constraints and structural restrictions of one’s native language steer speakers in their search to replace foreign sounds with native sounds. Our main source of data in support of this model comes from differences between the Korean adaptations of English and French voicing contrasts on the basis of a recent survey of English and French loans in the year 2011. In word-initial position, for example, English voiceless plosives are borrowed as aspirated plosives, while French voiceless plosives are borrowed as either aspirated or fortis plosives in free variation. Considering the data examined here, we suggest that the different Korean adaptations of English and French voicing contrasts in plosives are based on Korean speakers’ perception of redundant phonetic variants in the donor languages (L2) and that this perception is conditioned by the acoustic cues to the laryngeal features [±spread glottis] and [±tense] of Korean, the host language (L1). In contrast to some current models, it shows that the distinctive feature composition of L1 segments plays an important role in loanword adaptations. We also suggest that not only L1 laryngeal features but also L1 syllable structure constraints and lexical restrictions influence L1 perception of the L2 voicing contrasts in word-final postvocalic plosives and that variation in vowel insertion after the plosives in our 2011 data collection is motivated by L1 phonology in both English and French loans. Variation in vowel insertion after English and French word-internal preconsonantal coda plosives is also affected by the native phonology in the 2011 data, no matter whether the plosives are released, as in French, or unreleased, as in English.

Phonetic compliance: a proof-of-concept study.

In this paper, we introduce the concept of “phonetic compliance,” which is defined as the intrinsic individual ability to produce speech sounds that are unusual in the native language, and constitutes a part of the ability to acquire L2 phonetics and phonology. We argue that phonetic compliance represents a systematic source of variance that needs to be accounted for if one wants to improve the control over the independent variables manipulated in SLA experimental studies. We then present the results of a two-fold proof-of-concept study aimed at testing the feasibility of assessing phonetic compliance in terms of gradient. In study 1, a pilot data collection paradigm is implemented on an occasional sample of 10 native French speakers engaged in two reproduction tasks involving respectively vowels and aspirated stops, and data are analyzed using descriptive statistics. In study 2, complementary data including L1-typical realizations are collected, resulting in the development of a first set of indicators that may be useful to appropriately assess, and further refine the concept of, phonetic compliance. Based on a critical analysis of the contributions and limitations of the proof-of-concept study, general discussion formulates the guidelines for the following stages of development of a reliable and valid test of phonetic compliance.

On the effects of L2 perception and of individual differences in L1 production on L2 pronunciation.

The speech of late second language (L2) learners is generally marked by an accent. The dominant theoretical perspective attributes accents to deficient L2 perception arising from a transfer of L1 phonology, which is thought to influence L2 perception and production. In this study we evaluate the explanatory role of L2 perception in L2 production and explore alternative explanations arising from the L1 phonological system, such as for example, the role of L1 production. Specifically we examine the role of an individual’s L1 productions in the production of L2 vowel contrasts. Fourteen Spanish adolescents studying French at school were assessed on their perception and production of the mid-close/mid-open contrasts, /ø-œ/ and /e-ε/, which are, respectively, acoustically distinct from Spanish sounds, or similar to them. The participants’ native productions were explored to assess (1) the variability in the production of native vowels (i.e., the compactness of vowel categories in F1/F2 acoustic space), and (2) the position of the vowels in the acoustic space. The results revealed that although poorly perceived contrasts were generally produced poorly, there was no correlation between individual performance in perception and production, and no effect of L2 perception on L2 production in mixed-effects regression analyses. This result is consistent with a growing body of psycholinguistic and neuroimaging research that suggest partial dissociations between L2 perception and production. In contrast, individual differences in the compactness and position of native vowels predicted L2 production accuracy. These results point to existence of surface transfer of individual L1 phonetic realizations to L2 space and demonstrate that pre-existing features of the native space in production partly determine how new sounds can be accommodated in that space.

The role of orthography in (apparent) L2 dialect acquisition

This paper investigates the role of orthographic representation in the production of the local variant of the STRUT vowel in the speech of Polish migrants living in Manchester. A previous study (Drummond 2013) showed that acquisition of the local variant depended on various social factors, yet this only took into account conversation data, leaving some word list data unexplored. Comparing the two data sets reveals a difference in degree of acquisition, with the word list data producing more of the local vowel. This is explained not as a case of dialect acquisition as such, but more as an effect of orthography triggering a connection to the L1 phonology, the particular nature of which mimics acquisition of the local variant.

