Cumulative effects of phonetic context on speech perception

18th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, 10-14 Aug 2015, SECC, Glasgow, Scotland, UK2015-2016 > Academic research: refereed > Refereed conference paperVersion of RecordPublishe

Effects of two teaching methods of connected speech in a Polish EFL classroom

The results demonstrate that in general, NF proved more effective than NNF. With regard to individual processes of connected speech, NF was more effective in production, whereas no such effect was found for perception

Computing phonological generalization over real speech exemplars

Though it has attracted growing attention from phonologists and phoneticians Exemplar Theory (e g Bybee 2001) has hitherto lacked an explicit production model that can apply to speech signals An adequate model must be able to generalize but this presents the problem of how to generate an output that generalizes over a collection of unique variable-length signals Rather than resorting to a priori phonological units such as phones we adopt a dynamic programming approach using an optimization criterion that is sensitive to the frequency of similar subsequences within other exemplars the Phonological Exemplar-Based Learning System We show that PEBLS displays pattern-entrenchment behaviour central to Exemplar Theory s account of phonologization (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserve

Perception of nonnative tonal contrasts by Mandarin-English and English-Mandarin sequential bilinguals

This study examined the role of acquisition order and crosslinguistic similarity in influencing transfer at the initial stage of perceptually acquiring a tonal third language (L3). Perception of tones in Yoruba and Thai was tested in adult sequential bilinguals representing three different first (L1) and second language (L2) backgrounds: L1 Mandarin-L2 English (MEBs), L1 English-L2 Mandarin (EMBs), and L1 English-L2 intonational/non-tonal (EIBs). MEBs outperformed EMBs and EIBs in discriminating L3 tonal contrasts in both languages, while EMBs showed a small advantage over EIBs on Yoruba. All groups showed better overall discrimination in Thai than Yoruba, but group differences were more robust in Yoruba. MEBs’ and EMBs’ poor discrimination of certain L3 contrasts was further reflected in the L3 tones being perceived as similar to the same Mandarin tone; however, EIBs, with no knowledge of Mandarin, showed many of the same similarity judgments. These findings thus suggest that L1 tonal experience has a particularly facilitative effect in L3 tone perception, but there is also a facilitative effect of L2 tonal experience. Further, crosslinguistic perceptual similarity between L1/L2 and L3 tones, as well as acoustic similarity between different L3 tones, play a significant role at this early stage of L3 tone acquisition.Published versio

Coalescent Assimilation Across Wordboundaries in American English and in Polish English

Coalescent assimilation (CA), where alveolar obstruents /t, d, s, z/ in word-final position merge with word-initial /j/ to produce postalveolar /tʃ, dʒ, ʃ, ʒ/, is one of the most wellknown connected speech processes in English. Due to its commonness, CA has been discussed in numerous textbook descriptions of English pronunciation, and yet, upon comparing them it is difficult to get a clear picture of what factors make its application likely. This paper aims to investigate the application of CA in American English to see a) what factors increase the likelihood of its application for each of the four alveolar obstruents, and b) what is the allophonic realization of plosives /t, d/ if the CA does not apply. To do so, the Buckeye Corpus (Pitt et al. 2007) of spoken American English is analyzed quantitatively. As a second step, these results are compared with Polish English; statistics analogous to the ones listed above for American English are gathered for Polish English based on the PLEC corpus (Pęzik 2012). The last section focuses on what consequences for teaching based on a native speaker model the findings have. It is argued that a description of the phenomenon that reflects the behavior of speakers of American English more accurately than extant textbook accounts could be beneficial to the acquisition of these patterns

Native Speaker Perceptions of Accented Speech: The English Pronunciation of Macedonian EFL Learners

The paper reports on the results of a study that aimed to describe the vocalic and consonantal features of the English pronunciation of Macedonian EFL learners as perceived by native speakers of English and to find out whether native speakers who speak different standard variants of English perceive the same segments as non-native. A specially designed computer web application was employed to gather two types of data: a) quantitative (frequency of segment variables and global foreign accent ratings on a 5-point scale), and b) qualitative (open-ended questions). The result analysis points out to three most frequent markers of foreign accent in the English speech of Macedonian EFL learners: final obstruent devoicing, vowel shortening and substitution of English dental fricatives with Macedonian dental plosives. It also reflects additional phonetic aspects poorly explained in the available reference literature such as allophonic distributional differences between the two languages and intonational mismatch

Speech rhythm: a metaphor?

Is speech rhythmic? In the absence of evidence for a traditional view that languages strive to coordinate either syllables or stress-feet with regular time intervals, we consider the alternative that languages exhibit contrastive rhythm subsisting merely in the alternation of stronger and weaker elements. This is initially plausible, particularly for languages with a steep ‘prominence gradient’, i.e. a large disparity between stronger and weaker elements; but we point out that alternation is poorly achieved even by a ‘stress-timed’ language such as English, and, historically, languages have conspicuously failed to adopt simple phonological remedies that would ensure alternation. Languages seem more concerned to allow ‘syntagmatic contrast’ between successive units and to use durational effects to support linguistic functions than to facilitate rhythm. Furthermore, some languages (e.g. Tamil, Korean) lack the lexical prominence which would most straightforwardly underpin prominence alternation. We conclude that speech is not incontestibly rhythmic, and may even be antirhythmic. However, its linguistic structure and patterning allow the metaphorical extension of rhythm in varying degrees and in different ways depending on the language, and that it is this analogical process which allows speech to be matched to external rhythms

Phonetic drift

This chapter provides an overview of research on the phonetic changes that occur in one’s native language (L1) due to recent experience in another language (L2), a phenomenon known as phonetic drift. Through a survey of empirical findings on segmental and suprasegmental acoustic properties, the chapter examines the features of the L1 that are subject to phonetic drift, the cognitive mechanism(s) behind phonetic drift, and the various factors that influence the likelihood of phonetic drift. In short, virtually all aspects of L1 speech are subject to drift, but different aspects do not drift in the same manner, possibly due to multiple routes of L2 influence coexisting at different levels of L1 phonological structure. In addition to the timescale of these changes, the chapter discusses the relationship between phonetic drift and attrition as well as some of the enduring questions in this area.https://drive.google.com/open?id=1eQbh17Z4YsH8vY_XjCHGqi5QChfBKcAZhttps://drive.google.com/open?id=1eQbh17Z4YsH8vY_XjCHGqi5QChfBKcAZhttps://drive.google.com/open?id=1eQbh17Z4YsH8vY_XjCHGqi5QChfBKcAZAccepted manuscriptAccepted manuscrip