Voicing contrast of L2 final stops: A case study on ESL learners from Saudi
Abstract
Previous research in L2 perception has shown limited and diverge findings for final stop voicing contrasts by learners with different L1 backgrounds in comparison to natives of the target language. This paper aimed to investigate L2 learners’ perceptual identification of voicing in English final stops based on the duration of succeeding vowel, and the impact of prior linguistic expertise in establishing L2 phonetic category as learners’ level of proficiency develop. The subjects were adult Arabic L2 learners (N = 9) with different proficiency levels (advance, intermediate, & beginners). The subjects' performance was later compared to controlled native English group (N = 3). Data were elicited through listening to stimuli in one task that contained three controlled conditions and one test condition. The analysis employed descriptive statistics, and one-way ANOVA. The findings showed that as the subjects' proficiency level developed, their accuracy in identifying final stops voicing increase. It also showed the possibility of establishing L2 phonetic category that seemed developed in correspond to the development of L2 proficiency level. The results illustrate the systematic processing of L2 sounds which have implications for theories in L2 perception.Â
Keywords
Full Text:
PDFReferences
Al-Ani, S. (1970). Arabic Phonology: an acoustical and phonological investigation. The Hague, Paris: Mouton de Gruyter publisher.
Aljaser, F, Jackson, T. K., Vitevitch, M. S. & Joan A. S. (2018). The influence of phonem inventory on elicited speech error in Arabic speakers of English. The Mental Lexicon. 13, 26-37.
Al Malwi, M. I. (2017). The effect of gender and age on voice onset time by Abah Arabic speaker. (Unpublished master’s thesis) California State University, USA.
Alotaibi, A. (2013). Pronunciation Problem in the production of the voiced labiodental fricative /v/ by Saudi speaker of English. (Unpublished master’s thesis). Southern Illinois University Carbondale, Carbondale, Illinois,USA.
Alotaibi, A. (2018). The role of native language dialects on the perception of L2 English vowels. (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Indiana University at Bloomington, USA.
Best, C. (1995). A direct realist perspectives on cross-language speech perception. In W. Strange (Ed.), Speech perception and linguistic experience: Issues in cross-Language research (pp. 171-206). Timonium, MD: York Press.
Boeirsma, P.& Wenink, D. (2017). Praat: doing phonetic by computer [Computer program]. Version 6.0.28, retrieved 23 March 2017 from http://www.praat.org/
Buali, I. (2010). The Perception and Production of /p/ in Saudi Gulf Arabic English: A Variationists Perspectives. (Unpublished master’s thesis).
Concordia University Montréal, Québec, Canada.
Charles, L. J. (1985). Word-final devoicing in German: Effect of phonetic and sentential contexts. Journal of Phonetics, 13, 309–324.
Chen, M. (1970). Vowel length variations as a function of the voicing of the consonants environment. Phonetica, 22, 129-159.
Darcy, I., & Krüger, F. (2012). Vowel perception and production in Turkish children acquiring L2 German. Journal of Phonetic, 40, 568-581.
Flege, J. E. & Eefting, W. (1987). Production and perception of English stop by native Spanish speakers. Journal of Phonetics 15, 67-83.
Flege, J. E. (1979). Phonetic interferences in second language acquisition (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Indiana University, Bloomington.
Flege, J. E. (1980). Phonetic approximations in second language acquisition. Language Learning 30, 117-134.
Flege, J. E., Hllengbrand, J., Ingrisano, R., Smth, B., (1984). Perception of the voiced voiceless contrasts in syllable-final stops. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 76, 18–26.
Flege, J. E., McCutcheon, M. & Smith, S. (1987). The development of skills in producing word-final English stop. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 82 (2), 433-447.
Flege, J. E. & Port, R. (1981). Cross-language phonetic interferences: Arabic to English. Language and Speech 24, 125-146.
Flege, J. E. (1995). Second language speech learning: Theory, finding, and problems. In W. Strange (Ed.), Speech perception and linguistic experience: Issues in cross-language research (pp. 233-276). Timonium, MD: York Press.
Flege, J. E., Munro, J., & MacKay, I. (1995b). Effect of age of second-language learning on the production of English consonants. Speech Communication, 16, 1-26.
Fokes, J., Bond, Z. & Steinberg, M. (1985) Acquisition of the English voicing contrast by Arab children, Language and Speech, 28, 81-91.
Genesee, F. (1989). Early bilinguals development: One language or two?. Journal of Child Language, 16, 161-179.
Hazan, V. L. & Boulakia, G. (1993). Perception and production of a voicing
contrasts by French-English bilingual. Language and Speech, 36 (1), 17–38.
Hogan, J. T., and Rozsypal, A. J. (1980). Evaluation of vowel duration as a cue for the voicing distinction in the following word-final consonants. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 67, 1764–1771.
Kuhl, P. (2000). A new view of language acquisition. Proceeding of the National Academy of Science 97, 11850-11857.
Krause, S. (1982). “Developmental use of vowel duration as a cue to postvocalic stops consonant voicing. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 25, 388-393.
Ladefoged, P. (2006). A course in phonetic (5th ed.). Boston: Thomson Wadsworth.
Lehman, M., and Sharf, D. (1989). “Perception∕production relationship in the development of the vowel duration cue to final consonant voicing. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 32, 803–815.
Mack, M. (1982). Voicing-dependent vowel durations in English and French: monolingual and bilingual production. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 71, 173-78.
Major, R. (1987). The natural phonology of second language acquisition. In James, A. and Leather, J. (Eds.), Sound patterns in second language acquisition, (pp.207-224). Dordrecht Holland: Foris Publications.
McAllister, R., Flege, J, & Piske, T (2002). The influence of the L1 on the acquisition of Swedish vowel quantity by native speaker of Spanish, English, and Estonian. Journal of Phonetic, 30, 229-258.
Mayo, C., & Turk, A. (2004). Adult–child differences in acoustics cue weighting are influenced by segmental context: Children are not always perceptually biased toward transitions. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 115, 3184–3194.
Mora, J. C. (2007). Learning context effects on the acquisition of a second language phonology. In C.Pérez-Vidal, M. Juan-Garau, & A. Bel (Eds.), A portrait of the young in the new multilingual Spain (pp. 241-263). Clevedon: Multilingual Matter.
Ohde, R. N., & Abou-Khalil, R. (2001). Age differences for stops consonant and vowel perception in adults. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 110, 2156– 2166.
Port, R., Al-Ani, S. & Maeda, S. (1980). Temporal compensations and universal phonetics. Phonetica, 37, 235-252.
Smith, B., Hayes-Harb, R., Bruss, M., & Harker, A. (2009). Production and perception of voicing and devoicing in similar German and English word pair by native speakers of German. Journal of Phonetics, 37, 257–275.
Trofimovich, P. (2008). What do second language listener know about spoken words? Effects of experience and attention in spoken word processing. Journal of Psycholinguistic Research, 37, 309–329.
Watson, J. C. (2002). The Phonology and Morphology of Arabic. Oxford
University Press Inc. New York.
Zampini, M. L. & Green, K. P. (2001). The voicing contrasts in English and Spanish: the relationship between perception and production. In Nicol, J. L. (Ed.), One mind, two languages (pp. 23–48). Oxford: Blackwell.
Refbacks
- There are currently no refbacks.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
ISSN 1305-578X (Online)
Copyright © 2005-2022 by Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies