Role Of Orthography Research Articles

The role of phonology-to-orthography consistency in predicting the degree of pupil dilation induced in processing reduced and unreduced speech

AbstractThe relationship between the ways in which words are pronounced and spelled has been shown to affect spoken word processing, and a consistent relationship between pronunciation and spelling has been reported as a possible cause of unreduced pronunciations being easier to process than reduced counterparts although reduced pronunciations occur more frequently. In the present study, we investigate the effect of pronunciation-to-spelling consistency for reduced and unreduced pronunciations in L1 and L2 listeners of a logographic language. More precisely, we compare L1 and L2 Japanese listeners to probe whether they use orthographic information differently when processing reduced and unreduced speech. Using pupillometry, the current study provides evidence that extends the hypothesis about the role of orthography in the processing of reduced speech. Orthographic realization matters in processing for L1 and L2 advanced listeners. More specifically, how consistent the orthographic realization is with its phonological form (phonology-to-orthography consistency) modulates the extent to which reduced pronunciation induces additional processing costs. The results are further discussed in terms of their implications for how listeners process reduced speech and the role of the orthographic form in speech processing.

The Role of Orthography and Phonology in Written Word Recognition: Evidence From Eye-Tracking in the Visual World Paradigm.

There is a long-standing debate about how written words are recognized. Central to this debate is the role of phonology. The objective of this study is to contribute to our collective understanding regarding the role of phonology in written word recognition. A total of 30 monolingual adults were tested using a novel written word version of the visual world paradigm (VWP). We compared activation of phonological anadromes (words that are matched for sounds but not letters, e.g., JAB-BADGE) and orthographic anadromes (words that are matched for letters but not sounds, e.g., LEG-GEL) to determine the relative role of phonology and orthography in familiar single-word reading. We found that activation for phonological anadromes is earlier, more robust, and sustained longer than orthographic anadromes. These results are most consistent with strong phonological theories of single-word reading that posit an early and robust role of phonology. This study has broad implications for larger debates regarding reading instruction.

An exploration of the potential benefit of extensive listening along with orthography for improving EFL learners\u2019 pronunciation

Explicit pronunciation instruction has been shown to be effective in improving language learners’ pronunciation, yet it is not clear whether the same can be said about implicit pronunciation instruction. In addition, the role of orthography in improving language learners’ pronunciation is yet to be fully understood. Thus, this research examined the contribution of extensive listening combined with orthography to the improvement of language learners’ pronunciation. Ninety Saudi learners of English were randomly allocated to three groups and offered different types of instructions: (A) extensive listening only; (B) extensive listening with orthography; and (C) a control group. Similar utterances were collected from the three groups before and after the instructions. The utterances were then presented randomly to a group of native English listeners for global foreign accent rating. Small, though non-significant, improvement was observed for both experimental groups. This may be attributed to the relatively short duration of exposing the learners to the aural input. Semi-structed interviews, with a sample of the learners from the experimental groups, showed that they had positive opinions regarding extensive listening with orthography for the improvement of their pronunciation. Further research may use longer period to examine whether extensive listening along with orthography can result in significant improvement of language learners’ pronunciation.

The time course of speech production revisited: no early orthographic effect, even in Mandarin Chinese

ABSTRACT Most psycholinguistic models of speech production agree on an earlier semantic processing stage and a later word-form encoding stage. Using a logographic language, Mandarin Chinese, Zhang and Weekes [2009. Orthographic facilitation effects on spoken word production: Evidence from Chinese. Language and Cognitive Processes, 24(7–8), 1082–1096. https://doi.org/10.1080/01690960802042133] reported an early effect of orthography in a picture-word-interference study and suggested orthography affects speech production via a lexical-semantic pathway at an early stage. This early orthographic effect without co-occurrence of phonological effect, however, was not replicated [Zhao, La Heij, & Schiller, 2012. Orthographic and phonological facilitation in speech production: New evidence from picture naming in Chinese. Acta Psychologica, 139(2), 272–280. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actpsy.2011.12.001]. The present study aimed to dissociate further the semantic and phonological representations from orthography by using simplex Chinese characters. The results of Experiment 1 and 2 revealed an orthographic effect but only at a similar point in time as the phonological effect, both of which followed the semantic effect. Our results thus raise further doubts about the role of orthography at the conceptual level of speech planning and lend new evidence to a two-step model of speech production.

The Role of Orthography in Lexical Processing of the Phonological Variants in Second Language.