Effects of beliefs about first language orthography on second language vowel perception

Recent research has identified that L1 orthography can affect perception of vowels in a second language (e.g., Escudero and Wanrooij, 2010). The present study investigates the effect that participants' beliefs about orthography have on their ability to perceive vowels in a second language. English- and Polish-speaking learners of Swedish have to encounter some new vowel sounds and also the characters that are used to represent them, e.g., å, ä, and ö. New survey data of native speakers of English, Polish, and Swedish confirm that L1 English speakers see these characters like these as familiar letters with diacritics, while L1 Swedish and L1 Polish speakers tend to see these types of characters as different characters of the alphabet. These differing beliefs about orthography may cause English speakers to confuse the vowels represented in Swedish by the characters å, ä and ö with vowels represented by the characters a, a, and o, respectively, while Polish speakers would not be similarly affected. Results of a Swedish vowel perception study conducted with native speakers of English and Polish after exposure to Swedish words containing these characters will be presented. These results contribute to increasing knowledge about the relationship between L1 orthography and L2 phonology.

From interference to transfer in language contact: Variation in voice onset time

AbstractThis study examines cross-generational differences in the realization of an English phonological contrast by bilingual Polish Americans in New York City. I analyze the production of voice onset time (VOT) in underlying stops, as intinandden, and stops derived from interdental fricatives, as in [t]in forthinand [d]en forthen, in an English-only reading task. Generation one exhibits VOT “interference” for both stop types, with a bias toward interference for voiced stops. Generation two “transfers” Polish-like VOTs to derived stops. I argue that the cross-generational progression from theglobaleffects of interference to thefocusedpresence of transfer is filtered through L1 markedness and reflects speakers' growing sensitivity to L2 phonology and social considerations. The observed asymmetries in the distribution of interference/transfer are unaccountable by existing models of L2 acquisition and motivate a view of L1/L2 phonetic categories as governed by a variable grammar with access to phonological and social information.

Doing away with the ‘native speaker’: a complex adaptive systems approach to L2 phonological attainment

Employing the complex adaptive systems (CAS) model, the present case study provides a self-report description of the attitudes, perceptions and experiences of an advanced adult L2 English learner with respect to his L2 phonological attainment. CAS is predicated on the notion that an individual's cognitive processes are intricately related to his or her experiences in particular social contexts and all language activities are dynamically regulated. In the study, interview data and reflective essay entries were analysed. The findings revealed that motives for L2 speech production and the concomitant attempts to improve L2 phonology were in a phase transition between idiolect (individual) and communal (social) levels. Autonomy, experience and environment were influential in the reorganisation of the learner's attitudes and perceptions about L2 pronunciation and accent. In addition, the learner's awareness of phonological variation, external motives and individual goals interact with one another in a dynamic fashion. The learner appreciates linguistic diversity and rejects the idealised ‘native speaker’ norm in the acquisition of L2 phonology. Finally, based on the findings of the study, implications pertaining to L2 learning, teaching and research are discussed.

A prerequisite to L1 homophone effects in L2 spoken-word recognition

When both members of a phonemic contrast in L2 (second language) are perceptually mapped to a single phoneme in one’s L1 (first language), L2 words containing a member of that contrast can spuriously activate L2 words in spoken-word recognition. For example, upon hearing cattle, Dutch speakers of English are reported to experience activation of kettle, as L1 Dutch speakers perceptually map the vowel in the two English words to a single vowel phoneme in their L1. In an auditory word-learning experiment using Greek and Japanese speakers of English, we asked whether such cross-lexical activation in L2 spoken-word recognition necessarily involves inaccurate perception by the L2 listeners, or can also arise from interference from L1 phonology at an abstract level, independent of the listeners’ phonetic processing abilities. Results suggest that spurious activation of L2 words containing L2-specific contrasts in spoken-word recognition is contingent on the L2 listeners’ inadequate phonetic processing abilities.

Complexities and Interactions of Age Effects in L2 Learning: Broadening the Research Agenda

This special issue gathers together a collection of studies that broadens the research agenda and debates in the area of age studies in second language (L2) learning (see Munoz and Singleton 2011). The contributions point to the current breadth and wealth of approaches to age effects, from those that predominantly rely on a maturational constraint explanation to those that propose a multi-factor explanation focusing their attention on the interaction of age with a multiplicity of factors. In different ways, the contributions challenge Lenneberg's (1967) traditional view of a critical period ending around puberty. Some move the cut-off points of the proposal, while others investigate whether predetermined limits can be removed; some underline the moderating role of the learning context and the learner's orientation and engagement with the language. The seven articles in this issue delve into a variety of age dimensions -age of acquisition (AoA) as the start of significant exposure to an L2, or as the start of instruction of a foreign language (FL), chronological age and aging effects. They discuss a wide range of data- behavioural and brain-based data collected from immersion and instructed contexts. The issue includes two types of contributions. The first three articles give the reader reviews of studies in specific areas: age and dominance (by Birdsong), age and proficiency in event-related potential (ERP) research (by Steinhauer), and exceptional attainment in L2 phonology (by Moyer). The remaining four articles provide new empirical data: on late learners in a naturalistic context (by Kinsella and Singleton), on age and input in the long-term attainment of instructed FL learners (by Munoz), on age and aptitude in child learners (by Granena), and on non-nativeness in child learners (by Nishikawa). The target languages in these studies are also diverse including French, English, Spanish, and Japanese. The following paragraphs provide an overview of ...

Exceptional Outcomes in L2 Phonology: The Critical Factors of Learner Engagement and Self-Regulation

A number of studies attest to the late language learner's ability to attain native-like outcomes in morphology and syntax, with accent often the only linguistic hint of their non-native status. Nevertheless, some do end up sounding native-like despite a late start. This article explores possible explanations for 'exceptional' outcomes in L2 phonology, specifically, whether such learners' abilities are due to innate talent, a metacognitive learning approach, a certain social-psychological orientation, or specific kinds of experience. Various learners profiles are compared, an argument is made for learner engagement and self-regulation, and areas for future research are outlined.

THE EXPLOITATION OF SUBPHONEMIC ACOUSTIC DETAIL IN L2 SPEECH SEGMENTATION

The current study addresses an aspect of second language (L2) phonological acquisition that has received little attention to date—namely, the acquisition of allophonic variation as a word boundary cue. The role of subphonemic variation in the segmentation of speech by native speakers has been indisputably demonstrated; however, the acquisition of allophonic cues in L2 phonology remains underexplored. We examine here L2 learners’ acquisition and perception of noncontrastive acoustic differentiation at word boundaries in English. Fifty French-speaking students of English were tested on their ability to differentiate potentially ambiguous phrases in which word boundaries are marked by the word-initial aspiration of plosives (e.g.,Lou stopsvs.loose tops) or prevocalic glottal stops (e.g.,tea matvs.team at). Participants showed greater sensitivity to the presence of glottal stops than aspiration, suggesting that glottal stops may represent a more perceptually salient segmentation cue for learners than aspiration. We discuss the implications of these results regarding the role of first language transfer versus the universality of some segmentation cues.

L2 ACQUISITION OF PROSODIC PROPERTIES OF SPEECH RHYTHM

This study examines the development of speech rhythm in second language (L2) learners of typologically different first languages (L1s) at different levels of proficiency. An empirical investigation of durational variation in L2 English productions by L1 Mandarin learners and L1 German learners compared to native control values in English and the learners’ L1s showed that the L1 groups followed comparable developmental paths in their acquisition of vocalic variability and accentual lengthening. However, the two L1 groups diverged in the proportion of vocalic materials in their L2 utterances, exhibiting L2 acquisition patterns that are consistent with direct transfer from the L1. The results support a multisystemic model of L2 rhythm acquisition in which the various linguistic-systemic properties that contribute to speech rhythm are acquired at different proficiency levels and depend on different acquisition processes with respect to L1 influence and universal effects. We conclude that theories of L2 phonology need to be able to accommodate the multisystemic nature of L2 prosodic acquisition. Additionally, L2 phonological acquisition theories, and SLA theories more generally, should take into account the nonuniform manner in which the various prosodic properties of the interlanguage reflect L1 transfer effects as well as universal constraints on acquisition.

Khalkha Mongolian speakers' vowel bias: L1 influences on the acquisition of non-adjacent vocalic dependencies

Native language (L1) phonology has been shown to play an important role in influencing humans' perception and production of novel speech. Yet research examining the conditions which trigger humans to calculate transitional probability between non-adjacent linguistic elements has not considered the potential influence of L1 phonology. For example, previous artificial grammar learning (AGL) literature has shown that participants acquire certain non-adjacent phonological dependencies only with difficulty. However, this previous research used only speakers of English or French, languages which do not exhibit such dependencies. This paper investigates how L1 phonology influences participants' acquisition of non-adjacent phonological dependencies in an AGL task. Five experiments were conducted with speakers of Khalkha Mongolian, a language which exhibits a non-adjacent dependency, vowel harmony and with speakers of American English, a language which exhibits no such dependencies. Khalkha Mongolian speakers successfully acquired non-adjacent vocalic dependencies while American English speakers failed to do so under identical statistical conditions. Besides providing further evidence that statistical learning is not limited to the acquisition of adjacent dependencies, these findings suggest that L1 phonology plays an important role in biasing speakers' attention towards certain aspects of language.