There is evidence that orthographic knowledge can influence on-line spoken-word recognition. Interestingly, when graphic and phonetic codes are not congruent due to the application of phonological alternation processes, people report hearing sounds that are matched to graphic (underlying), not phonetic codes (Halléet al. in J Mem Lang 43:618-639, 2000). It is, however, not known whether the same effect arises in the processing of a non-native language (L2). In the present study, advanced Mandarin learners of Korean as well as native Korean listeners performed a phoneme monitoring task using words undergoing obstruent nasalization in Korean. The results showed that orthographic information dominated the phonetic judgments of the native Korean listeners, while the Mandarin learners' judgments relied more on the phonetic input. These results suggest that even the lexical access of highly experienced L2 learners differs from that of native speakers and that advanced learners still have difficulty employing orthographic information to access the L2 lexicon.

Predictors of Reading Skills at the First and Second Grade: The Role of Orthography

We investigated the predictive power of cognitive skills and background variables of 769 first and second grade children learning to read two orthographically different languages Finnish and German in three countries Finland, Germany and Italy. Main results from stepwise regression models showed that in all countries word reading at first grade was best predicted by letter-sound-connection, as found in other transparent orthographies. In Italy and Finland also phoneme blending, a demanding phoneme awareness skill, was a good predictor. Surprisingly, in Germany initial phoneme identification which is a basic phone awareness skill, and mother’s occupation predicted first grade reading. At second grade in Finland and Germany the strongest predictors of word reading were rapid naming, in Finland also short-term-memory and in Germany and Italy reading level at the first grade. Results indicate that both orthographical and educational differences in the three countries can account for different predictors in reading.

Teachers, textbooks, and orthographic choices in Quechua: comparing bilingual intercultural education in Peru and Ecuador across decades

ABSTRACT One of the central paradoxes of textbook authorship in Indigenous languages is that some of those for whom the textbooks are intended find it challenging to read them. Here, through examining cases of Quechua across the Andes in Peru and in Ecuador, we consider the role of orthography in this paradox. Textbook authors must decide on an alphabet for writing textbooks. Yet, the selection of a particular alphabet or changing the alphabet can cause unforeseen difficulties in reading and teaching with the books. Teachers often have experiences with the letters and with reading and writing that are linked to larger-scale questions about what ‘the Quechua language’ is and how one writes in Quechua. These experiences affect their own and others’ interactions with linguistic varieties and with textbooks, playing a significant role in what and how they teach.

Orthographic facilitation in oral vocabulary learning: effects of language backgrounds and orthographic type

Two experiments investigated whether exposure to Chinese characters and pinyin would facilitate oral vocabulary learning for Chinese as a first (L1) and second (L2) language learners. In Experiment 1, 48 second Chinese graders studied 15 made-up associations between spoken labels and pictures accompanied either by no orthography, by pinyin, or regular characters in a repeated measures design. Pictures prompted recall of spoken labels without orthography present on tests. Results showed that both regular characters and pinyin boosted recall over no orthography. In Experiment 2, 19 American undergraduates as Chinese foreign language learners learned the same 15 label-picture associations in a similar design. Results showed pinyin facilitation, but no character facilitation. The findings highlight the influence of L1 on the role of orthography in oral vocabulary learning in L2, and have implications for vocabulary instruction in Chinese as L1 and L2 learners.

Learning to read for the first time as adult immigrants in Finland

Against the backdrop of increasing global humanitarian migration to highly literate countries and the resulting necessity and challenge to provide language and literacy education to non-literate or low-literate adult second language (L2) learners, this article calls for more research on a new population of late literacy learners, particularly in Finland. The article begins by outlining the pressing necessity for research on this special group of L2 learners who has traditionally been ignored by Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research. It will then go on to illuminate essential components of developing reading literacy, drawing on relevant previous research on pre-literates. Further, the role of orthography, in particular the shallow transparency of the Finnish language, are critically examined with regard to alphabetic literacy. As adult non-literacy is a relatively new phenomenon in the highly literate society of Finland, there is a scarcity of research on how non-literate adults acquire Finnish. Growing academic interest and emerging Literacy Education and Second Language Learning for Adults with little or no schooling (LESLLA) research in Finland, with focus on reading literacy skills, is presented and discussed. The article highlights the possibilities of technology to enhance the individual literacy process for LESLLA learners and presents the Digital Literacy Instructor (DigLin) as one technology-enhanced practice environment for the very first steps in learning to decode the alphabetic code. Finally, conclusions on LESLLA learners’ late literacy acquisition and a future research perspective are drawn, emphasizing the potential of computer-assisted language learning (CALL).