Second language phonology influences first language word naming

The Masked Onset Priming Effect (MOPE) has been reported in speakers’ first languages (L1). The aims of the present study are to investigate whether second language (L2) phonology is active during L1 reading, and to disentangle the contributions of orthography and phonology in reading aloud. To this end, Dutch–English bilinguals read aloud L1 target words primed by L2 words, while electroencephalography (EEG) was recorded. The onset of the primes was manipulated to disentangle the contributions of orthography and phonology (i.e. O+P+: kite – KUNST, ‘art’; O+P−: knee – KUNST; O−P+: crime – KUNST; O−P−: mine – KUNST). Phonological but not orthographic overlap facilitated RTs. However, event-related brain potentials (ERPs) revealed both orthographic and phonological priming starting 125ms after target presentation. Taken together, we gained insights into the time course of cross-linguistic priming and demonstrated that L2 phonology is activated rapidly in an L1 environment.

Phonetic accommodation in Russian-Estonian bilingual speech

The influence of L1 phonological knowledge on L2 bilingual speech has long been a fruitful topic of speech perception and production research (Piske et al., J. Phonetics 29, 191–215). Recent research examining phonetic accommodation in bilingual speech has demonstrated that L1 and L2 phonologies interact in a bidirectional, dynamic manner (Fowler et al., J. Phonetics 36, 649–663). My study builds on these results by examining the acoustic outcomes of phonetic accommodation in vowels produced by bilingual Russian(L1)-Estonian(L2) speakers. Specifically, I aim to test the hypotheses that L2 knowledge can significantly affect robust aspects of L1 speech, i.e., vowel quality, and that there is a correlation between the extent of L2 exposure and the degree of phonetic accommodation. The preliminary results of acoustic analysis suggest that bilingual speakers produce L1 vowels with formant values that are intermediate from both L1 and L2 monolingual controls, indicating that L2 exposure influences significant aspects of L1 speech. Presently, I am conducting analyses which compare individual speaker differences in the extent of phonetic convergence to the amount of their L2 use and exposure. My overarching objective is to present novel empirical evidence that expands our current understanding of phonetic accommodation in bilingual speech production.

Trial by trial: selecting first or second language phonology of a visually masked word

People often process non-native linguistic information. Here, we investigated whether first (L1) and second language (L2) phonologies are automatically activated. Response latencies and event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded, while Russian–English bilinguals read aloud L1 target words (e.g. PEЙC /reis/ ‘flight’) primed with onset-matching L1 (e.g. PAHA /rana/ ‘wound’) or L2 words (e.g. PACK) and corresponding onset-mismatching primes (e.g. L1: КAPA /kara/ ‘punishment’; L2: HOPE). Responses were faster to targets preceded by L1 onset-matched than by onset-mismatched primes. No priming from L2 primes was found due to conflicting phonologies (e.g. <P> is /r/ or /p/). These results were supported by the ERPs suggesting that both, L1 and L2 phonologies are simultaneously activated, after which the phonology belonging to the language of the prime is selected. The results provide support for non-selective models of bilingual reading, which assume automatic activation of the non-target language phonology even when it is not required by the task.

The Proximate Phonological Unit of Chinese-English Bilinguals: Proficiency Matters

An essential step to create phonology according to the language production model by Levelt, Roelofs and Meyer is to assemble phonemes into a metrical frame. However, recently, it has been proposed that different languages may rely on different grain sizes of phonological units to construct phonology. For instance, it has been proposed that, instead of phonemes, Mandarin Chinese uses syllables and Japanese uses moras to fill the metrical frame. In this study, we used a masked priming-naming task to investigate how bilinguals assemble their phonology for each language when the two languages differ in grain size. Highly proficient Mandarin Chinese-English bilinguals showed a significant masked onset priming effect in English (L2), and a significant masked syllabic priming effect in Mandarin Chinese (L1). These results suggest that their proximate unit is phonemic in L2 (English), and that bilinguals may use different phonological units depending on the language that is being processed. Additionally, under some conditions, a significant sub-syllabic priming effect was observed even in Mandarin Chinese, which indicates that L2 phonology exerts influences on L1 target processing as a consequence of having a good command of English.

Methods for Researching Second Language Phonological and Phonetic Acquisition

Abstract In this commentary I provide a brief overview of selected research areas and methodology used to study adult L2 phonology and phonetics. I focus the discussion on studies that include Spanish as either the first or target language.