The Role of Orthography and Phoneme Inventory in Dutch Students’ Speech Perception in the EFL Classroom

The Role of Orthography and Phoneme Inventory in Dutch Students’ Speech Perception in the EFL Classroom

Learning analytics to improve writing skills for young children – an holistic approach

Purpose Due to the important role of orthography in society, the project called IDeRBlog presented in this paper created a web-based tool to motivate pupils to write text as well as to read and to comment on texts written by fellow students. In addition, IDeRBlog aims to improve student’s German orthography skills and supports teachers and parents with training materials for their students. The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach With the aid of learning analytics, the submitted text is analyzed and special feedback is given to the students so that they can try to correct the misspelled words themselves. The teachers as well as the parents are benefiting from the analysis and exercises suggested by the system. Findings A recent study showed the efficiency of the system in form of an improvement of the students’ orthographic skills. Over a period of four months 70 percent of the students achieved a significant reduction of their spelling mistakes. Originality/value IDeRBlog is an innovative approach to improving orthography skills combining blogging and new media with writing and practice.

Specific Exceptions Driving Variation: The Role of Orthography in Modern Hebrew Spirantization

This paper reports results from a production experiment examining the patterns of variation in the morphophonemic alternations present in spirantization in Modern Hebrew, a phenomenon to which there are many exceptions and diverse levels of variation. Real and nonce verbs were used to elicit variation in a sentence completion task as a follow-up to a perception experiment (Temkin Martínez 2010) which found gradient levels of acceptability in variation due to the presence of exceptionality. The diverse patterns of variation indicate that not all exceptions affect the same level of variation in alternation. Results of the current study suggest that levels of gradience are linked to the presence or absence of multiple orthographic representations for each of the segments involved. An Optimality Theoretic (OT) account modifying a combined model of set-indexation (Pater 2000) and Stochastic OT (Boersma 1998; Boersma & Hayes 2001; Hayes & Londe 2006; Hayes & MacEachern 1998; Zuraw 2000) presented in Temkin Martínez (2010) is provided to account for the alternation patterns in nonce verbs.

The role of orthography in oral vocabulary learning in Chinese children

Previous research has shown that the presence of English word spellings facilitates children’s oral vocabulary learning. Whether a similar orthographic facilitation effect may exist in Chinese is interesting but not intuitively obvious due to the character writing system representing morphosyllabic but not phoneme-size information, and the more direct semantic-orthography mapping but less consistent orthography and pronunciation correspondence in Chinese. The current study aims to examine whether semantic and phonological information provided by character radicals affects oral vocabulary learning of Chinese children. Twenty-four second graders studied made-up associations between 12 spoken labels and pictures accompanied either by accurate phonological information characters, misleading phonological information characters, or no orthography. Half of phonologically accurate or misleading characters were semantically accurate or misleading. Pictures prompted recall of spoken labels without orthography present on tests. Results showed that exposure to characters which accurately represent sounds and meanings during learning did not enhance recall of the spoken labels compared to no orthography in early trials. But exposure to characters, which misrepresent sounds and meanings, significantly impeded vocabulary learning compared to no orthography.

Connections between Fingerspelling and Print: The Impact of Working Memory and Temporal Dynamics on Lexical Activation

Recently there has been a renewed interest in characterizing the role of fingerspelling for deaf readers. The present study takes a step back and creates a theoretical foundation for investigating similarities between fingerspelling and print decoding in hearing signers. In this way, we can probe the constraints of temporal processing and memory on L1 orthography and the processing of L2 fingerspelling. Using a cross-modal priming paradigm, the role of orthography and phonology in print and fingerspelling word recognition was investigated. Results indicate significant inhibition in target retrieval when the prime was fingerspelled but not when it was presented in print. It was hypothesized that inhibition was due to either recoding or prime temporal dynamics. Hearing nonsigners were tested with serially or simultaneously presented print to determine the role of recoding and temporal dynamics. The results suggest that: (1) difficulties in processing fingerspelling for L2 learners might arise from recoding back into an L1 orthographic representation; (2) working memory abilities may reduce inhibition caused by recoding in L2 learners; (3) serial presentation of an orthographic code, either manual or visual, reduces priming effects; and (4) letter position differences provide evidence of depletion of activation over time.

The influence of spelling on the production and storage of words with allophonic variants of /h/ in Korean

ABSTRACTThis study examined the role of orthography in the production and storage of spoken words. Korean speakers learned novel Korean words with potential variants of /h/, including [ɦ] and ø. They were provided with the same auditory stimuli but with varying exposure to spelling. One group was presented with the letter for ø (<ㅇ>), the second group, the letter for [ɦ] (<ㅎ>), and the third group, auditory input only. In picture-naming tasks, the participants presented with <ㅇ> produced fewer words with [ɦ] than those presented with <ㅎ>. In a spelling recall task, the participants who were not exposed to spelling displayed various types of spellings for variants, but after exposure to spelling, they began to produce spellings as provided in the task. These results suggest that orthographic information influences the production of words via an offline restructuring of the phonological representation.

Cross-language activation of morphological relatives in cognates: the role of orthographic overlap and task-related processing.

We considered the role of orthography and task-related processing mechanisms in the activation of morphologically related complex words during bilingual word processing. So far, it has only been shown that such morphologically related words (i.e., morphological family members) are activated through the semantic and morphological overlap they share with the target word. In this study, we investigated family size effects in Dutch-English identical cognates (e.g., tent in both languages), non-identical cognates (e.g., pil and pill, in English and Dutch, respectively), and non-cognates (e.g., chicken in English). Because of their cross-linguistic overlap in orthography, reading a cognate can result in activation of family members both languages. Cognates are therefore well-suited for studying mechanisms underlying bilingual activation of morphologically complex words. We investigated family size effects in an English lexical decision task and a Dutch-English language decision task, both performed by Dutch-English bilinguals. English lexical decision showed a facilitatory effect of English and Dutch family size on the processing of English-Dutch cognates relative to English non-cognates. These family size effects were not dependent on cognate type. In contrast, for language decision, in which a bilingual context is created, Dutch and English family size effects were inhibitory. Here, the combined family size of both languages turned out to better predict reaction time than the separate family size in Dutch or English. Moreover, the combined family size interacted with cognate type: the response to identical cognates was slowed by morphological family members in both languages. We conclude that (1) family size effects are sensitive to the task performed on the lexical items, and (2) depend on both semantic and formal aspects of bilingual word processing. We discuss various mechanisms that can explain the observed family size effects in a spreading activation framework.

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.

The implication of spelling and frequency in the recognition of phonological variants: evidence from pre-readers and readers

Hearing a reduced variant of a word seems to delay access to the representation of this word. One hypothesis explaining the precedence of full variants over reduced ones is that they correspond to the orthographic form of the word. In this study, we examined the role of orthography on the processing of variants resulting from schwa deletion in French. In a word-monitoring experiment, we compared the performance of pre-readers and readers on two word types. For words whose schwa variants are more frequent and correspond to the words' spelling, schwa variants were recognised with shorter reaction times by both pre-readers and readers. For words whose schwa variants are less frequent but correspond to the words' spelling, non-schwa variants were recognised faster than schwa variants by pre-readers, whereas there was no difference between the two variants for readers. Taken together these results suggest that the recognition of phonological variants changes when children learn to read, highlighting the crucial role of spelling in the processing of phonological variation.

The role of orthography and phonology in English: An ERP study on first and second language reading aloud

This study investigated the role of orthographic and phonological information in reading aloud. Dutch-English bilinguals (L2) and native English (L1) participants read aloud English words. The contribution of orthographic and phonological activation was distinguished with prime manipulation. Phonological overlap, but not orthographic overlap, facilitated the response latencies for both English L1 and L2 speakers. In contrast, event-related brain potentials also revealed orthographic priming for both groups. Altogether, the present results demonstrate that late L2 speakers exhibit a Masked Onset Priming Effect similar to that of native speakers. In addition, the ERP results revealed that orthographic information is activated earlier during reading, but is not detectable anymore at the behavioral response level when the task is reading aloud.

PL2 production of english word-final consonants: the role of orthography and learner profile variables

The present study investigates some factors affecting the acquisition of second language (L2) phonology by learners with considerable exposure to the target language in an L2 context. More specifically, the purpose of the study is two-fold: (a) to investigate the extent to which participants resort to phonological processes resulting from the transfer of L1 sound-spelling correspondence into the L2 when pronouncing English word-final consonants; and (b) to examine the relationship between rate of transfer and learner profile factors, namely proficiency level, length of residence in the L2 country, age of arrival in the L2 country, education, chronological age, use of English with native speakers, attendance in EFL courses, and formal education. The investigation involved 31 Brazilian speakers living in the United States with diverse profiles. Data were collected using a questionnaire to elicit the participants' profiles, a sentence-reading test (pronunciation measure), and an oral picture-description test (L2 proficiency measure). The results indicate that even in an L2 context, the transfer of L1 sound-spelling correspondence to the production of L2 word-final consonants is frequent. The findings also reveal that extensive exposure to rich L2 input leads to the development of proficiency and improves production of L2 word-final consonants.